Parfois ce sont les petites choses qui font sourire. Deux situations récentes : Ce soir, en fin de repas Mama : “Willst du Käse?” (Tu veux du fromage?) Notre fille (28 mois) : “Non, pas kä!” Elle court au frigo, visant le camembert. Papa : “Tu sais, le truc rond [la boîte de camembert], c’est […]

Yesterday, at almost 29 months, was a good day for talking: two full sentences! From the shoulders of her dad: “Papa, je veux descendre.” (Daddy, I want to go down.) Discovering the still too-complicated-to-handle Crayola pens on a higher shelf: “Il est là mon crayon!” (That’s where my pen is!)

I thought it was good fun to introduce my little girl to Pippi Longstocking. Even more so when I discovered there’s a new illustrated editon with the most lovely pictures. Nostalgic as I am, they made me ditch my old copy with the black-and-white drawings. (Besides, the new one has the new German spelling and […]

Our little girl has very few words she actively uses in both languages. Usually, when she has one word, whether German or French or an onomatopoeia (such as “wauwau” for “dog”), she sticks with that, even if she understands perfectly well when we say “Hund” or “chien”. For some strange reason (and to my obvious […]

Our little girl’s active vocabulary still tends to be mainly French, but when she has a word in one language, she usually sticks with it. The other day, Daddy asked her for the French version of one of her first words in German, namely cheese (Käse/fromage): Daddy: “Tu sais dire fromage?” (Can you say “cheese”?) […]

I was looking forward to this, or rather, I was curious about it. Mixing languages is a stage most bilingual kids go through, and normally it sorts itself out with time, once the child realises there are two different sets of vocabulary and how to use them. Correcting is not recommended, at least not in […]

The other day, at the swimming pool, my little girl didn’t want to get dressed. We were in the communal changing rooms reserved for the baby swimming group, and another child her age came in with his dad. At some point I told her “Guck, der Junge zieht sich auch an.” (“Look, the boy is […]

Last weekend I took my little girl to see her granny (“Oma”) in Germany. It was an occasion to speak and hear only German for a few days, as Daddy stayed home. Oma doesn’t speak much French, and I had to translate “lait” and “chat”, but also “ouais” which she sometimes says instead of “oui”. […]

There are so many words and little sentences she says, but just try to switch on the recorder at the right moment! Whether it’s “papa, la lune” (pointing to the moon) or “pas chat” (not to be confused with “non pas ça”), the recorder is never close at hand. But last Thursday I handed it […]

Comment élever un enfant dans le bilinguisme, c’est le titre d’une émission passée cette semaine sur RFI, avec comme invitée, Barbara Abdelilah-Bauer, fondatrice du Café Bilingue et généralement spécialiste dans la matière. Pour l’instant, l’émission qui dure 26 minutes est encore disponible sur le site de RFI ici. (Si le lien ne marche plus, j’ai […]