Raising Bilingual Kids- it’s more than words

Open air markets, street vendors yelling, buses honking, and people everywhere = home. Fresh ceviche, coke in glass bottles, dodging pothole and devouring sublimes (the best chocolate ever) = home. Well, those are reminders of home at least. I left Tacna, Perú a few years ago and one of the ways I’m sharing my legacy with our kids is through language. I am grateful to be able to stay home with our two kids and I have only spoken Spanish to them since the day they were born. When our daughter turned two, without prompting, she started speaking English and Spanish simultaneously. We now make a game of translating words back and forth from the different languages. Our son is one and he tends to favor Spanish over English. I’m confident that as he gets older, he will also master both languages.

Our purpose in raising our children in a dual-language home isn’t simply to teach them vocabulary and verb conjugation. In teaching our kids Spanish, we want them to see the world through accepting eyes. We want them to “hear” people, not language. We don’t want them to see clothes or talent; we want them to “see” people. We want them to love people, not a “type” of people. In teaching our kids another language, we desire for them to understand that there is no one right way to speak. English isn’t better and Spanish isn’t better. People are not the language they speak, the past they represent, or the job they hold. People are souls who need to be loved and accepted. Isn’t that how God treats us?

Mothers have such a powerful voice in the lives of their kids. I would encourage this motherhood group to promote other cultures to our kids and model for them curiosity and acceptance of other people groups.  This might mean checking out bilingual books from the library or watching music videos from different countries on YouTube. My husband introduced our kids to Slovakian folk music and that was great fun! They were mesmerized by the choreographed dancing and the colorful outfits. Maybe we can look up an authentic Indian dessert and have the kids help us prepare it over the weekend. If your kids are older, you could watch a movie in a different language with English subtitles. When our kids are naming a new toy or pet, maybe we could look up popular Greek names and give them some suggestions. Does your child have a favorite song? It might be fun to look up how to translate the words into sign language. If our child wants to draw, we could show them flags from different countries and see if they could copy them. If we’re planning to go out to eat, maybe we could look up an ethnic restaurant to broaden our palates? The possibilities are endless!

I would love to hear your ideas for how we can incorporate other cultures into our lives and into the world our Littles inhabit. Being bilingual really is more than just the words one speaks; it’s a way of viewing the world. ¡Gracias por pasar un ratito conimgo!