66. Bilingualism at Three (and a half!)

So let's start just by talking about what has been going on lately with bilingualism in your family and your now three and a half year old daughter.

Yeah, this child is starting to become very chatty.

She...

It's really, really interesting because...

I'm seeing her pick up all kinds of words and phrases.

Recently, we were listening to a podcast and I realized that she has this little phrase that she'll say, huh, fascinating when she hears something that's really fun.

And it's from this little podcast that we listen to from time to time.

So little fun things like that, that just kind of make me laugh, but that she's parroting.

and then just lots and lots of words.

Let's take a step back.

I guess I should have asked you to start.

Can you first give us an overview of what approach to bilingualism are you using? What does it look like in your family with you and your husband? That would be a great overview.

Yeah, of course.

So what we're trying to do is make homes a very Italian space.

That's become more difficult since she has really started picking up a lot of words at school that are all English.

But we're pushing through.

We do a lot of reading at home.

Um, we speak a lot with, uh, her grandparents in Italy.

So we're speaking only in Italian with them, of course.

Um, but I've started to get a little bit more lazy for lack of a better word, um, with my, my Italian, um, which honestly is, uh, I don't feel as bad about anymore.

Um, just trying to communicate.

And then sometimes I'll repeat myself in Italian after I've said something in English.

So doing it like that.

That's great.

I was going to ask how you are feeling about your English versus Italian use more on an emotional level.