A Fish In Foreign Waters...

Anyone who has read this blog for a while, or who knows us personally, will know that our family is a little bit different in the languages department. Five years ago, when I fell pregnant with Ava, we made the decision to bring up our children trilingual - they speak German with me, Norwegian with Dave and English with everybody else. It's been a big old adventure and one which, though we were convinced it would work, has only shown its success in the last couple of years since the children having been talking.

My little Lingusts... Loving Librileo!

As a trilingual family (more on that here), getting hold of quality, current books in our home languages can be a challenge... I often wish there was such a thing as a local children's languages library... Perhaps there's a business idea for one day, when I'm not running riot around two little people! For now, however, its a distant dream! Our usual strategy for getting foreign language resources is to take an empty suitcase whenever we travel to one of our language countries, so we can come home laden with books and DVDs that are at the right stage for our girls.

But then, just before the summer holidays, a lovely little email landed in my inbox. A company called Librileo had stumbled across our little blog and wanted to work with us to spread the news about their business!

I am SO excited about this little venture!

Librileo is a Children's Book Box Company, based in Berlin, which was set up exactly for families like us! Families who want their children to have access to excellent reading resources at the right age and stage, but for whom its more of a challenge.




Within a few weeks, a gorgeous little package arrived on our doorstop... Beautifully packed and containing some lovely new native German books, all based around the theme of Autumn and the Forest (which as you all know is my favourite time of year!) They had picked out books which were educationally appropriate for my children's reading (or in my case, not reading) stage and offer different Book Boxes from 0 right through to 8 years old.

To say my girls were thrilled is an understatement.

The books follow a monthly theme, and every month, you receive a new set. The company ships worldwide, so really, wherever you are - Germany or otherwise - if you're a German speaker, you can benefit from these gorgeous children's books!

And perhaps most exciting of all, they wanted to run a giveaway on my blog! Which means one of you can win a book box for your own little linguists just by leaving a comment on the bottom of this blog!

Perhaps the best person to convince you, though, is my three-year-old, Ava...

Here's what she has to say about Librileo's fabulous books!

Good Luck!

* The Giveaway is open to participants worldwide *

* The Giveaway will close at midnight on Tuesday 14th October 2014 *

* The winner will be announced on Friday 17th October 2014 *

* The winner will have 2 weeks to respond to receive their prize, if I do not hear from them by Friday 31st October, they will forfeit the prize to somebody else *

* Librileo will send the prize directly to the winner *

Our multilingual adventure... The second time round!

Multilingualism with a second child has proved a very different ball game to the first...easier? In many ways, yes. I don't get the same funny looks, the same questions, the same confusion. It was actually expected. Of course I was going to speak German to Heidi... Of course Dave was going to speak Norwegian... Of course everyone else would speak English. I guess people kind of knew what to expect this time round; and in a sense, to do anything else would have been strange...

                          

   

And yet Heidi's experience is very different. She has followed a very similar pattern to Ava in terms of timing, and now, at almost 15 months, has around 50 words. Pretty much spot on her sister's experience. And yet, there is one major difference.

Whereas Ava's words at this point were a real mixture of all three languages, Heidi's dominant language at the moment is German. Ava spent the summer she turned one in Norway, with six weeks full on time with Papa and surrounded by the Norwegian language. I was back at work part time, and so she spent 2 days a week with my Mum, in an exclusively English environment. And the German? Well, it may only have been me speaking German to her, but we had a serious amount of one on one time.

Heidi's experience has been totally different, without any intention. She has yet to experience a summer in Norway since she's been talking, so I'm excited to see how her language develops there this summer. I have not returned to work this time, meaning that although she spends a lot of time with my family, it is rarely exclusively English, as I am often there as well. And whereas Ava only got German from me, Heidi gets German from both Ava and myself, and hears conversation all the time at home between the three of us, exclusively in German.

At the moment, German words make up 90% of her vocabulary; she has a few English words: bye-bye (ba-bye), flowers (flow-as), shoes (soos) and house, but most of her words are in German, and while she understands all instructions in Norwegian, she has yet to produce a Norwegian word (with the exception of the opening of the Norwegian prayer we sing before every meal!)

Some people have asked if I'm worried... Will she pick up English? Will she speak Norwegian? I can honestly say I am not. We are learning, and have been learning these past three years, that consistency is the key to everything. As long as I continue, Dave continues and everyone else continues to speak the languages that in the girls eyes we are "supposed" to speak, without mix and matching, I know that in time, this little girl will speak all three with fluency, just like her big sister does.

It is so exciting to see how it all unfolds.

So here's the little ladies new words this month!

Ter-tig (Fertig - finished)

Puppe (doll)

Mehr! (More)

Da! (There)

Nase (nose)

Bauch (tummy)

Blume (flower)

Auto (car)

Schau! (Look!)

Nackedei (naked child)

Flowers

House/Haus

"Ha ber-day too ooo" in song

"All day long!" In song

Wee-ols (Wheels)

Zug/Tog (train)

Sitz! (Sit - meaning I want to sit)

Essen (food)

Kindi Kid!

One of the highlights of our time here has been Ava´s total immersion into German language. From the moment she was born, this girl has lived in a multilingual world... hearing a combination of English, German and Norwegian all of the time.

For the first time in her life... these ten days have been full immersion into one language.

As a non-playgrouper (she´ll start nursery in September), and sometimes of a sensitive nature, I wasn´t so sure how full immersion into German-speaking Kindergarten (where most of the other children are 3 or over) in a foreign country, with people she didn´t know at all would go down with my big girl.

I needn´t have worried.

She has stunned us all.

And I´m having to gulp and realise that my little Ava is turning all grown up on me.

 We found out she has a definite place in our local School Nursery for September last weekend.

This week`s been wonderful preparation.

And I´ve realised its going to be me finding it hard to say goodbye... not her!

#GetGoodSummer for kids!

I am feeling quite proud of my #GetGoodSummer this year. For once, I am actually managing to stick to my goals a bit, though I realise this self-congratulation could be a bit premature! I still have 7 and a half weeks to go!!

I was thinking the other day, though, that I would like to make some goals for Ava M this summer too... things for us to work together on for her to achieve. The summer is meant to be a time for us all to relax as a family and enjoy spending time together, but it is nice if you can look back and see what you've done. For Ava, I basically have one MAJOR intention, and four others that I would like to have a go at with her!

#1: Get potty trained! This is the biggy! We have been on the potty training journey for quite a while now. Our adventure started back in January when we gave it a good go. Ava was pretty good, but it became evident that she  wasn't quite ready. With the arrival of little sister, we decided to stall until the Summer.

This summer in Norway should be the perfect opportunity... I'm hoping the weather will be good, so she can wander around the fjordside without a nappy and clearing up accidents therefore won't be disastrous!

Wish us luck!

#2: Learn her colours: I was looking up the other day when children are supposed to be able to do this... at the moment, everything is pink or green to Ava. She's impressed some people with her colour ability, only for them later to discover that her answer of "green!" was a pure shot in the dark! Lol... I've gathered a collection of items to help me with my latest scheme - books and puzzles on the theme of colour, crayons and playdough, as well as just random everyday objects, will all play their part! We'll see...

#3: Join German-speaking playgroup: This was on my to-do list for Ava, and I'm pleased to say we bit the bullet on this one on Monday and headed to our local German-speaking Mum's and Tots group. It was a lovely morning, brilliant for me to get the chance to speak some adult German, and great for Ava to mix, for the first time, with other German-speaking children. It was fascinating to watch her thought process as she registered that these children were speaking the same language as Mama, and I'm so excited to see how this weekly/fortnightly trip enhances her language! (Our multilingual story is here!)

#4: Start to learn the children's catechism: On Sunday, one of the Pastors at our church introduced a memory verse for the children to learn... it went like this (see if you can guess the nursery rhyme tune!)

Ro-Ro-Ro-mans 8, 

and verse 39

Nothing can separate

us from the love of God

Well, needless to say, Ava M has been singing it all week, on repeat and basically hasn't stopped. How wonderful that at less than 2 years old, she has learnt this incredible truth! With this in mind, I spent an hour last week, translating the children's cateschism into German and we have started on the first two questions... she has mastered them with ease - oh to have the memory of a one-year-old! I have planned out some little activities to do alongside each question, and we will attempt one new question every week... so far we've covered...

- Who made you? God made me!

- What else did God make? God made everything!

Watch this space!
(The catechism we are using can be bought here!)

#5: Swim in the fjord: Ha! This could be a fun one. Ava is a funny one when it comes to new experiences. She will fearlessly climb a huge climbing frame, but will scream if you push her, even just gently, on a swing!! Bizarre! Getting my daughter into the cold water of the Norwegian fjords could be fun, but with the help of her Minnie Mouse swimming costume, a life jacket and a rubber dinghy that her Grandparents have bought her, I'm hopeful that she'll make her Sognefjord debut. Last year she made it as far as paddling... we'll see what this year holds!

So that's Ava's #GetGoodSummer... why not sit down with your kids and ask them what they'd like to achieve this summer?

Bucket lists aren't just for adults!

Bringing up trilingual children

"So, what language are you speaking to Ava?"

"German"

"Oh, I see, so Dave speaks English to her?"

"No, he speaks Norwegian"

Look of bewilderment.

It's a conversation I've had a hundred times... if not more! When we made the decision to bring our children up trilingual, we were prepared for a lot of odd looks, curious questions and doubting responses. It's an alien concept in the UK, and we knew that some people would think it was brilliant, others would think it was weird, and others would think it was "wrong" (why would you ever speak a language that is not your mother tongue to your own children??)

So I thought I'd write it down, for the wide world to understand... why are we doing it? How are we doing it? Is it working?? And hopefully, break down some of the misconceptions people have about the whole thing. It is a TOTALLY alien concept to the majority of our friends, and we have had some pretty funny questions (from very clever, educated, normal people) that just show how out-of-this-world the concept seems to be...
* So how often do you teach Ava German? (teach Ava German? She's 1 and a half... she is not having "German lessons"... she's just picking it up as we go along!)
* So, does Heidi understand you? (err... Heidi understands no-one at the moment. She is 8 weeks old. She understands facial expressions and tones of voice. She understands German as well as she understands English as well as she understands Mandarin Chinese)
* Will you speak German to Heidi as well? (nope, I'm going to give her sister this amazing head-start in life, and just speak English to Heidi... of COURSE I'll speak German to her too! It would be far too confusing for me not to!)

Ava having a "German lesson" (not!)

Anyway, there's an example of three of the misconceptions I've been approached with recently, and I'm not judging... it just goes to show how clueless we British are about language acquisition. Take a trip to India, Switzerland or even Wales and you'll see tiny children coping with multiple languages. They are like sponges... they soak anything and everything up!

So here's where the story began... back in 2005 in a little mountain village in Austria. I was a languages student at University on my year abroad, and I had the wonderful opportunity to get to hang out with these kids...

Me with T and K back in 2006

This is T and K... when this picture was taken, they were 8 and 3. They are fluent in English and in German. Both of their parents are Austrian, but their Mum had spent her growing up years in Africa, where she had learnt English, and then spent two years as a Nanny in the States in her late teens. She was the first person who ever put the thought in my head that it was possible to speak a language not your mother tongue to your children. Of course, you have to be confident, pretty fluent and determined to make it work. She was. And I was inspired. I decided then I would bring any children I ever had up in German...

Fast forward 3 years and I married a fellow languages student who was half-norwegian (and fluent in English, Norwegian, French and German - sickening, hey?!) Because he understood German, I knew my "bilingual plan" would be supported. Either I would speak German, and Dave English, or he would speak Norwegian, and I would speak English. When I fell pregnant with Ava, I got the go ahead from Dave who decided it would feel most natural for him if he spoke English.

"Speak to your Bump in German" T and K's Mum told me, "and buy in resources... you'll need them"

So I went to town buying "The very hungry caterpillar" and "The Gruffalo" and all my favourite children's books in German and was all geared up, chattering away to my ever growing bump in German, until, when I was 8 months pregnant, Dave dropped the bombshell...

"I've changed my mind. I want to speak Norwegian to the baby"

By this point, there was no going back for me. The Baby's room was full of German storybooks; I'd even started writing in the "Baby Book" in German...

And so we entered the unknown. The world of trilingual children.

Our baby would be spoken to in German by it's Mama, Norwegian by it's Papa and Bestamor (Granny) and English by my family and everyone else.

I'm a fairly confident person. There's not a lot that phases or embarrasses me. But I have to admit, I found the first couple of months of speaking purely German to Ava tough (that is the secret if you really want it to work. You must be ABSOLUTELY consistent with what language you speak... it helps the child distinguish between the languages and prevents confusion). I was very aware of what other people thought. We had prepped our family and close friends. But it was the acquaintances who gave odd looks that threw me. I felt I needed to justify and "explain" myself.

We have made this decision as a family, because we think having the ability to communicate to others in their own language is such a great gift... we want our girls to be world-vision children... not thinking that the world revolves around Great Britain, but seeing the bigger picture. We have done this because we know that learning a language is dead simple when you're one, and ridiculously hard as an adult. We have done it because, after a lot of prayer and questioning our motives, we actually felt it could be a gift that, God-willing, he might use in our girls lives in the future.

Me having to work hard at learning Norwegian - the girls get it so easy!

We have been absolutely consistent with what we speak to the girls. With three languages flying around, confusion could have been easy, so it was vital that Ava knew who spoke what and associated the language with the people. I only speak German to them, all the time. Dave only speaks Norwegian to them, all the time. Everyone else speaks English. By a year old, Ava was saying "Heiss", "heit" and "hot".

Celebrating her Norwegian heritage at the London Olympics!

It has been so exciting, these past 6 months, to watch the penny drop as Ava has acquired more and more words, and has now, these past couple of months, been starting to form sentences. This month we have seen a huge development in her speaking the right language to the right person. It still blows my mind, that whenever my Mum walks through the door, Ava switches straight to English.

With Heidi, the trilingualism been a lot easier... Ava is talking in all three languages now, so people have seen that it has worked and therefore they are less questioning. They all know we don't speak English at home, so they haven't been surprised by my German with Heidi.

Ava 'reading' "Der Lolli" to Heidi

Its an exciting journey!

We love our languages, but we are holding them loosely. If, at any point, we feel that the language is impinging on our relationship with the girls, or feel it is affecting our ability to communicate with them, discipline them, or have those deep-and-meaningfuls with them, its out the window. The languages are not the be all and end all, but what a gift to give them if we can.

Please fire your questions at us!

Our Multilingual Singer!

I've had a whole ton of questions recently about our trilingual family; why we're doing it, how we're doing it, whether its working, so I plan to post about that tomorrow...

For now, though, the sun is shining, and I have a million and one things to do, and I want to do that post justice...

So here's our little singer instead!

Ava loves to sing... She is a walking music box half the time and comes out with the most random songs at the most random times! In every case below, Ava was singing the song beautifully until I got the camera out... then it all went a bit pear-shaped, but you'll get the rough idea!!

Enjoy... These are three of her favourites!

The English One: Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star

The German One: Backe Backe Kuchen

The Norwegian One: Ja, Eg Veit At Jesus Bryr Seg Om Meg (with backing vocals from Heidi!)

All performed with oodles of personality for you! Not sure she's going to be the next X factor star, but hey, I can live with that!!

Savouring the moment...

I have been working a bit more this week, trying to squeeze in all my hours before I go on maternity leave again. I do love teaching; the children were very sweet and hardworking and are beginning to get quite excited about our imminent arrival. But I love it when the weekend swings round and I know I have 5 whole days with my Ava M. She is such a little bundle of joy and chatters away now in all three languages. It still doesn't cease to amaze me how much she has picked up. This morning, I was up in the bathroom brushing my teeth, while she was down in the hallway waiting for me at the stair gate and I could see her trying to reach her coat. "Jacke" (the German word for coat) she repeated 3 times before then saying "coat" on repeat in English another three times. Amazing.

I love savouring those sweet little moments... Hearing her chatter to herself, watching her play, enjoying bedtime snuggles. I know that in no time she will be grown up and I'll be struggling to remember these little details, so I'm doing my level best to store 'em up and keep 'em safe.

I do love that Girly...

PS Ava's bedroom will be revealed in all its glory on Monday (!!)... I just have a few finishing touches to make and plan to have her sleeping in there tomorrow night... Eek! Exciting!

My little dictionary...

Language is an incredible thing, isn't it? I have been absolutely amazed, these past couple months, as Ava's vocabulary has expanded, to see how much she soaks up without me even realising it. She is literally picking up a word a day and its so much fun.

I love wandering the streets to the delighted cries of "Au-to!" (car), and watching my daughter climb up on the chair and reach for her favourite DVD and call out "Heidi! Pe-ter! Baa!" (there are a lot of goats in Heidi!) Its so rewarding to be woken up in the morning by a little voice calling "Mama?" and hear her cute names for her soft toys "Ber-yi" (Bearli), "Gre-gor" (MacGregor) and "Baby". She calls out any version of "heit", "heiss" or "hot" at every hot drink, radiator, oven and candle...

The funniest thing we've come across with the whole trilingual thing, is that Ava seems now to be beginning to distinguish between the languages. On Tuesday, some friends came over and were asking about how its working out. I replied that Ava is able to say a few words in each language, but that she understands most things you say to her now in any of the three... I turned to Ava and said,

"Was sagen die Ente, Ava?" (What do the ducks say?")
"Quack, Quack!" came the immediate response...
I then turned round to her and said, in English,
"What do the ducks say Ava?"
She looked at me, frowned slightly and then looked away. When I repeated the question, she point blank ignored me.

I have to admit to being slightly confused by this reaction - I KNOW she knows the answer to that question - she answers to my Mum all the time, and it suddenly dawned on me that perhaps she was beginning to recognise which language she was being spoken to in and associating languages with certain people. In other words, she wasn't answering me because I was speaking the "wrong" language to her...

I turned to Rosie and said, "you ask her..."

Rosie: "Ava, what do the ducks say?"
Ava" "Quack! Quack!"

I was telling my Mum this story yesterday and decided to try it out again. Again, she answered me in German, and then point blank ignored me in English. The minute my Mum asked her, she responded happily.

How weird is that?!

It reminded me of when I lived with the bilingual family in Austria and occasionally spoke to Kaya in German (Kaya was 2 at the time). Every time I did, she would turn to me with an angry face and say:
"Claire! No! You speak English!"

This whole trilingual thing is a HUGE learning curve for us - but its so very exciting to watch it unfold and its incredibly to see how such little minds are capable of sorting out such complex stuff. I guess being secure and confident in what language each of us speaks to her has enabled Ava to figure out what it is we're saying. The moment we "mess up" the system and speak the "wrong" language to her, it throws her into confusion!

Crazy stuff!

Going quattrolingual...?!

Kaya, one of the bilingual kids I lived with, aged 2 -
"reading" the english dictionary!

Yesterday, I spent the morning on my "40 bags in 40 days" mission (more on that tomorrow!) and literally ransacked my larder. I took EVERYTHING out, cleaned it out, got rid of old packaging, put half full bags of flour and rice and pasta into my canisters, stacked my tins, recycled a tonne of cardboard and found lots of things I thought I'd lost!

While all this was going on, I had one of those "bad mother" moments... I plonked my six month old in front of the TV and put on "Aristocats."

Ava was merrily jabbering away to the television, and suddenly, with my arms full of canisters and a cloud of flour dust emerging from the bag I'd just emptied I heard...

"AIUTO!!!!"

Huh??? I swivelled round, and realised poor Ava had just watched 15 minutes of "Aristocats" in Italian. Poor child... as if three languages aren't enough for her already!!

Her complete oblivion to the fact that she was watching it in another language (she IS only 6 months after all!) just embedded the fact for me that doing this trilingual thing is the right thing for us. For those of you who don't know, Ava is going to grow up with three languages. Dave speaks Norwegian with her, I speak German with her and everyone else speaks English.

We've had a lot of reactions to this - odd looks, curious questions and compliments too! Why on earth would we choose not to speak our mother tongue to our child?

I have had contact with a number of multilingual families over the past few years - I worked in a bilingual Kindergarten in Austria, lived with a bilingual family there, have come across numerous bilingual kids as a teacher, and am married to a bilingual kid myself (Dave was brought up with english/norwegian). I am utterly convinced that the best way to "learn" a language is not to learn it at all, but simply to be immersed in it. If we can give this gift to Ava, then what a blessing it will be for her. I have prayed and prayed about whether it was the right thing to do, and am convinced that this is what is right for us now... it definitely wouldn't be right for everyone, and I know some people find it a little odd, but I'm convinced that its working for us as a family now and feel real peace about it.

I hope that, one day, Ava will be able to use her languages for God's glory... but for now, she's just soaking it all in... and why not throw a little Italian in there as well...

Aiuto!