{"id":3724,"date":"2014-10-01T14:41:27","date_gmt":"2014-10-01T12:41:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rickzullo.com\/?p=3724"},"modified":"2018-06-01T21:38:11","modified_gmt":"2018-06-01T19:38:11","slug":"teaching-our-child-to-be-bilingual","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/teaching-our-child-to-be-bilingual\/","title":{"rendered":"Teaching our child to be bilingual"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"teachingMy little principessa<\/em> turned one year-old recently, and this is a great time for being a parent. She\u2019s discovering the world, learning to walk, and saying her first words.\u00a0 It would not be an understatement to say that hearing her call me, \u201cDa-da\u201d for the first time was the best moment of my life so far.\u00a0 However, it comes with a little anxiety, too.\u00a0 She\u2019s learning English and Italian at the same time, and I can\u2019t help but feel a little guilty about intentionally causing all this confusion in her developing brain.\u00a0 I tell her \u201cshoe,\u201d and Jessica tells her, \u201cscarpa.\u201d\u00a0 Poor thing.<\/p>\n

My wife and I have both been language teachers, so you\u2019d think that teaching our child to be bilingual would be an easy task.\u00a0 The obvious fact is, it\u2019s not the same thing teaching a language to an infant as it is to an adult.\u00a0 In some ways, it\u2019s easier\u2026at least for our \u201cstudent,\u201d who has no blocks and no preconceived notions of grammar rules or pronunciation.\u00a0 For the teachers, however, how do you \u201cexplain\u201d something to a little person who has none of your linguistic reference points?<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"teaching<\/a>
She’s changing the passwords on all my bank accounts.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Of course, I can\u2019t remember back to when I was learning English as my first language, but I do remember when I first started learning Italian about 7-8 years ago.\u00a0 After a few useless lessons at the community college, I did a very smart thing and bought a software program.\u00a0 The reason I mention this is because a good software program mimics the way we acquired our first language by using a combination of verbal and visual cues to connect the physical world to the corresponding words.\u00a0 (They all work in about the same way, but the one I currently use is Rocket Languages<\/a> because I like the interface and the price is better than that more \u201cfamous\u201d brand.)<\/p>\n

So that\u2019s what we\u2019re doing in teaching our child to be bilingual: building vocabulary by showing her an object and then telling her the word.\u00a0 Right now her 12-word vocabulary consists of about 8 Italian nouns and 4 English ones.\u00a0 Sooner or later, the verbs start to emerge without even trying.\u00a0 (\u201cWalk to Daddy! Or: \u201cMangia la pappa!\u201d)\u00a0 And now we\u2019re slowly introducing short sentences to start building her overall communication ability.\u00a0 At least I am starting slow\u2014Jessica has already begun to teach her the opening canto to The Divine Comedy<\/em>.\u00a0 Funny thing is, I think she\u2019s actually getting it.<\/p>\n

\"my
Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Let\u2019s also remember that speaking a second language is not exactly the same thing as being bilingual.\u00a0 I speak Italian, but it will always be a second<\/em> language, unnatural to me.\u00a0 English will always<\/em> be the default language of my thoughts, dreams, and colorful expletives, no matter how long I stay in Italy.\u00a0 I can say that I speak two languages, but I can\u2019t claim to be bilingual.\u00a0 A subtle but important difference.<\/p>\n

When a child grows up speaking both languages in the house, they are able to switch back and forth effortlessly; within the same conversation and even the same sentence without thinking or making mistakes.\u00a0 They\u2019ll have the full repertoire of idiomatic expressions and no detectable accents.\u00a0 Some scientists claim that, in theory, the child will unconsciously select one as their primary language.\u00a0 But even if this is true, the listener will not be able to identify which one it is.<\/p>\n

Case in point, when our daughter says \u201cmamma,\u201d she pronounces the double M very distinctly, just like an Italian would.\u00a0 In English (and Spanish) the word is written and pronounced with only one M, \u201cmama,\u201d and I still make this mistake occasionally.\u00a0 Demetra does not.<\/p>\n

Perhaps you detect a note of panic in my tone.\u00a0 Well, you\u2019re right.\u00a0 I know that my days are numbered when I can claim to speak better Italian than my daughter.\u00a0 I\u2019ve gone back to the software and to my university text books in the hopes of perfecting my usage of the passato remoto<\/em> verb form before Demetra beats me to it.\u00a0 Especially since she\u2019s Sicilian, and they use this form over the passato prossimo<\/em> almost exclusively.\u00a0 Which leads me to another point\u2026.<\/p>\n

U Sicilianu<\/h1>\n

Then there\u2019s the third language in our house: Sicilian.\u00a0 This summer we spent about six weeks with Jessica\u2019s family in Sicily.\u00a0 And while they all speak perfect Italian, they can\u2019t help slipping in the occasional word or phrase of Sicilian when the situation calls for something more nuanced and precise than exists in the standard language.\u00a0 I tried my best to pick up some of it, but I have a hard enough time with Italian.<\/p>\n

Demetra already says, \u201cbedda,\u201d instead of \u201cbella,\u201d although that\u2019s probably due more to her limited pronunciation skills at just 13 months old; \u201cD\u201d is much easier than \u201cL\u201d for her at this point.\u00a0 But I envision the day when this language, Sicilian, will be \u201ctheir\u201d language, a secret code shared between mother and daughter when they don\u2019t want daddy to know what they\u2019re talking about\u2014such as the credit card bill.\u00a0 Minchia!<\/em><\/p>\n

Full Immersion<\/h1>\n

So as I mentioned earlier, the second best way to learn Italian is with a good software program<\/a>.\u00a0 But of course there\u2019s no substitution for full immersion.\u00a0 I recently came across a language course in Molise that caught my attention.\u00a0 At first, it caught my attention because it\u2019s in Molise, which is where my great-grandparents came from.\u00a0 As I looked into it further, it struck me as a beautiful way to combine a holiday with language learning. \u00a0They offer cooking classes, visits to artisan workshops, and all the other activities designed to deepen your knowledge of the culture, as well as the language.\u00a0 Indeed, you can\u2019t really call it immersion if you\u2019re stuck in a classroom all day.<\/p>\n

The place is called Learning and Living Italian<\/a>, and it\u2019s tucked into the medieval village of Agnone, equidistant from Rome and Naples (about 3 hours).\u00a0 In summer, the town \u201cswells\u201d from its winter population of 5,000 to almost 10,000 when family members flock home to the cooler air of the mountains.\u00a0 Quiet, secluded, the perfect place to settle in and absorb your surroundings.<\/p>\n

\"Agnone
Agnone in Molise<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Now, I haven\u2019t visited the school yet\u2014although they invited me to come for the sagra<\/em> in my grandparents\u2019 village next summer.\u00a0 I have, however, been to Molise, I can I can promise you that this is about as far off the beaten path as you can get.\u00a0 People always want to find \u201cthe authentic Italy,\u201d or \u201cthe hidden Italy,\u201d or discover non-touristy areas.\u00a0 Well, in this part of Molise, you\u2019ll be forced to speak Italian because other than your teachers, you\u2019re not going to find a lot of people who can speak English.\u00a0 Full immersion, that\u2019s what you signed up for, right? It\u2019s not only the best way to learn Italian, it\u2019s also the most fun.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, check out my quick and dirty email course to get you started on your language learning journey. Ciao!<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My little principessa turned one year-old recently, and this is a great time for being a parent. She\u2019s discovering the world, learning to walk, and saying her first words.\u00a0 It would not be an understatement to say that hearing her call me, \u201cDa-da\u201d for the first time was the best moment of my life so […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3727,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,6],"tags":[293,35,84,34],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3724"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3724"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3724\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3724"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rickzullo.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}