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Chapter One
Bilingualism – An Introduction
We are now living in the age of globalization, and in
that age bilingual families are no longer uncommon. The world
is getting smaller because international travel is easy and
people can live in any foreign country they want. However, as
more people go to foreign countries and meet various people
and encounter various cultures there, the more people have
become to learn and speak more than one language to
communicate with them.
That is to say more people are learning the community
language of a specific group. A “community language” is the
dominant language of the group. For example, in Japan, the
community language would be Japanese. In a closed community
with a local dialect, the community language would be that
local dialect. When someone who is a “foreigner” enters this
community (for example Japan or our pretend closed community),
then that foreigner’s native language would be defined as the
“non-community language”.
In fact most people are surprised to learn that
bilinguals outnumber monolinguals in the world. It can be
seen, for example, in African countries, most European
countries and India too. According to Joshua Fishman, a
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prolific writer on bilingual matters, “More than half of the
world’s population today uses more than one language while
engaging in the activities basic to human need.”i
The fact that over half the world’s population is
bilingual usually surprises many Europeans because they
usually think that one person speaks one language and all
speakers of that language belong to the same country. This is
a kind of narrow-minded arrogance from people who assume the
rest of the world is like them. The idea could stem from the
fact that most European’s countries were once the strongest in
the world (e.g. the U.K, France, Spain) and those languages
are spoken all over the world. There are 3000-5000 languages
in the world but only about 150 countries to fit them into.
The European monolingual idea is obviously not true because of
these facts.
Of course, some special cases of numerical distributions
are involved. Chinese, if we count it as a single language is
spoken by 1000 million people (about a fifth of the world’s
population). The opposite case, it was reported in the 1960’s
that one North American Indian language was spoken only by two
elderly sisters who only used it when they happened to meet.
Languages can also have very different geographical
distributions. For example, English, French, and Spanish can
be listed here. English is spoken in most major countries
(the U.K, the United States, Australia, Canada and New
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Zealand) as is French (France, Belgium, Switzerland and
Canada) and also Spanish (Spain, Central/South America). On
the other hand, the Welsh, the Scottish and the Ainu, for
instance occupy only a very small part of their country.
Despite these facts, it is clear that speakers who have
different languages must share most countries. Bilingualism
would not be so common in the world if there were any
evolutionary disadvantage to it.
Even in Japan, it is said that one marriage in 25 is an
international marriage.ii That is why people will get more and
more chances to hear and speak other languages and become
bilingual. Also bilinguals may get more chances to succeed in
any field, especially those involving international
communication (business, academic etc).
I have been interested in “bilingualism” and I have taken
an interest in international families that are obviously
closely linked to bilinguals. But some information made me
notice the fact that the children of international families
are not always bilinguals. That is, some families have
succeeded in bringing up their children bilingually and some
families are not interested in bilingualism or haven’t
succeeded in bringing up their children bilingually yet.
However, there are maybe some golden rules that could be
suggested to promote bilingualism in the children of
international families
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What is Bilingualism?
What is Bilingualism? Most people who are not linguists
would answer, “having the ability to converse fluently in two
languages”. However, there is a problem. How do you measure
“fluency” in any language? For example, no one speaks the
whole of the English language, only parts that are relevant to
their lives.
Bilinguals must be the same. For example, a bilingual
scientist, who speaks English at home and Japanese at work.
His domestic English would be better than his scientific
English and his scientific Japanese would be better than his
domestic Japanese. That is why defining bilingualism is so
difficult; with two different bilinguals you are never
measuring the same thing. Moreover does knowing a few words in
a foreign language make you bilingual, or if not, how many
words and how much grammar does one need?
There are many definitions of bilingualism. Although it
may be effective to explain one type of bilingualism, it also
appears that these definitions don’t cover every aspect of
bilingualism.
Here are some of the definitions suggested by researchers
and linguists in the past:
“The mastery of two or more languages – bilingualism or
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multilingualism – a special skill. Bilingualism and
multilingualism are relative terms since individuals vary
greatly in types and degrees of language proficiency.” iii
“Bilingualism is native like control of two languages… Of
course, one cannot define a degree of perfection at which a
good foreign speaker becomes a bilingual; the distinction is
relative.” iv
“The phenomenon of bilingualism is something entirely
relative…we shall therefore consider bilingualism as the
alternative use of two or more languages by the same
individual.” v
“Bilingualism is understood…to begin at the point where the
speaker of one language can produce complete, meaningful
utterances in the other language.” vi
“Bilingualism is an optional or obligatory means for
efficient two-way communication between two or more
different ‘worlds’ using two different linguistic systems.”
viiviii
I want to study bilingual families to see if there are
any “golden rules” to help establish bilingualism in children.
This information would be very useful for parents and
educators as bilingualism is something that will become more
and more useful as the world becomes more international
The following chapter will suggest some ideas to think
about “who is bilingual” and “what is bilingualism?” Chapter
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Two contains all the information obtained on the families I
studied. Using this information I will try to show any (if
any) “golden rules” that are useful in helping bilingualism in
children, this information will be presented in chapter three.
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Chapter 2
Case studies
Introduction
In chapter one we discussed what exactly bilingualism is
and why it is very difficult to define. We also discussed
people’s general perceptions of bilinguals and bilingualism.
Finally we talked about the increasing incidence of
international families and international children and the need
for serious consideration amongst parents and educators in
order to encourage bilingualism within these children.
In order to collect the raw data needed for this work, I
interviewed a total of eight families. In this chapter I will
give a summary of the information collected using a
questionnaire (see appendix 4) from the eight families. The
purpose of the questionnaire was to find out the personal,
educational and language backgrounds of the parents and
children. The questionnaire also was designed to find out the
communication pattern within the family, who communicates with
who, and how. The information is then presented in a diagram
to illustrate these relationships.
The questions were answered by either faxing the
questionnaire to the family, telephone interview or via email.
In some cases a second interview was made.
All of this information is available in appendix 2,3 and
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4 in excel format. This was done so an easy comparison could
be made between different families to facilitate spotting any
relevant patterns within the group.
There are three tables in all. The first table (appendix
1) is the “Children’s Background” table and contains a summary
of children’s siblings, community/non-community language,
parents language and any relevant extra information.
The second table (appendix 2) is the “Parent’s
background” table and contains a summary of nationality,
educational background, native/non-native language abilities
and any relevant extra information.
The final table (appendix 3) is the “Language use” table
and contains a summary of the percentage language use for each
family member. That is to say, who speaks to whom within the
group, in what language they speak and when they speak the
language.
In chapter three I will then proceed to analyze this data
collected. Using this information I hope to be able to get
information about “golden rules” for aiding parents and
educators to encourage bilingualism from their children.
Case Study 1 – Mitch and Izuru Abell
Mitch and Izuru are an America/Japanese couple living in
Okayama Prefecture, Japan. Mitch has lived in Japan for about
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15 years and he now works as an English teacher teaching to
university students. Izuru studied English, Persian and
Chinese at University and is proficient in all three
languages. She has worked as an English teacher at an English
school for 10 years.
Both parents are extremely positive in their attitude
towards bilingualism and they think that it is very important
for the children to learn English in a country where English
is spoken. Shun (aged 15) had 1 year in America when he was 4
years old and then spent another 8 months in America when he
was 11 years old. Anju (aged 12) is in America now and has
been there for 2 months. Michiru (aged 6) is going abroad in
the future
The father always speaks to the children in English,
whilst the mother speaks to the children in Japanese and
English. When the father speaks to the children they answer
him 100% of the time in English. But when they don’t know how
to say something in English, they ask the mother in Japanese
and then answer the father in English. The children speak to
each other and to their friends in Japanese and also use
Japanese at school.
The communication pattern within the family is as
follows:
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Each child’s Japanese is fluent and Shun’s English is the
same as a native child of his age. Anju and Michiru’s reading
and writing skills haven’t so far developed the same way as a
native speaker’s. The children have had English input from TV,
conversation with their father and picture books.
The father believes that it is important to bring up the
children bilingually so he never speaks to them in Japanese.
So, even if they speak to him in Japanese, he pretends not to
understand it. The mother believes that it is important for
bringing up the children bilingually that they study the
grammar of both target languages.
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Case Study 2 – Laurence and Misako Dante
Laurence and Misako are an American/Japanese couple
living in Okayama Prefecture, Japan. After Laurence graduated
from University, he worked in Himeji ( and also Okayama
Prefecture) on the JET scheme (Japan Exchange Teaching scheme)
for one year and then worked in Fukuoka as an English teacher
at an English conversation school. Laurence and Misako met at
that time. He returned to America to get a master’s degree and
now works as an English teacher in a university.
Misako has studied English for three years in an American
university after she had worked for some years as a nurse.
Laurence and Misako have two young children, Kouhei (aged 4)
and Elena (aged 2).
Both parents are positive in their attitude towards
bilingualism although they never took a conscious decision to
bring up their children bilingually. They hope that their
children would learn English naturally without their
compulsion. When their children take interest in something and
ask their parents, “What’s this/that?” the parents try to
teach the words in two languages, Japanese and English
The communication pattern within the family is as
follows:
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The father and mother usually converse in English, but
they sometimes converse in Japanese unconsciously. In the same
way, the father speaks to the children in English (95% of the
time) and Japanese (5% of the time). Kouhei spoke to his
Father mostly in Japanese until the family went to America
this summer, now he speaks to him in English most of the time,
while he still speaks to his mother mostly in Japanese. The
mother speaks to Kouhei in Japanese more than Elena because
she needs to explain more complex things in detail to him.
Elena speaks to her parents mostly in Japanese.
The reason is because the father’s Japanese is fluent (he
got the Japanese language proficiency test level 1 when he
returned to Japan). Like the father, the mother’s English is
fluent too. Therefore, she speaks to the children in English
in daily conversation except when she needs to explain complex
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things. Kouhei can read the Roman alphabet but he cannot read
the entire Hiragana alphabet. Whenever Elena speaks English,
she still uses Japanese grammar. The mother thinks this is
because she has been in the daycare center since she was very
small. But each child’s Japanese is fluent for a Japanese
child of that age.
The children have had English input through TV (English
movies and news) and conversation with their father and mother
and sometimes with their grandparents in America. The
grandparents want the parents to teach English more because
they want to converse with the children in English.
The father believes that it is important for his children
to learn two languages bilingually by studying very hard. The
mother believes that it is so important to bring up the
children bilingually that the parents teach not only their own
native languages but also about their native cultures too. She
wants her children to both languages to communicate with many
people.
The parents are thinking about moving to the United
States in the future so that their children later education
can be at American schools (they have yet to decide). In that
instance then while living in American they would speak to
their children in Japanese while they are at home.
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Case Study 3 – Brett and Yoko Reynolds
Brett and Yoko are an American/Japanese couple living in
Tokyo, Japan. Brett works as an English teacher in Junior and
Senior high schools in Tokyo. He teaches English at a senior
high school. Yoko is a staff member at an international
university for American and Japanese students that is also in
Tokyo.
Brett is from Canada and has lived in Japan for about 10
years so he has fluent level Japanese and he has the Japanese
language level proficiency test level two, although he is weak
at reading. If however he uses a computer then he can write in
Japanese.
The mother’s English is not fluent but it is at a very
high level because of her work. She has to communicate with
the foreign students at her university in English. Brett and
Yoko have one child, his name is Tomo and he is 1 year old.
The father speaks to the mother in 50% English and 50%
Japanese in front of their child. The mother speaks to the
father in 90% Japanese and 10% English in front of their
child. Whenever they speak in front of the child they only
ever use one language, they never mix languages. At the moment
the child utters words in Japanese only.
The communication pattern within the family is as
follows:
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. Both parents read a picture book with their child every
night, the father always only reads in English, the mother
reads in a both English and Japanese. The child only ever
watches Japanese TV. The father has decided that when he
speaks to the child he would only use English. The mother has
not yet decided which language she will use and talks to the
child in both languages at the moment.
The mother believes it is important to bring up a child
bilingually that the parents should give the child a lot of
English input, as much as possible while they are living in
Japan. She is going to constantly change the way she teaches
English to her child as the child’s age increases.
This family plans to move to Canada in a year. When they
live in Canada they plan to use Japanese in the home
environment so that the child is exposed to as much Japanese
as possible while outside of Japan.
Both parents are worried that if they move abroad the
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child won’t learn to read and write in Kanji, especially if
they return to Japan. Both parents believe it is important
that the parents decide how to bring up their children
bilingually and that they give as much contact as possible to
the child in both target languages.
Case Study 4 – Craig and Mitsuko Sower
Craig and Mitsuko are an American/Japanese couple and
live in Okayama Prefecture, Japan. Craig was born in America
but from the age of 11 to 14 he lived in Germany so he speaks
fluent German. He also went to Denmark, Scotland and Italy for
some time. After that he returned to America where he obtained
a masters degree and then came to Japan, he has lived in Japan
for about 15 years. He now works as a university English
teacher. Craig’s Japanese understanding is excellent but his
other three skills of reading, writing and speaking are not so
strong. Craig and Misuko usually only speak to each other in
English in the home environment so there has never been the
need for him to study Japanese extensively
Mitsuko went to America to study English when she was a
university student but she now works as an English teacher at
a senior high school. Mitsuko’s English is fluent because she
uses English everyday at work and at home. She also tries to
read an English newspaper as much as possible.
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They have two children, Joe (aged 9) and Sam (aged 7).
Joe, the eldest child has very strong understanding of spoken
English because of contact with his father and mother. He also
speaks English but sometimes makes grammatical errors. Since
he was very young Joe has been exposed to English picture
books and has strong reading skills. Sam usually speaks
Japanese at home and usually doesn’t speak English at all
although he understands most of what his father says to him.
The father and mother converse in English in front of the
children. The father speaks to the children in English only
and the mother speaks to the children only in Japanese. Joe
recently started to answer in English to the father although
only a little. Usually he speaks to the father in Japanese.
Sam speaks to his father in Japanese but he tries to speak in
English. Both children speak to the mother in Japanese but
when they are asked something by the mother in English, then
they speak to her in English if they can. The children only
ever speak to each other in Japanese.
The communication pattern within the family is as
follows:
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All TV programs at home are in English if the father is
present. However if the father is not there, the children
watch TV in Japanese (about 90% of the time). The children
have also had English input through natural conversation with
the father and from English picture books and also English
movies. They have also traveled to English speaking countries
once a year and have had the opportunity to speak English
outside of Japan.
The parents plan to bring up their children as Japanese
first because they live in Japan and if they have time later
then they will teach them English. The parents believe it is
up to the children to decide for themselves. The mother is
positive towards bilingualism but wants her children to see
other countries and cultures for themselves instead of
studying lots of languages. The father believes that it is
important for a child to become bilingual naturally and not
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through teaching.
Case Study 5 – Rob and Tomoko Waring
Rob and Tomoko are an English/Japanese couple living in
Okayama Prefecture, Japan. Rob lived in Australia for about 10
years and he went back to the UK for traveling and then
returned again to Australia to get his some teaching
qualifications before coming to live in Japan. He has lived in
Japan for 12 years and now works as a university English
teacher. His Japanese listening and speaking are strong but
not always fluent, however he used to speak French and German
reasonably well.
Tomoko went to Australia for a year to study English
while she was at university and now her job is a garden
designer. Tomoko’s English is fluent as she speaks English
everyday. She became very fluent in English by studying and
practicing with her family.
They have one child, Mariko (aged 8). She has been to the
UK for one year when her father was on sabbatical. She has
native level fluency in both English and Japanese and she goes
to private elementary school where she learns English once a
wek, but it is too easy for her.
The father and the mother always converse in English in
front of Mariko and the father speaks to the child in English
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only. The mother speaks to the child in Japanese if the father
is not there. If the father is there then the mother speaks to
the child in English (about 90% of the time). Mariko answers
in English (about 98% of the time) when spoken to by her
father and Mariko answers in Japanese if the father is not at
home. She always speaks Japanese at home or at school. The
family policy is that English will be spoken when the father
is at home. The aim of this is to provide an ‘English only’
environment for Mariko.
The communication pattern within the family is as
follows:
Mariko usually watches TV 50% of the time in English and
50% of the time in Japanese. She also listens to music the
same way. Mariko also reads in English early everyday and
watches English movies and writes emails to friends in
English. She gets exposed to Japanese naturally with her
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friends.
Both parents are very positive about bilingualism, the
house rule is when the father is at home they use only English
and if the father is not at home then they speak Japanese.
The father believes it is important that when he speaks
to his child in English, not to dent her confidence or make
her choose between languages. He wants her to feel natural so
that a positive attitude is encouraged. The father also
believes it is very important to take the child overseas often
so that the child can become bilingual and bicultural.
The father thinks that bilingualism is a good thing
because it builds a good mind and personality and the child
can talk to other relatives within the family. However he
worries that in becoming bilingual, his child may be bullied
at some time.
Case Study 6 – Andrew and Tin Tin Barfield
Andrew and Tin Tin are an English/Myanmar couple who live
in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. Andrew went to Yugoslavia for 6
years as an English teacher and then he came to Japan, he has
been in Japan for 12 years. He now works as an English teacher
in a university. Andrew can speak Yugoslavian although not
fluently, he can speak French and German fluently and his
Japanese listening is strong but he can’t speak, read or write
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very well.
Tin Tin came to Japan after she got a masters degree in
psychology from university in Myanmar. She has been in Japan
for about 10 years and she got her doctorate from a Japanese
university. Tin Tin speaks English fluently as she has been
studying English since she was a Junior High school student
and she speaks English everyday at home with Andrew. She can
also speaks, read and write Japanese fluently too.
They have one child called Moemin (aged 2) and he goes to
a daycare center everyday. His Japanese development is slower
compared to other 2-year-old Japanese children but he speaks
Japanese the most fluently at the moment. He usually speaks
60% Japanese, 30% English and 10% Burmese. He understands all
three languages although his mother thinks that he understands
Burmese the most.
The father and the mother always converse in English. The
father always speaks to Moemin in English. The mother always
speaks to Moemin in Burmese. Moemin always speaks one of the
three languages to either parent at random. He speaks Japanese
at the daycare center.
The communication pattern within the family is as
follows:
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Moemin always watches TV in Japanese and always watches
videos in English. He reads books mostly in English (75% of
the time) and also Burmese (15% of the time). He doesn’t read
much Japanese. Most of the music he listens to is in Burmese.
Moemin has got his language input from picture books, TV,
movies and conversation with parents in all three languages.
The family house rule is that the father speaks to Moemin
in English; the mother speaks to him in Burmese. Both parents
are very positive about bilinguliasm/ trilingualism and they
both hope that Moemin can understand the identity of both
England and Myanmar. The father doesn’t like Moemin to use
Japanese at home.
The mother believes it is important to bring up a child
bilingually by teaching both cultures conscientiously. The
parents also believe it is also important for the child that
the parents speak their own languages.
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They plan to send Moemin to an international school from
Junior High school onwards. The family goes to England once a
year and is planning to go to Myanmar once a year from now on
so Moemin can use the English and Burmese that he has learned.
They are planning to live in Japan for another 10 years.
Case Study 7 – Jeff and Samantha Romonko
Jeff and Samantha are a Canadian/English couple living in
Okayama Prefecture, Japan. They have been living in Japan for
9 years and both of them teach English in Okayama. Jeff
teaches English at a junior high school. Samantha teaches
English at a senior high school.
Jeff speaks French fluently because he lived in Quebec
for a year to study French and his Japanese is fluent too.
Neither parent has taken the Japanese language proficiency
test but they are at about level 2 they think. Samantha is
also fluent in French because she has learned French since she
was 8 years until the age of 23.
They have two children called Hannah (aged 7) and Emily
(aged 3). Hannah was born in Canada and was in Canada for two
years. Emily was born in Japan. Both children can understand
and speak English and Japanese but Hannah’s writing and
reading skills are weaker in Japanese.
Emily can’t read or write either Japanese or English
- 24 - -
however she can understand and speak both. However, she is
more comfortable speaking Japanese.
Hannah went to a day care center from the age of 4 until
6 years old. Emily has been going to day care center from the
age of 8 months until now.
The father and the mother always converse in English and
the father and the mother always speak to the children in
English too. Hannah speaks to them mostly in English, Emily
however spoke to them mostly in Japanese until the family went
to Canada this summer, now she speaks to them in English most
of the time. Also before the Canada trip, both children spoke
to each other in Japanese, but now they speak to each other
mostly in English.
The communication pattern within the family is as
follows:
- 25 - -
Both parents are positive about bilingualism but they
think it is difficult to encourage it. They think that it is
important for the children’s future experience and they will
become more open-minded. They believe it will be important for
bringing up their children bilingually if they use Japanese as
little as possible while they are in Japan.
They also think that while they live in Japan there
children will become bilingual naturally because they speak
Japanese outside and English at home. They think they will
have a problem if they moved to England or Canada because the
children will lose the chance to speak and use Japanese there.
They think they should get a Japanese tutor or send them to a
Japanese school. They are worried about Emily’s English
because even if they speak to her in English, she replies in
Japanese so they hope she studies English harder.
The parents believe to bring up children bilingually it
is important for the parents to try and expose them to English
and encourage chances to speak English as much as possible so
they insist on English at home.
Case Study 8 – Chris and Kazuko Balderston
Chris and Kazuko are an American/Japanese couple who live
in Tokyo, Japan. When Chris graduated from university, he came
to Japan and became an editor. He has lived in Japan in for 10
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years. He is currently trying to study for a master’s degree
in Japan but is too busy at work. His job is an editor.
Kazuko is a housewife and she is currently bringing up
their two children. Their children are Mitch (aged 4) and Jack
(aged 2).
Chris’s Japanese language skills are fluent with daily
conversation and Kazuko’s English is about Senior high school
level. Mitch’s Japanese is the same as a Japanese native child
of the same age. However when Mitch went to America he started
speaking English with perfect pronunciation. Jack’s Japanese
is the same as a native speaker although his English is too
early to determine at the moment.
The father and mother mostly converse in Japanese in
front of the children. Usually the father speaks to Mitch in
English and Japanese and he usually talks to Jack almost
always in Japanese. Mitch always speaks to the father in
Japanese (sometimes English). Jack often speaks to his father
usually in Japanese but he imitates his father’s English, at
the moment it is too early to tell much about his development.
The mother speaks to the children mostly in Japanese but
when she gets angry she speaks English. Both children always
speak to the mother in Japanese and the children always speak
Japanese outside the home environment.
The communication pattern within the family is as
follows:
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The children have got their English input from
conversation with their father, TV, videos, English picture
books and when they go to America. The father reads English
picture books every night so the children (especially Mitch)
can read the alphabet naturally. The parents try not to use
Japanese and English at the same time because their children
are not bilingual and they don’t want to become confused.
When Mitch was first born, Kazuko tried to speak English
to her new child but her husband’s mother told her that she
should only speak Japanese to her child because she is
Japanese. Also her English pronunciation would not be as good
as a native speaker, therefore she should not speak English to
her children. However the father’s mother wants them to become
bilingual too.
After this comment the mother noticed the difference in
foreign and Japanese approaches to raising a bilingual child.
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The American approach appears to be that the native parent
should teach the native language where as in Japan, both
family members teach both languages.
The family is planning to move to America in the near
future, so their children will not use Japanese so they
believe that they should use Japanese as much as possible in
Japan while they are here. Both parents want the children to
acquire Japanese now.
Summary
Each family is different and represents a unique aspect
of bilingualism. It is important that we now look at this
information and see what it can tell us about bilingualism.
In chapter three we will examine the main patterns within
each group and any patterns between families. We will also
look at how this is affected by language use and general
beliefs about bilingualism within each family.
By studying any patterns that appear we can make conclusions about
any potential “golden rules” for establishing bilingualism within
children.
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Chapter Three
Analysis
Introduction
In Chapter One we discussed “Who is bilingual?” “What is
bilingualism? In Chapter Two we looked at some data collected
from eight bilingual families. These data tended to show the
most successful families (in encouraging a bilingual state)
were those in which there was a system where there was little
confusion about which language the child should speak in each
situation.
In this chapter we will consider what would be an “ideal”
environment in order to encourage “bilingualism” in a child.
This list of ‘Golden Rules’ will be a guide for parents and
educators. This list of ‘Golden Rules’ will be based on the
data collected in Chapter Two
Some Golden Rules for bilingualism
The data from Chapter Two will be used to find out if
there are any common Golden Rules held by the eight families.
It is important to stress that the Golden Rules will only be
general and are dependent only on the data collected from
these families. However, the Golden Rules should be useful
for educators and parents. The Golden Rules we will find
- 30 - -
will of course be subjective not objective because the data
were collected in a questionnaire.
There are too many variables to consider when raising a
child to make anything certain from the data we have
collected, however, it is possible to state a few guiding
principles to increase the chances of developing a bilingual
state in a young child. It is also worth noting that this
study is very small (only eight families) and for anything
more compelling to be stated, many more families would have to
be studied with follow up studies over a number of years.
Clearly that is beyond the scope of what we wish to cover
here.
The guidelines that I believe are essential for
increasing the chances of encouraging a bilingual state in a
child are as follows:
1) The child should be exposed to both languages “consistently”
and from birth, but it should remember that there are many
ways of being consistent. For example, the child could be
exposed to one language in the home environment, and one in
the outside world.
This can be seen in Case Study 7, Jeff and Samantha
Romonko, an English/Canadian couple living in Japan. Both
of the parents don’t speak Japanese in the home environment,
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so their children speak English at home and speak Japanese
at school with their friends. Both children haven’t been
taught any spoken Japanese by their parents but their
Japanese seems fluent and they feel more comfortable
speaking Japanese rather than English even though they can
both speak English well. The only reason could be because
they live in Japan and their friends are Japanese, so their
community language is Japanese at the moment.
Another way to be consistent with both languages is
reported in Case Study 1 (Mitch/Izuru) and Case Study 5
(Robert/Tomoko). The only house rule these families have is
that if the father is there, they speak only English in the
house and if the father is not there, then they only speak
Japanese.
Also “one parent, one language” can be possible. You
can see this in Case Study 4, Craig and Mitsuko Sower, an
American/Japanese couple who have two children aged nine and
seven. The father speaks to his children in English and the
mother speaks to her children in Japanese. A holiday
language and a round-the-year language, a weekday language
and a Sunday language, and so on are possible ways to do
this. It depends on the family. It is very important for
the children that the exposure be constant and as much as
possible, however it requires a long-term commitment.
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2) The children should be provided with the richest possible
linguistic environment as much as possible in both
languages. All of the eight families have used several ways
to educate their children in both languages: reading books
in English and in Japanese; talking in Japanese and in
English; listening to English songs in the car; watching
foreign movies and T.V in English and watching TV in
Japanese. The following ideas could also be tried:
Make a playgroup of children who speak foreign
language.
Go overseas during holidays.
Do games that use foreign language.
Invite visitors who are from foreign countries.
Bilingualism should be encouraged through many sources,
not just through conversation with the parents. Providing
many kinds of input in the target language will provide
additional chances to become accustomed to the language being
acquired. Also we have learned from research that children
learn better from many, different, interesting media and not
just from one source.
Also, learning a language should be enjoyable for
children, using games for example. If the parents are very
strict with their child on language use, his creative ability
and motivation may go down and he may come to reject the
language. In Case study 6, Andrew and Tin Tin Barfield, the
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English/Mynamar couple, the mother’s English approach doesn’t
seem to be positive because the mother uses English only when
she gets angry with her children. The child is only one year
old at the moment so it many not matter too much just yet,
however, if this continues, the child may become accustomed
to thinking that English is the language that is used when
people (or more importantly their mother) get angry, or at
least, they may not have a good impression of English.
If the mother usually speaks Japanese and speaks English
only in a specified time, it might be better to use English
when she praises her children rather than when she gets
angry. As we know the parents’ attitudes can influence their
child’s motivation. Therefore, parents and educators should
consider this point carefully.
3) The approach to the acquisition of two languages within a
child should be, of course, positive and with the aim of not
directly teaching a language, but by allowing it to grow
naturally. However the most important and common idea is
that “the child’s feelings come first”. A child should
i Bilingual Children: From Birth to Teens, George Saunders, P1ii http://www.kokutei.com/harbin/sub.7.htmiii Encyclopedia Britannica, 1965 iv L. Broomfield, 1933v? W.F Mackey, 1962vi E. Haugen, 1953vii Van Overbeke, 1972viii
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never be made to feel bad about speaking a language and
never forced to choose, it must be natural for the child to
use both languages in their daily lives and to different
people and there should no associated feelings of confusion
in either instance.
All of families whom I had interviewed had same idea.
Even if parents try to teach two languages to their child in
the most “ideal” way, it will not work well when he or she
is not interested in the language and doesn’t want to speak
the language to anybody.
This can be seen in Case Study 7 with child number
two, Emily (aged 3). She used to speak Japanese to her
parents and her older sister and friends, anyone. She was
obviously comfortable with speaking Japanese, but this
summer holiday in Canada, her attitude changed toward
English. She spoke to her grandparents and friends in
English in Canada without really realizing that she was
speaking English. Now she has started speaking to her
parents and sister in English too. This is still continuing
in Japan even now. It is ideal for children to be inspired
so that they want to communicate with people in their common
language. Exactly the same thing happened to Kouhei (Case
study 2, Laurance and Misako Dante), the child, who is a
similar age to Emily went on a trip to the States in the
summer and exactly the same thing happened, the child
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started to speak English without realizing the switch when
immersed in an English only environment, something which has
continued when the child returned to Japan. The fact that
this has happened to two children within the course of this
study is an unprecedented trend which gives weighty evidence
to the importance of the child’s perception of language.
4) The parents should not try and confuse the child with the
idea of learning culture through language. You cannot learn
culture through a language; it should be kept purely as a
method of expression and communication. Culture is an adult
concept. Children do not have an idea of culture. Some of
the parents whom I had interviewed have been trying to teach
their cultures to their children at home. However, children
will not be able to learn the culture as their own one
without going overseas and living there. Therefore, parents
should make chances to go overseas and let their children
have contact with a different culture.
5) There should only be one extra language acquired. Anything
more would be confusing and thus retard the development of
the other languages. The key word is "confusion", which we
must avoid as much as possible. This is necessary because
there is no evidence to suggest that a child can easily
acquire three or more languages. In fact there is evidence
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to suggest that trying to focus upon more than one extra
language can have retarding effects in the development of
other languages. Where as there is plenty of evidence that
a child can successfully acquire one extra language.
You can see this by comparing Case Study 6
(Andrew/Tintin) and Case Study 7 (Jeffrey/Samantha). In
Case Study 6 the child is being raised in a trilingual
environment and although it is too early to say at the
moment, it would appear that the child’s development in all
three languages is slower than a child of similar age raised
in a bilingual environment. However, with Case Study 7, it
would be possible for both parents to raise their child in a
trilingual environment but they have not and the children’s
development compared with Case Study 6 at the same was far
more advanced.
However, it is worth noting that if the languages are
very similar, or are from the same family of languages, for
example Spanish and Italian there would be fewer problems
than a Spanish person learning Chinese, which is obviously
very different.
6) The acquisition of the second language should be backed up
with trips to the native country to immerse the child in an
environment where the other language is used, in order to
exercise and develop the none community language and provide
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a point to being able to speak two languages. This is very
important, especially because as children develop mentally
they develop analytical skills and they begin to question
things and thus they need to meet both their cultures at
that time. as the child’s analytical skills develop and they
begin to question things.
Moreover, being exposed to two languages does not
necessarily imply the children will learn two cultures. For
example, children playing games in Japan will decide teams by
playing ‘janken’ but boys playing soccer in the UK will choose
a captain and the captains will select players one by one,
which many Japanese see as very unfair. Therefore children
need to understand both ways of thinking to accept them into
their own culture.
Conclusion
In this chapter we considered what would be an “ideal”
environment in order to encourage “bilingualism” in a child.
The Golden Rules that are suggested above should be useful
for educators and parents.
Even if parents neglect their children by leaving them
in front of an English TV program in the hope they will pick
up English, the child will not come to speak English and
will not even understand it too. This passive contact with
a foreign language may be able to stimulate the child and
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increase his or her language acquisition ability later when
he or she learns the language or another language or another
language formally. However, a child needs to use the
language in an “interactive” way and the language should be
used not only one-way but to help the child communicate with
people interactively. The more the child uses the language
in the interactive way, the more the child will acquire the
language. Therefore, parents and educators should find
creative learning ways as much as possible to have the child
use the language in the interactive way. For example, when
a mother reads a book, which is written in a foreign
language to her child, she can ask the content of the story
in that language. Also, she can ask some questions in the
language to urge him or her to answer his or her feelings,
opinions, and interests.
Although we cannot define the best way to bring up
children bilingually, we will be able to do well by
considering it and then making efforts to bring it about.
There is no evidence that bilinguals are bad for our
society. In fact Bilinguals can be a great social benefit.
Imagine that how wonderful it will be if we come to
communicate with people who are from all over the world
without being worried about language barriers. Bringing up
our children bilingually should be the first step to the
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future.
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References
Harding Edith/Riley Philip, The Bilingual Family: A handbook for parents (Cambridge University Press, 1986) ISBN 0-521-31194-2
Saunders George, Bilingual children: From Birth to Teens (Multilingual Matters Limited, 1988) ISBN 1-85359-009-6
http://www.kokukei.com/harbin/sub7.htm
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