Baby Talk!

[Beachcomber]

Hi

I guess there are many mixed marriages on this site also many mixed kids.

My question is regarding when baby starts to talk. Baby Beach is just over one year old. I talk to her in English and everyone else talks to her in Thai. Mum, for my benefit talks a lot of English to her.

Baby Beach can string sounds together and she will look at you and say something really important but in “what language”

Anybody have experience with baby language. When do babies start to talk? Is it more difficult for them being expose to two languages?

Help!!!

[dr_Pat_Pong]

Not at all. The bub will sort it quickly ( and be unaccented in both languages )

[dereklev]

Not at all. The bub will sort it quickly ( and be unaccented in both languages ) 

Hope you are right Doc! !

Our 9 month old son is being spoken to in the same way as Baby Beach.

[solo siam]

You mean I've got to wait a year before my baby starts saying anything!

[Superfly]

I have heard that babies brought up exposed to two languages simultaneously will be a little slower than other babies starting to speak, but when they do start, like the Dr. said, they will be speaking in both languages very naturally. I know a lot of mixed marriage couples that both speak to baby in their own language, this apparently helps the baby figure out what is what in each language. (Is that last sentence coherent?)

Edited October 2, 2005 by Superfly

[Diablo Bob]

I have heard that babies brought up exposed to two languages simultaneously will be a little slower than other babies starting to speak, but when they do start, like the Dr. said, they will be speaking in both languages very naturally. I know a lot of mixed marriage couples that both speak to baby in their own language, this apparently helps the baby figure out what is what in each language. (Is that last sentence coherent?)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

How about three languages..... my daughter is 2 1/2, my wife is originally from Buriram (Khmer) we now live in Chiangmai (Thai) and naturally my American English.

When visiting Grandma & Grandpa she speaks Khmer, when out and around Chiangmai its Thai and when talking to me English.

The amazing thing is up to around 24 months it was just individual words ...... now she is stringing the words together and making sentences.

For fun, we put on a Karake VCD and she sings in either Thai or English IF she likes the song......

Enjoy it....... these are the great times with the kids.

[billd766]

I have heard that babies brought up exposed to two languages simultaneously will be a little slower than other babies starting to speak, but when they do start, like the Dr. said, they will be speaking in both languages very naturally. I know a lot of mixed marriage couples that both speak to baby in their own language, this apparently helps the baby figure out what is what in each language. (Is that last sentence coherent?)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

How about three languages..... my daughter is 2 1/2, my wife is originally from Buriram (Khmer) we now live in Chiangmai (Thai) and naturally my American English.

When visiting Grandma & Grandpa she speaks Khmer, when out and around Chiangmai its Thai and when talking to me English.

The amazing thing is up to around 24 months it was just individual words ...... now she is stringing the words together and making sentences.

For fun, we put on a Karake VCD and she sings in either Thai or English IF she likes the song......

Enjoy it....... these are the great times with the kids.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Our son is 14 onths old and he can say the usual Mae, Paw words etc but he will also be tri lingual as my wife talks to him in Thai and English, I talk in English and some mangled Thai, the rest of the family use eithernThai or English and the people who work for us use Thai and Muser (hilltribe). He seems to listen and understand a lot of it but I find that I use the words NO or Mai Dai a lot as he is into everything he can at the moment. Sometimes when he doesn't get his own way he just sits and howls the place down, just like me at times I suppose.

Up to last week he really wasn't walking on his own but now he either walks or grabs somebodies hand and drags them around.

I am 61 and he is my 2nd child (the first is 27) and some of the things I find harder to do are getting back up off my knees but I do find I have more patience than I did before and being a little deaf in one ear when he cries I just turn that ear towards him, much quieter.

[SiamOne]

Yep, kids are smarter than us! my hubbie can't speak Thai yet, after four years plus of trying....

[awarrumbungle]

I have heard (Queen of Jordan's autobiography) that a good way for your kid to learn both languages is for eg the father speaks only english and the mother speak only thai to it. Reduces confusions somewhat.

But it's only hearsay.

[grahamb]

I have heard that babies brought up exposed to two languages simultaneously will be a little slower than other babies starting to speak, but when they do start, like the Dr. said, they will be speaking in both languages very naturally. I know a lot of mixed marriage couples that both speak to baby in their own language, this apparently helps the baby figure out what is what in each language. (Is that last sentence coherent?)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Superfly is right. My wife used to work in an international kindergarten in Europe and some of the kids there used to speak 4 or 5 languages. They will often start to speak a bit later than the monolingual kids but will catch up. She said there may also be times when they will only use 1 language, irrespective of who they are speaking to (e.g. talking to you in Thai even though you are speaking English). This is just their brains trying to sort out the differences in the languages, etc. and again is nothing to worry about. Continue as you are doing and you'll end up with a bi or tri lingual kid. I wish I'd have been as lucky when I was a kid to get 2 languages from birth...

[The_Moog]

Eventuially Little One's first language will be the one used in the schoolyard and among L.O. and chums.

Baby Beach is just over one year old.

I used to have a registered login in another Asia Forum "Babybitch". I didn't make it a secret that I was a fat bald old farang, but some other members still hoped I was something else.

Edited October 3, 2005 by The_Moog

[tuky]

My little Kitty has just started to speak, she calls me Daddy.

She only speaks Thai/Laos at the moment but I am sure she will pick up more english as she starts to listen to me, and get to kno wme better.

She had never heard the word Daddy until I asked her "Daddy yu nai?" and she pointed at me, now all I hear is Diddy, Diddy, Diddy kanom bung mai?

She can also count to 10 in both Thai and English, she knows who everyone is and their names. I am just about to start her on the alphabet song.

[BambinA]

She had never heard the word Daddy until I asked her "Daddy yu nai?" and she pointed at me, now all I hear is Diddy, Diddy, Diddy kanom bung mai?

She can also count to 10 in both Thai and English, she knows who everyone is and their names. I am just about to start her on the alphabet song.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

lovely story

[pedro01]

My son is 3 and a half, knows all the words to the first 2 coldplay albums as well as Black Eyed Peas.

Remembering words aren't a problem but he does babble a lot & he rarely asks/answers questions.

He's coming along now he's at school.

I think 1 year is a little young to be worrying but you can do stuff to help.

- TV is bad for language development - it's one-way communication

- don't let them have stuff without asking - they are often lazy when it comes to speaking

- use picture cards - play games where each time they get the word right - they get something

There's loads of time - my kid is a late talker but I'm not sweating it yet...

[Backpack_thailand]

The little Backpacker will be 2 in December and now knows that Daddy ("dee") speaks a different lingo than Mummy ("ma" or "mee").

He understands a lot more than he can actually say and identifies things in two languages, i.e when he sees our cat it's a "meow", a dog is a "mar" yet a bird is a "bird" and a fish is a "fshshshshsh" - Dead cute, I wish he could stay as he is forever!

It's quite surreal when we're both sitting and playing with him, he's getting a 3 way conversation in two different languages! Got to keep up the English though, as all the Dads on here know, he's hearing Thai from everyone around him all day, all night. There's only 4 or 5 regular foreigners he sees and hears.

As my missus doesn't speak any English it's hard sometimes not to speak to my son in Thai so she gets the joke as it were but 99% of the time I speak to him in fluent Cockney...

...in a few years he'll be quoting Del Boy all over the place!

Lovely Jubbly!

[x-pat]

I mentioned in another thread:

My daughter is seven months old now and gradually beginning language acquisition. Since many of the posters here are in a bicultural partnership, I’d like to ask what your experience is with kids learning two or three languages. I would imagine it’s quite a challenge for the little ones. My wife speaks Thai with our daughter, I speak German with her. My wife and I speak English to each other and occasionally we also speak English with our daughter. Her environment is thus trilingual. How can we make it easier for her to learn three languages?

...to which the scouser replied:

If you fancy a bit of light reading, then you check out this university student's thoughts on language acquisition. However, bearing in mind that your child's mind is effectively a blank page and that she will learn language in context, my belief is that she will come to be able to distinguish words in the different languages meaning the same thing; e.g. ma/dog/Huind. In other words, over time your daughter will realise that she is speaking different languages and will use the correct one depending upon to whom she is addressing herself.

What does perplex me is how anyone, even a native German, can accurately learn the case structure in the German language. blink.gif

Thanks for the link, scouser. - Steven Pinker a university student? I believe he's a respected authority on the topic, isn't he? His name comes to mind, as well as that of Noam Chomsky. I will read the paper; thanks again. Regarding the German inflections, yes, I often hear that they are a pain for people who learn German as a second language. What can I say? - I think it's all very logical. German sentence structure also seems to be quite an annoyance to SL learners.

If you ask me, I think that English is worse. English only pretends to be easy and it ensnares victims with an unsophisticated grammar and simple syntax. However, pronunciation is a nightmare, there are virtually no rules for that, and then think about the humongous size of the English treasury of words; 600,000 bloody words and ten synonyms for almost everything. Lifelong vocabulary slavery is practically inevitable.

Cheers, X-Pat