HomeResidents in JapanRaising a bilingual baby: is it hard to maintain and improve your Japanese as a parent who’s always speaking English to your kids?
If you speak Japanese outside, for example at work, it shouldn’t really be an issue. But if you never use Japanese, then of course it will be harder to naturally maintain, and you’d probably want to put in some effort to study on the side in order to maintain and improve.
I’d be worried about maintaining english once the kid goes to KG/school (source: my kid went from 100% english to almost not being able to say hello)
I use both languages with my kids. My kids speak Japanese as their primary language and English as their secondary and they go to school in Japanese so naturally their Japanese is stronger than their English, but they can understand when I talk to them in English, they can speak English and have my accent, and they watch TV in English sometimes also.
Personally I don’t put any stock into the “1 parent, 1 language” theory and I personally think it’s destructive for familial relationships because there is a high chance that they will reject English at some stage of development, and in many cases they reject their English-speaking parent at that stage as well. I have seen and heard of it happening a number of times so going with the “1 parent, 1 language” rule seems rather idiotic to me. And because I have had success in teaching them English while having a multilingual relationship with them, I really don’t see the point in that other method. Plus there is the added benefit that I get to use Japanese in my home beyond just reading novels, playing games or watching TV.
But I also believe that developing and maintaining your own Japanese ability is an entirely separate matter. Personally speaking the bulk of my Japanese knowledge came from reading novels, and if I relied on my kids for developing my Japanese ability then I would be speaking at a much lower level and wouldn’t have any reading ability whatsoever.
It’s only hard to maintain your Japanese if you chose not to work on it. We only speak English at home but when my husband and I are alone we speak Japanese and we also speak Japanese at the in-laws. If you don’t work in Japanese then I suppose you’ll have to make a more conscious effort to practice.
No, because a lot of my work is in Japanese and I have to talk to my kid’s Japanese daycare teachers….conversely I have found it hard to “re-integrate” with English speaking society now that my kid is kindergarten age and we hang out with other English speaking friends her age. Her making friends is not the issue, because she does, rather me being around only Japanese people for too long and becoming kind of Japanese in mannerism sometimes makes me feel like the odd one out with other parents. But in the end I guess it could be a lot worse.
I speak Japanese with the wife, English with the kid. The kid uses Japanese with mom and outside the house. The kid is a relatively fluent English speaker. They can’t understand everything and sometimes can’t formulate an idea well in English, but they can get by.
Speaking Japanese with my partner made a huge difference, and a few years in a Japanese workplace really leveled up my Japanese. I’m now self-employed, so I don’t have that workplace experience, so I take a weekly one hour private lesson to discuss things in a more academic way. I get by in Japanese with very few problems, but I plan to keep studying nonetheless, since I’ll never quite be native level.
Do a search on サイモンのイキれる英語教室. I think he is a model case of success. He spoke English inside the house and lived in Japanese outside the house.
If your Japanese is so poor that you need to practice with a baby/toddler/child to keep it sharp, it was never that good in the first place.
My daughter deals with 3 languages daily. We maintain English at home through Netflix and parents talking in English. My wife also speaks Portuguese with our daughter. She started Japanese in kindergarten at 2. She speaks mostly English and Japanese while understanding and speaking a little Portuguese. The most important thing is repetition to create neural links at a young age. Then the goal is to maintain them. This means being consistent. By splitting language at home you lose consistency. This will also mean compromise from one parent. Try not to punish or correct the language use as much. When their Japanese becomes stronger, instead of forcing English, try to get them to explain what the word or phrase is in English as if you didn’t understand, then praise them when they are able to do it. If they can’t, help them out then praise them for trying.
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If you speak Japanese outside, for example at work, it shouldn’t really be an issue. But if you never use Japanese, then of course it will be harder to naturally maintain, and you’d probably want to put in some effort to study on the side in order to maintain and improve.
I’d be worried about maintaining english once the kid goes to KG/school (source: my kid went from 100% english to almost not being able to say hello)
I use both languages with my kids. My kids speak Japanese as their primary language and English as their secondary and they go to school in Japanese so naturally their Japanese is stronger than their English, but they can understand when I talk to them in English, they can speak English and have my accent, and they watch TV in English sometimes also.
Personally I don’t put any stock into the “1 parent, 1 language” theory and I personally think it’s destructive for familial relationships because there is a high chance that they will reject English at some stage of development, and in many cases they reject their English-speaking parent at that stage as well. I have seen and heard of it happening a number of times so going with the “1 parent, 1 language” rule seems rather idiotic to me. And because I have had success in teaching them English while having a multilingual relationship with them, I really don’t see the point in that other method. Plus there is the added benefit that I get to use Japanese in my home beyond just reading novels, playing games or watching TV.
But I also believe that developing and maintaining your own Japanese ability is an entirely separate matter. Personally speaking the bulk of my Japanese knowledge came from reading novels, and if I relied on my kids for developing my Japanese ability then I would be speaking at a much lower level and wouldn’t have any reading ability whatsoever.
It’s only hard to maintain your Japanese if you chose not to work on it. We only speak English at home but when my husband and I are alone we speak Japanese and we also speak Japanese at the in-laws. If you don’t work in Japanese then I suppose you’ll have to make a more conscious effort to practice.
No, because a lot of my work is in Japanese and I have to talk to my kid’s Japanese daycare teachers….conversely I have found it hard to “re-integrate” with English speaking society now that my kid is kindergarten age and we hang out with other English speaking friends her age. Her making friends is not the issue, because she does, rather me being around only Japanese people for too long and becoming kind of Japanese in mannerism sometimes makes me feel like the odd one out with other parents. But in the end I guess it could be a lot worse.
I speak Japanese with the wife, English with the kid. The kid uses Japanese with mom and outside the house. The kid is a relatively fluent English speaker. They can’t understand everything and sometimes can’t formulate an idea well in English, but they can get by.
Speaking Japanese with my partner made a huge difference, and a few years in a Japanese workplace really leveled up my Japanese. I’m now self-employed, so I don’t have that workplace experience, so I take a weekly one hour private lesson to discuss things in a more academic way. I get by in Japanese with very few problems, but I plan to keep studying nonetheless, since I’ll never quite be native level.
Do a search on サイモンのイキれる英語教室. I think he is a model case of success. He spoke English inside the house and lived in Japanese outside the house.
If your Japanese is so poor that you need to practice with a baby/toddler/child to keep it sharp, it was never that good in the first place.
My daughter deals with 3 languages daily. We maintain English at home through Netflix and parents talking in English. My wife also speaks Portuguese with our daughter. She started Japanese in kindergarten at 2. She speaks mostly English and Japanese while understanding and speaking a little Portuguese. The most important thing is repetition to create neural links at a young age. Then the goal is to maintain them. This means being consistent. By splitting language at home you lose consistency. This will also mean compromise from one parent. Try not to punish or correct the language use as much. When their Japanese becomes stronger, instead of forcing English, try to get them to explain what the word or phrase is in English as if you didn’t understand, then praise them when they are able to do it. If they can’t, help them out then praise them for trying.