A consistent thread in our language journey has always been to find what works and lean into it. Protecting the positive relationship that Bilingual Baby has with Spanish is our number one priority. If speaking Spanish becomes a chore, all is lost.
She has always loved explaining things to people: the rules of games (both invented and traditional), how a toy works, how to get places (the most unreliable backseat driver ever). So when her grandmother, Mimmy, in Massachusetts asked for help with her Spanish homework, we set up a Zoom right away.
Mimmy’s second language is French, so she’s brave to be starting from the very beginning with Spanish. And I’m so grateful Bilingual Baby has family modeling doing hard things and putting in practice time.
Here’s Bilingual Baby helping her grandmother over Zoom with parts-of-the-face vocabulary:
Around the same time (fall, 2021), when she was asked by our friends at MamaLingua why she likes being bilingual, she said she liked that it allowed her to speak to other people whether they speak Spanish or English, and to be a translator.
I love that she sees her bilingualism as a tool for being a connector, for getting to play with more friends, for helping to translate when it’s needed.
