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Jan and his wife, Souad,
are raising their two young daughters in Manchester, England. What
makes this family unique is their multilingual home – where four
languages are being taught simultaneously! While French, German,
Arabic and English co-existing in one family may seem chaotic, Jan
and his wife convey the relaxed, orderly vibe of both their home and
teaching methods on their blog
Babelkid.
1. How did you decide to
raise your children multilingual? Was it an obvious choice for your
family?
[Jan] Souad and I speak French which is
not my mother tongue, and we live in the UK, a “foreign language”
environment for both of us. So yes, I would say it was an obvious
choice for us.
[Souad] I grew up in Algeria, and left
home when I was 22. Arabic is my mother tongue, though French comes
a close second. It never occurred to me to speak to my children in a
language that was not mine.
2. You are obviously
proponents of raising multilingual children, and have done your
research. Even still, a family teaching its children four languages
simultaneously isn’t common. Have there ever been moments when
you’ve been worried and thought “Uh-oh, have we bit off more than we
can chew”?
[J] I am not a person who worries a
lot. I do expect our kids to drop some of their languages from their
active repertoire at some point, but I also expect them to be able
to pick them back up easily if necessary.
[S] I do not see us as “teaching”
languages to our children. I see it more like passing a piece of
what makes us who we are. For me, it is about connecting with my
children in an honest and open way. I feel different in each
language, and I feel I want to be the original me when interacting
with my children. It is funny that I do not feel the need to
communicate at this level with Jan. Perhaps it is different with
grown-ups. When we meet adults, our personality is already formed,
and language is an integral part of it.
Of course I have doubts; what if they
never master any language properly? What if they never feel they
have a mother tongue? But then, I just can't bring myself to doing
it any different, even if I tried.
3. On your site, you give
your readers a glimpse into the progress of your two daughters
(referred to on the blog as the Babelkids - BK1 and BK2 for short).
Has watching your girls learn four languages simultaneously given
you an insight into how humans learn language, or how a child’s mind
develops?
[J] Definitely! Especially the way they
mix and match reflects how they think. For me, the way that my
personality depends on the language I speak is another very
interesting aspect which I intend to monitor over the years.
[S] We have some fantastic “Ah, that's
why...” moments, for example realising that different languages
occupy different areas in the brain; for children it seems all
languages hover next to each other ready to intertwine to produce
the funniest and cleverest mixes!
4. Your eldest daughter BK1
once said “Ich got meine robe getachet” (I stained my dress), which
is a sentence that contains English, French, and German – and you
noted she conjugated the French verb ‘tacher’ perfectly in the
German way! Often monolingual individuals will communicate with
perfect grammar in their native tongue, but may not have a strong
understanding of the underlying grammatical rules or structure. Do
you think learning multiple languages perhaps forces BK1 to think
more critically about grammar?
[S] This is a possibility indeed, to be
honest we have not looked this far ahead yet. Now that you mention
it, I am amazed to notice that BK1 is able to conjugate French verbs
intuitively, even in “subjonctif” which eludes most adult
French-learners.
Another area worth noting is learning
to read. BK1 is starting to read, and I have had to change certain
things I do. I used to translate English books into French on the
fly while reading to her. However, I have now decided to read each
book in its language, so as not to hamper her pattern recognition.
The result has been us spending a bit of money to diversify the
girls' book stock.
5. You mention, though BK1
sometimes struggles, how it seems learning multiple languages makes
her more resourceful linguistically. Is this something you expected
to encounter? Does it seem that skills your children are developing
while learning multiple languages will carry over to other aspects
of their lives?
[J] I did expect her to be able to find
words more easily because she has 4 languages to choose from rather
than just one. I do that myself.
[S] These are early days, I find it
hard to project into the future. However, I am reassured by my own
experience that being exposed to more than one language from birth
must not be such a bad thing. I grew up in a culture with three
languages (Arabic, French and Berber). I have had various degrees of
fluency in these languages throughout my life. I am not sure how
much my multilingualism has helped learn other languages (English
and German), but it certainly has
normalised the idea that
children can be multilingual successfully.
6. Your youngest daughter
(BK2) is just learning to speak. Is there anything that you would do
differently with her language wise, having learned from teaching
your first daughter?
[S] Hum, interesting question. I am
trying not to mix Arabic and French as much as I have a tendency to.
Also, I definitely am more careful to read books in their original
languages.
7. Maybe this is question is
better directed to Souad (Jan’s wife and the co-contributor to
Babelkid). Souad you say that Colloquial Arabic is your mother
tongue, as is French, though you don’t like to admit it. Language is
both a powerful political symbol and an expression of personal
identity. How has the symbolism of language factored in to your
family?
[S] I see language as part of who we
are, who our ancestors are, what values were transmitted to us, what
values we decide to transmit to our children. I find it important to
know where we come from, in order to know where we are going. I am
aware that my languages are part of who I am, not necessarily of who
my children are. I am doing what feels right to me right now; it is
up to them to decide what feels right to them later. It is a bit
like transmitting our spiritual beliefs to our children; we try to
be honest and truthful with our children and allow them to advance
in life with as stable a background as possible.
When we are in Algeria, people are
surprised to hear BK1 speak a nearly perfect Arabic. Invariably, she
is expected to speak either French or English. I can't help feeling
touched – and if I admit it, proud – when she speaks Arabic to her
younger sister.
8. What are your dreams for
your daughters? Any specific ways you envisioned them benefiting
from being multilingual?
[J] I don’t have to dream to know that
it’ll enable them to communicate pretty much everywhere in Europe
and around the Mediterranean easily. I hope that it’ll help them to
immerse into all the great things Europe & the Maghreb have to
offer.
[S] I wish that my children are able to
have a critical eye on things, take some distance to events
surrounding them, and feel real empathy to people from everywhere.
Because at the end of the day, language is about connecting.
Follow Jan and Souad as
they chronicle the adventures of raising multilingual children at
Babelkid. |
