[teranga]

I am in full agreement that there are tremendous benefits to raising a bilingual (or more) child...we have 3 children, and would like to raise them with more than one language, but we are only fluent in English (we have smatterings of other languages, but not enough).

My oldest (6) wants to learn Chinese. There is a weekend Chinese school here, so I enrolled her in that, but it's only 1 hour/week and I found on the first week, that even though it is called Chinese as a Second Language, pretty much everyone in the class has at least one Chinese speaking parent...(plus, turns out I signed up for the 2nd semester, so they were too far ahead to catch up).

I've signed my 6 year old and my 4 year old up for Spanish (still an hour a week, but at least I can help somewhat with homework and read some basic kids' books to them in Spanish, which I couldn't in Chinese). I'll put them in a week long summer immersion course for Spanish, but...is it enough?

Is it possible for them to pick it up quickly enough/well enough without reinforcement at home?

My 6 yo wants to sign up for the 1st level Chinese when it's offered again next fall, but I wonder if she would be able to make much progress in one hour/week (and no summer immersion near us). I wonder if even the Spanish will amount to something which makes a difference...

What do you think?? Anyone here raise a child bilingual (or close to it) without a FT bilingual school or bilingual parents?? Is it possible??

[jenniferw223]

I have been wondering the same thing myself. My son is only 2 and he goes to a private sitter three days a week who pretty much just speaks Spanish. He understands her completly and is saying some Spanish words. I wonder how long I ahve to keep him there until he will remember it. I plan on leaving him atleast another year until he is three but may leave him until he is four depending on how much Spanish he learns.