Trilingual Parents

We speak 5 languages between my partner and I, predominantly English and French and we live Spain. I was wondering if someone had experienced something similar as we would really like our child to be raised trilingual at least (french, english, spanish) and introduce the two minority languages (creole and Catalan) later as we think it might be too much but still think it is very important she learns them. How would that work in the household? I see a lot of articles and podcasts about bilingual parents, but not that much trilingual or polyglot. We are both french but speak mainly in english because of our work, so it has become the main language at home. For couples who are native in 3 or more languages, how did you raise your child to be multilingual?

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Sorry no advice, hopefully someone else comments but just wanted to say I think this is fantastic and I think it will be so great for your child!!

We're focusing on Spanish and English at the moment. One parent speaks one language, and when we're all together, we use English. We live in Spain, so she also gets a lot of Spanish exposure in her environment. Some of our friends are doing something similar, with each parent taking a language and a third language introduced at nursery — it seems to be working well for them too! We often do things like "Mummy says..., Daddy dice..." to help her connect both words. She usually picks the easier word in each case — like saying apple instead of manzana, or agua instead of water. We’ve got lots of books and songs in both languages — often in duplicate!

Perhaps put her in a Catalan speaking nursery when she is ready?

My fiancé is Hmong, but also speaks Spanish, my family French (dominantly) and Mexican. Our main language is English cause we live in the states. We’re focusing on French and Spanish, but that’s because Spanish our kids will definitely use here, and French because my family speaks that dominantly and some even live overseas. His family speaks Hmong and English but we agreed Hmong is too much in itself but if our kids pick anything up from his family then that’s a bonus. It’s mainly just instilling what language(s) (up to 2) you want at home. With their environmental language being learned at home and in the real world. Their secondary main language to be learned at home. And whatever else that is “less important” can be learned from interacting with family members. Ex: I grew up mainly with French and English, my (step)dads side is from the states so they speak English, my moms is a blend of Mexican and French, but is French dominant so that’s what I mainly grew up with

Hi, at home I would recommend doing one parent, one language — so one of you speaks to her in English and the other in French. I wouldn’t worry too much about Spanish and Catalan, as she’ll pick them up at school. x

Agree/aligned with @Chloe & @Raquel - I am French and my partner is Polish and we are living in London. So, we want our child to speak French, Polish & English. So, I speak French to him and he speaks Polish to him. He will learn English at nursery. I also have a Swedish friend living in Copenhagen. He is Swedish, her wife is Colombian. Their son speaks Swedish with his father, Spanish with his mother & Danish at nursery. He is 3 and speaks the 3 languages. 🙂 It seems that the easiest for a child to pick up the language is one parent, one language.

Hi! So we both speak English. His first language is Chinese and I’m fairly fluent in French and Russian, while restudying my Spanish. We decided to start with English (it’s the main language in the country and the families) and Chinese since his parents are more comfortable with it and it’s the hardest of them all. My two year old has been speaking both English and Chinese. They did assume she was slow on her speaking but turns out I wasn’t picking out the Chinese well as I’m currently learning it myself. My almost one year old love Chinese and has been calling their dad baba (dad in Chinese). He also answers more to Chinese. I found a Chinese version of ms Rachel and I’ll play that once or twice a day. Plus me learning it has helped as well. We are now incorporating French as it’s the one I’m more comfortable with while letting them continue watching things in either Chinese, English, or sometimes Spanish to work that in since it’s close to French. (1/2)

(2/2) My duaghter seems to be picking up the new languages a bit and my son seems to prefer Chinese but will get excited when is peak French. So I would say pick the two you guys can both do or atleast one does one and one does the other and basically throw it at them. They soak it up fast, but stay consistent. That’s key in this. I stopped with my daughter for a bit and I think that’s what caused her to pick it up slower. And take it slow. Don’t throw another one at them until you think they got the first two down but you can definitely introduce it to them young. And don’t translate it, treat it as though you’re speaking English. If you’ll put your arms out when you say come here in English, do the same when you say it in another language. They’ll figure it out quickly.

Also find a school specific to the language once she’s old enough for it. I’ll be putting my kids in Chinese school next year.