Parent to Parent
What is your best "success story" or proudest moment as a parent of a bilingual child?I was surprised by how young he was (two) when he started differentiating the languages and switching back and forth correctly depending on whether he was speaking to his English-only speaking grandparents or to us. I am also surprised when we come back from France every year after a couple months there, and despite having lost much of his English, he is speaking it again just as well as before he left within about two days.
— Mother of bilingual 4 1/2-year old (French)I am very happy to see my son being able to communicate in Chinese with his cousins in China.
— Father of bilingual 6-year old (Chinese)Hearing the two of them speak in French together and realizing how much they have absorbed. It's truly amazing.
— Mother of bilingual 4-year old and 2 1/2-year old (French)They were able to communicate with their grandmother.
— Mother of bilingual adult children (Marathi)He can understand and speak in both languages, and he knows the difference. He can say a word in English and then say it in Spanish. He knows that he needs to speak in Spanish to his relatives because they can't understand another language, and he does it correctly.
— Mother of bilingual 3-year old (Spanish)Just having my children understand my native language because that is an integral part of my cultural heritage.
— Father of trilingual 8-year old and 3-year old (Italian and Farsi)Once when my oldest son was 4, he spent the summer in Japan with his mother. When he got off the plane, my mother met him and said how much she missed him etc, etc. He responded in Japanese and didn't "remember" how to speak English for 2 days. Then it came back all at once. Amazing.
— Father of bilingual 11-year old and 7-year old (Japanese)