Shannon, Whoa, that's a good question. All the studies I've read about teaching a child two languages say that the child will "pick up" English on the "outside".....I would encourage you to continue speaking to him in Spanish, but you should also increase his English exposure time. This might be hard to do where you are, but essentially, you are in the same boat many people are in---only they are trying to teach SPANISH, and need to increase exposure time to Spanish.
I you are moving to the states in a couple of months, just relax...your two year old WILL learn English, and will sound fluent in it since he is learning it so young. I have not written any books on this issue--just have read a lot. I would consider a joy, that your child speaks to you only in Spanish. It is yours and his language of love. Instead of trying to reverse it back to English, be glad that you two share a language that most likely, be will not rebel against, the way some older children may do (by refusing to speak a language their friends don't speak). I hope this helps Paige -----Original Message----- From: Shannon Morales [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 12, 2005 9:06 PM To: [email protected] Subject: [munchkins] Son only responds in Spanish Hello, all! I'm fairly new and have just been reading, not posting, for a few weeks now. All your postings have been very motivational and informative -- thanks! I'm a native Eng. speaking American, my husband is Peruvian, and we met, married and lived in Japan until our son turned 2. We've always done opol: me English, dh Spanish. (We didn't bother much teaching him Japanese since we knew we'd be leaving before he got too old to use it.) When we left Japan, he was just starting to talk and had a few words in Spanish but many more in English. We're spending a year in Peru now (starting last March) and ds speaks FANTASTIC Spanish now. It's been amazing watching him pick up so easily all these crazy verb conjugations that I still haven't figured out myself! I speak to him in English except when I need whoever's helping me take care of him at the time to understand what I want him to do, etc., in which case I usually just say it in Spanish instead of telling him 1st in English -- I know, not perfect but much more practical! He understands me perfectly, except of course when it's a new word or something he doesn't understand the concept of. The problem is that he always responds to me in Spanish! He does say some words in English, but isolated words and not full phrases or sentences (or any verbs at all, for that matter). Now we're getting ready to move to the States in 2 months and I need him to start speaking English (for the monolingual grandparents). But since he knows I understand him when he speaks Spanish, he doesn't want to bother saying things in English. He does understand now the difference and knows that he's going to have to speak English with his grannie because she doesn't understand Spanish. And I'm sure he'll be fine within a few weeks of arrival, but how can I get him to start responding to me in English now? Any tips would be appreciated. While I'm at it, any ammo I can get for convincing my parents that he really *will* talk well soon in English and that it will all be SO worth it once he's totally bilingual would be useful. I'm sure they're going to rail on me when he can't talk to them, so I want to be ready! Thanks in advance. Shannon Morales in Peru Yahoo! Groups Links ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Take a look at donorschoose.org, an excellent charitable web site for anyone who cares about public education! http://us.click.yahoo.com/1gzaND/8WnJAA/HwKMAA/W_NqlB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/multilingualmunchkin/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
