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4 - Raising Children Bilingually: What Parents and Educators Should Know about Bilingualism in Children

from Part II - Bilingualism, Literacy Ecologies, and Parental Engagement among Immigrant Families

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 March 2019

Elizabeth Ijalba
Affiliation:
Queens College, City University of New York
Patricia Velasco
Affiliation:
Queens College, City University of New York
Catherine J. Crowley
Affiliation:
Teachers College, Columbia University
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Summary

This chapter discusses how the author and her husband plan to raise their children bilingually; their thinking, researching, and how they control their home language environment to provide sufficient first language exposure for their young children. Their example stands in sharp contrast to the reality of most immigrant families, who do not actively plan for their children’s bilingualism. Despite her expertise in bilingualism and language acquisition, the author describes contemplating parent-type questions about bilingualism. Her purpose in this chapter is to answer questions she believes to be important for a parent raising a bilingual child: Who is bilingual? What language(s) should parents speak at home and why? What language(s) should children be educated in, and why? Why is vocabulary so important for bilingual development? Are there cognitive advantages to being bilingual? Why is vocabulary so important for the overall language development of children? To answer these questions, she provides both research-based information, her own anecdotal descriptions and reasoning, and highlights the many choices that families have in planning for their children’s language acquisition.
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Chapter
Information
Language, Culture, and Education
Challenges of Diversity in the United States
, pp. 61 - 77
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

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