In a land like Singapore that is a melting pot of cultures, holding on to your motherland can be challenging. With families, cultures and traditions far from you, the only thing that keeps you connected to your roots is your mother tongue.
That’s why it’s considered sacred by many and something you want your next generation to learn as well. However, a melting pot of cultures would also mean that kids prefer speaking in a language that’s more engaging with peers or pop culture rather than your mother tongue. This is why parents have such a hard time getting kids to speak their native language.
Keeping the Mother Tongue Alive
But instead of giving up and letting your mother tongue fade away in the house, you need to work towards keeping it alive. This is not just for its cultural significance but because bringing up a bilingual child aids in their holistic growth.
As it turns out, learning the mother tongue in Singapore has become a part of classrooms and is associated with academic success. So children don’t need to feel disconnected from it. Instead, it’s now a part of their learning process with homework, exams and memorization.
Children avoiding the mother tongue isn’t specific to Singapore alone. Globally, children choose to shun their mother tongue and gravitate towards a more popular language as they grow older.
In many parts of the world including Singapore, this may be English.
It helps them conform easily to the social norms, while also keeping up with everything that’s popular. In contrast, your mother tongue isn’t as “cool” as one would want it to be, especially with peers. So, getting children to actively learn the mother tongue can be difficult.
Importance of Raising a Bilingual Child
Meanwhile, it's a common fact that most of the world is able to speak more than one language. As parents, we should recognise that in this day and age, you're better off being bilingual or multilingual. Children who develop the ability to speak more than one language see significant benefits socially and mentally.
Like with so many other traits and learned abilities, a child needs to develop bilingual skills early on in their development. It only gets more and more difficult to absorb the information and nuances of a language as they grow older.
Speaking multiple languages from early childhood can help your baby to learn. Studies show that bilingual children:
- find it easier to read
- learn another language easier
- settle into school without difficulty
- feel better about themselves (have high self-esteem)
- achieve better academic results
- will have more career opportunities when they are older
The thought of asking how to raise a bilingual baby will improve communication in your family and help you and your children to be a part of each other's culture.
Building A Positive Attitude Towards The Mother Tongue
To raise a bilingual child, parents need to understand the psyche of the little one and then build on the idea of learning the mother tongue.
- Instead of counting the benefits of being bilingual that would help them as adults, talk to them about the benefits they get today.
- Once your child realises how learning the native tongue will help them do better academically, they will be more inclined towards actively participating in the learning process.
- Once it becomes a part of their personal goals, kids are self-motivated to learn the language even if its use will be limited for now.
A Special Connection With Your Mother Tongue Teacher
Kids who’ve opted for learning their mother tongue are bound to build a special connection with their teacher. Speaking in a different language, learning the culture, songs and games help create a special bond.
Moreover, children also build a special connection with their grandparents who would probably be their sole connection to the heritage language outside of the classroom.
Every child has a different connection with their mother tongue. Parents will need to watch out for distinctive points that their child relates with when it comes to building that connection with the language.
It can actually build an emotional bond within the family and offer the right motivation to your child to pursue learning the mother tongue more actively.
You also need to make it a point to speak the mother tongue than just learning it in school. And that effort needs to come from parents even if the child insists on speaking in English at home. Children who speak the mother tongue fare better with bilingualism. Parents too need to understand this is a long and gradual process, so patience is key.
Bringing Up A Bilingual Child in a Monolingual or Bilingual Household
Before you enrol your child to learn their mother tongue, ask yourself why you want them to do it.
- Do you want to achieve a high PSLE score?
- Do you want your child to move back to your country?
- Is it because you want your child to keep in contact with the extended family?
- Or because you want to keep the culture alive?
Understanding and acknowledging your goals will help you as a family to direct efforts and resources towards bringing up a bilingual child.
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Raising A Bilingual Child: Be Prepared For Resistance
Children may learn the mother tongue at the parents’ behest but could drop it at the first given opportunity. This is particularly true in case of academic stress or if the child is inclined towards learning another language altogether.
In families too, this may the reason for friction and can create a tense situation. But the amazing part is the fact that our brain does not really forget a language.
For kids who’ve learnt it at a young age, it’ll be easy to pick it back up as adults even when they do not have practice or any memory of it.
7 Tips on How to Support Bilingualism in Early Childhood
The world is undeniably globalised and diverse, and the ability to speak more than one language is an interesting trait. Moreover, bilingualism confers social, economic, and intellectual advantages.
If as parents you believe the sentiment of wanting to raise a bilingual baby, PsychologyToday.com presented these 7 evidence-based suggestions.
While some of these strategies are mostly applicable to bilingual households, others will be useful even in a monolingual household.
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Increasing language quantity
The amount of linguistic input your baby receives in each of their languages translates to vocabulary and grammatical development. The richer the input, the higher the possibility of successful language acquisition.
For example, your baby hearing lots of words may result to them having a wider vocabulary. A parent speaking two languages to their baby might also influence them.
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Increase language quality
The quality of language input can also affect your baby’s language outcomes. For example, reading books to children supports language development, while language exposure via TV does not.
Low-quality TV exposure has significant relevance to bilingual children with lower vocabulary scores. In other words, make time for more face time and choose educational or high-quality children’s TV or media.
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Enlist the help of family and friends
Variability in language input is another key strategy on how to raise your baby to become bilingual. Your baby’s regular exposure to different speakers of two languages may advance to bilingual proficiency.
Letting your baby interact with extended family members and friends who speak the other language is beneficial for their development.
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Choose a strategy on how to raise your baby to be bilingual
There are various ways how to raise your baby to be bilingual, depending on the household. There is no single approach that can be the best in raising a bilingual baby but there are several approaches that support bilingual development.
For example, you may stick to the “one person one language” approach, commonly used by two parents speaking different languages.
In other usual approaches, a baby learns a language in a monolingual household and goes to school after years of learning another language.
Another strategy that you may try is speaking a different language each day of the week.
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Consider a bilingual education
During early development, there might be an option of providing bilingual childcare. In this approach, you may use babysitters or caregivers who speak another language to help you raise your bilingual baby.
Once your baby reaches school age, consider schools that teach content classes in two different languages.
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Let your child lead the way
Pay attention to the cues from your baby and follow their interests. Language development milestone is most successful when children interact with attentive and sensitive parents. A baby is more likely to learn new words when their parents focus on their objects of interest instead of what interests the parents.
This is how you can raise your bilingual baby with a higher chance of acquiring the languages successfully.
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Educate yourself on how to raise your baby to be bilingual
As parents with a bilingual baby, you need to learn more about bilingualism yourself. There are many misconceptions about the idea of raising a bilingual child.
For example, there are myths that bilingualism may result in language disorders and learning disabilities. Or that a bilingual child gets confused when he hears more than one language.
But today, many studies have debunked these myths. Bilingual children achieved important language milestones at the same rate as monolingual children.
Additionally, to let and support your bilingual baby to fully acquire more than one language, it should always start from home. A monolingual household must consider raising a bilingual baby and supports bilingualism in early childhood development.
Raising children in a multilingual home can be a challenging task if not addressed properly. It requires a lot of strategies, planning, and careful adherence to your long-term goals. Not to worry, as being bilingual will teach your child to enjoy different cultures but also having a special spot for your mother tongue.
There are a number of mental and social benefits to raising a child who can speak a multitude of languages. So, it’s always important for parents to consider teaching their children at a young age and sticking to their plans.