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I have a friend who speaks English to her daughter as well as everyone else but her mother speaks Spanish to her grandaughter. She just turned 2 and already speaks english very clear but will only speak spanish to her grandmother. Very funny, she if pretty fluent in both but will only speak spanish to her nana!

My husband speaks french and english. I speak english and japanese, a bit of french and german. He seems reluctant to speak french to her, but I think it's important to expose her to it now. Of course I am teaching her japanese and ASL, my husband doesn't speak any japanese. I think he is feeling left out. I noticed he has purchased japanese cd's, he is trying to learn some japanese on his commute to and from work. Anyway I know there is some concern that kids my become confused, but having many friends who are bi or multi lingual (their kids too) none of them seem to get the languages confused. I think this because their parents don't mix. They speak the one language without mixing it with another. The children also picked up english even though their parents may use a language exclusively at home. They pick it up from friends and tv. I don't know maybe I just have really smart friends who have really smart children. None of the children were required to take ESL, but for those children who don't pick up english before entering school, that is the purpose of the ESL program.

I think it is very unfair to send your child off to school knowing no english. The teacher shouldn't have to deal with that, PLUS it will hold the other kids back as the teacher will have to take extra time to keep explaining things. I don't get this, of course it is great for a kid to learn different languages but shouldn't they be the most proficient in the language they will use most often?

My two kids. 3yrs and almost 2yrs. know both french and english. we always talk both me and hubby. since they were born. they got used to it. and now that both talk, if they say an english word, then we will repeat it in french or virse versa. And they caught on pretty quick. the two languages have always been equal. my inlaws tend to speak more english an dmy parents more french. it did take my daughter more time to talk, but she knows both now.

We'll try to teach our daughter as many languages as possible. It is not only possible but highly desirable to speak multiple languages; besides being able to communicate with a bigger number of people, you also have the capability to better understand concepts and ideas. English won't be a problem since she'll pick it up from TV and other friends, and it's also how I communicate with my wife. The grade school she'll go to is bilingual (English and Mandarin Chinese), so English won't be an issue.

I think we need to explain the ESL program to that person who keeps commenting on the unfairness of sending children to scholl who do not speak English. ESL is specifically for kids who do not speak English or who do not speak English well. The entore cla__s is made up of students like this. The teacher is trained to teach these children, so it really isn't "unfair to the teacher" at all.

After reading all these posts i think the key is to speak 2 languages at home,i started speaking late b/c i heard 6 languages at the same time,i got confused,the moment we moved and i only heard 2 i started talking (both),so you can go overkill with too many at the same time.BBK,how are you going to introduce mandarin,i know Lisa will probably do it but do you speak it too?

Shelly I speak some "pidjin" mandarin.... not enough to be able to communicate with Lisa.... maybe just tease her :-) Lisa speaks Mandarin to her during the day and I speak Greek to her in the evening . When we are all together on the weekend we speak English. All the learning tools we have (baby einstein etc) are in English. This is the reason I'm not worried Anna picking up English. We know another kid with a trilingual backgound (now 5 yo) and not only he knows all three languages, but he knows what to speak to whom!

3 languages is a limit,at least in my opinion,i spoke 2 at 2 years old and 3 at 4-5 and 4 at 7 years and 6 at 13. I just think that too many to start out with would be too much.I want Jesse to know english and dutch and then spanish.Also a lot of the toys are in different languages,but no dutch though.my family has been sending me cd's with dutch childrens songs and story books,that also makes it easier to introduce dutch.

Shelly that makes sense so he can communicate with your side of the family. Even if he can't speak it he'll understand it. Spanish is good to know in this country, and can help you pick up other Latin-based languages easily.