I received an interesting email and, when I was answering to it, I realized that many more people might need the same kind of orientation, so I decided to post it.
I stumbled across your site on alltop.com and I was wondering if you could provide me with any direction (reference, another website, your own personal advise etc.) on how to immerse my daughter in the Spanish language. I am not Hispanic; I do okay with the language but not fluent by far; am currently working on it (me getting better with the language; my daughter is 18 months old; I read her Spanish books, play Spanish videos and music for her. I would love to put her in an environment where the people who care for, or rather, educate her are Hispanic but have been coming up with no options. I live in Richmond Virginia (but am from NYC). My mother watches her during the day for me and I like that. I am looking into some preschool type environments for her and would love to find something that puts a high importance on foreign language.
Anyway, I feel like I'm rambling so...again, do you have any direction for me?
In California, where I live, there are plenty of options for bilingual preschools, and I believe if you have something like this in your city, you should take a look at it. Another alternative would be starting your own school, maybe a cooperative nursery school with some other interested parents and hiring a bilingual teacher.
Here are three basic steps in raising a child bilingual:
- At least one hour a day, 5 days a week, of exposure of the child to the language. You may like having the grandma watching her, and that is great that you have it, but you may think of a fluent Spanish speaking nanny that could stay at least one hour interacting with her (even under grandma's watch - that could actually mean a well deserved break for grandma during the day!) If the city where you live is not so diverse as California (where Spanish is the second language spoken) you might want to try to find foreign students willing to take on such job (you can even offer them English instruction in exchange, or as a perk - I did that once and it worked great).
- It is best if one language comes always from the same person. If the mom is the one in charge of Spanish, let daddy be the one that brings home the French. Or German. Or Japanese. Kids love to have a secret, special language shared with this one special person. Like a sort of secret code.
- Use the language in your daily activities, attaching meaningful actions and interactions to words and sentences. Books, music and video are great resources, but the best way a child learns a language (even their mother tongue) is by interaction. At the table, during meals, potty time, at the playground... Using always the same sentences, you can help your child connect the words to the facts, while experiencing the language in its alive form. Spread the hour a day throughout the day. "Buenos dias. Quieres cereales para el desayuno?" "Abra la puerta mi amor, para salirmos" "Vamos a poner la arena al balde?" (and pardon my Spanish, cos I myself am no fluent...). Repeat the same sentences, with the same intention in the daily routine, and introduce new things every once in a while, remembering to apply the new things in more sentences until they become familiar. Repetition and surprise, familiarity and novelty.