In the last year, both Ana Lilian and I have shared a lot with you about how we’re raising our children bilingual + bicultural—joys and challenges included. Although we’ve shared some details, one thing we have not really done is tell you the how we grew up bilingual ourselves. In honor of SpanglishBaby’s first anniversary, we figured we’d get a bit more personal and allow you to get to know us a little bit better…

Roxana’s Story: A Multicultural Upbringing

The tale of how I grew up bilingual is totally different from that of my children. I am an immigrant who moved to this country from Perú as a teenager. Luckily, I already spoke English when I got here which made the transition a bit smoother.

Before I turned 15, I had already lived in three different continents (South America, Africa and North America) and had been exposed to at least four languages: Spanish, English, French and Afrikaans. I can’t deny it was a bit rough moving every couple of years growing up, but I wouldn’t change it for the world. It was rough because of the friendships we had to leave behind, but this also meant we got to meet people from all kinds of backgrounds.

As I’ve mentioned in the past, both my parents are bilingual (Spanish/English). My father taught himself English as an adult and my mother went to a bilingual British school in Lima, Peru. My sister and I attended the same school while we lived in Peru both before our travels started and when we returned several years later after a stint in Johannesburg, South Africa. Without the education and training I received there, I don’t think I’d be sitting here comfortably writing this in English, my second tongue.

Looking back, I think one of the most difficult moves was from Argentina to South Africa when I was nine years old. At this point in my life, I hadn’t really done much of the bilingual education thing and although I understood some basic English vocabulary, my parents realized it wouldn’t be enough and as soon as the move to Johannesburg was confirmed, they enrolled me in English classes while we waited for everything to be ready for the transfer. I remember nothing of them, but they must have helped because when we finally did move, I was able to survive in school—except for when we had Afrikaans lessons and I was utterly and helplessly lost!

By the time my father was transferred to Florida, I had several years of solid dual language instruction in English and Spanish. Although I can’t say moving to the U.S. as a teenager was not a shock, the fact that I at least was fairly proficient in the majority language made a huge difference. In school, I did not have to attend any ESL classes and in fact, I was placed in advanced English since my written skills tended to surpass those of my peers who were born and raised in the U.S. I must confess, though, that at first I really did not feel comfortable speaking English and I made every attempt to befriend those who spoke Spanish. Luckily we were in Miami.

Most of my family, on my mom’s side at least, is at the very minimum bilingual. Both my aunts, in fact, are English educators in Latin America. All my cousins speak English and some, additional languages. When SpanglishBaby was just an idea, I remember telling one of my aunts about it. She was kind of surprised that there would actually be a need for a blog like this. I guess maybe because they—my mom and her sisters—didn’t really think too much about the idea of their children growing up bilingual the way they had. In other words, they’re all bilingual because their father, my grandfather, was ahead of his time and sacrificed everything so they could attend one of the most prestigious bilingual schools in Peru.

I had to explain to my aunt that things are totally different for those of us who live in the U.S. but are Latino. For us, raising bilingual children is more than just speaking two languages. As I’ve said in the past, it has to do with heritage, culture, identity and familia.

I wonder if my children will feel so passionate about raising their own kids bilingual?

Ana Lilian’s Story: A Child of Both Worlds

I’m truly a child of both worlds. You can almost say I had it easy in the language acquisition sense. It’s not like I tried hard to learn Spanish and English. I just did.

My mother, my sister and I moved to El Salvador from Houston when I was six years old. My mom says that by the time we moved I was already perfectly bilingual. I don’t think she really gave it much thought at that time. I was getting plenty of English at kindergarten in Houston and playing with my English-speaking neighbors. The Spanish I got from both parents, my aunt who lived with us and the large group of party-loving Latinos my parents hung out with.

The one thing my mom had very clear was that she wanted us to attend an American school in El Salvador. The Escuela Americana follows a North American curriculum from kindergarten through high school, which meant I only had one class in Spanish every day. Not much, right? Well, I still learned to read and write it no problem. How? Because I was immersed in Spanish as it was the majority language. English, being the minority, had to be more strongly reinforced through school and activities.

Summers and some holidays were spent in Houston with my dad and his new family. This meant we were practically immersed in English, and bullied into speaking it well by our step-brothers or face the wrath of teases.

The fact that it was an organic and almost unplanned process for me to become bilingual, bi-literate and bicultural also made me naive as to the idea of having to actually have a plan with my daughter. The  thought had never crossed my mind before having her. Now I know how truly lucky I was to be given the gift of two languages—my mother did try for the third one, but I was way too necia!

Growing up with one foot on this side of the border and another on that side instilled in me a confidence that allows me to feel at ease in either culture with their many traditions. A confidence built around knowing the kinks of each culture and being able to automatically navigate between one and the other with out a thought.

Will  me daughter have that same confidence? I don’t have the answer yet, but at least it gives me a marker towards which to navigate to.

We invite you to share your story: how did you grow up bilingual?

----------------- FEATURED SPONSOR -----------------
--Ingenio-Bilingual Toys

--Latino Educators- Bringing Bilingual Educators and Parents Together
------------------------------

This CD just puts me in a good mood.  It makes me want to sing-a-long, if only my daughter would let me, and to relax with a tall bubbly drink.  Oh, yes,  it’s also totally entertaining for your bilingual or Spanish-learning child as well.  Thomas, AKA the Spanglish Wrangler, knows his music.  The birth of his two children, coupled with his love of Spanish, led him on a journey to compose 12 enchanting songs where Spanish and English effortlessly flow to the beat of blues, acoustic rock, and overall good-vibe music.

Amongst my favorite tracks is the acoustic”Emociones” where he grooves about basic emotions:  “When I’m triste I’ll cry” or “My head is high when I’m orgulloso.” The first time we heard it my daughter proclaimed:  “Me no cry. Me feliz!”  And me feliz, too.

You won’t be able to stop yourself from singing along with his translation of the classic “You Are My Sunshine” which he titled “Eres Mi Vida.”  I know, this song has been done and redone so many times, but the Spanglish Wrangler hit the mark here converting it into a soft, yet rhythmic, acoustic melody in Spanish you’ll want to sing while in a lovely embrace.  Ok, again, if my daughter will let me!

I’m thankful the Spanglish Wrangler sent us a copy of this CD to review so we can honestly let you know about this treasure of indie, original bilingual music for our niños.   We have three copies to give away, but you can also go to his site to listen to all the tracks and to find out where it’s sold.

The Giveaway

Enter here to win one of three copies of the Spanglish Wrangler CD. Just click over to his website here and tell us which of the 12 songs is your favorite.

That’s all you have to do to enter this giveaway. If you want to up your chances at winning, then this is how you can get additional entries (only after you´ve completed the step above):

**Please leave a separate comment for each so we can count them and avoid mistakes.

1. Subscribe to our feed via email or RSS and leave us an extra comment letting us know you did so or that you’re already a subscriber.

2. Follow us on Twitter and tweet about this giveaway including a link to the post. Copy the link to the tweet in an additional comment on the giveaway’s post.

3. Blog about this giveaway making sure to include our link, and you’ll get TWO additional entries.

This giveaway ends Sunday, March 14 at midnight EST and you must have a valid US address to enter.

Disclosure: A sample product was provided for review purposes; all opinions are 100% ours.  Check out our full Disclosure + Privacy Policy.

For the part that nobody likes, but we’ve gotta have, check out the Giveaway Rules.

----------------- FEATURED SPONSOR -----------------
--Ingenio-Bilingual Toys

--Latino Educators- Bringing Bilingual Educators and Parents Together
------------------------------

Talk about Spanglish…I love the title of this collection from Bilingual Readers.

One of my favorite things from this bilingual publishing house, which was born only last year in Spain, is the way they package their products. Their books have been a hit at our home, in part, because of the cool way they are presented. The Two Little Libros collection is no different. The two, 16-page board books come in a sturdy slipcase which already makes them different and interesting for little, exploring hands.

Each rounded page shows a unique image of an animal—from either the sea or the jungle—and its corresponding name in English (on top) and in Spanish (on the bottom). I actually thought these would be too easy for my 3-year-old daughter, but she loves “reading” the names of the animals out loud in both English and Spanish—especially now that she’s la hermana mayor and likes to show off to her baby brother!

One interesting thing about the books is that some of the animal names it depicts, we don’t really use at home.

Examples:

• gamba for shrimp (we call them camarones)
• medusa for jellyfish (we call them malaguas)

When Vanessa was younger, I usually just told her the word with which I was more familiar. But now, a couple of things have changed. One, I think she’s old enough to start understanding we can use different words to name the same things. We all know this is true for all kinds of words in Spanish, especially if we’re talking food. This is a topic we’ve dealt with in the past.

The second reason why I’m actually using the words on the books is that my daughter is fascinated with letters and she spells out words any chance she gets. Although she’s not reading yet, I do not want to confuse her by telling her a word says “camarón,” for example, when it really says “gamba.” In other words, eventually she will recognize that one starts with a “C” while the other one starts with a “G.”

Another really cool feature offered by Bilingual Readers, especially for those of you who might need help with pronunciation in either language, is their free and downloadable audio files.

We’re big fans of Bilingual Readers and we’ve enjoyed reviewing their other two products, Easy Alphabet! and Marina and the Little Green Boy. We can’t wait to see what they’ll be publishing this year!

THE GIVEAWAY

Even though the publishers are working on making their products available in U.S. stores, you still have a chance to get a set of Two Little Libros: Sea Animals + Jungle Animals by entering this giveaway! Just visit their site, Bilingual Readers, and come back and tell us one thing you learned about their products/books.

That’s all you have to do to enter this giveaway. If you want to up your chances at winning, then this is how you can get additional entries (only after you’ve completed the step above):

**Please leave a separate comment for each so we can count them and avoid mistakes.

1. Subscribe to our feed via email or RSS and leave us an extra comment letting us know you did so or that you’re already a subscriber. Make sure to leave the comment using the same email you subscribed with.

2. Follow us on Twitter and tweet about this giveaway including a link to the post. Copy the link to the tweet in an additional comment on the giveaway’s post.

3. Blog about this giveaway making sure to include our link, and you’ll get TWO additional entries.

This giveaway ends Sunday, March 14 at midnight EST.

For the part that nobody likes, but we’ve gotta have, check out the Giveaway Rules.

----------------- FEATURED SPONSOR -----------------
--Ingenio-Bilingual Toys

--Latino Educators- Bringing Bilingual Educators and Parents Together
------------------------------

One of our main goals when launching SpanglishBaby a year ago was to create the kind of community where parents raising bilingual kids could come and get useful and relevant information. Although we sometimes think we might have the answers to everything, as Ana Lilian likes to point out, motherhood has humbled us and now we know we don’t. Enter our most popular category: Ask an Expert.

We always envisioned having a panel with respected and trusted experts from various backgrounds related to bilingualism and we’re happy to announce that this is exactly what Ask an Expert has become. We currently count with the expertise of eight amazing professionals who take turns answering one of your questions every Wednesday. We feel honored and grateful to have such a distinguished panel, but we’d like to take a moment here to thank two of them in particular who believed in us and supported our vision even before we got started.

Our very first panelist was Simona Montanari, and Italian mom of two trilingual girls and an early multilingual development expert at California State University in Los Angeles. Ana Lilian first met her when she attended one of the popular seminars she hosts in LA for parents raising bilinguals. She immediately knew Simona’s personal and professional expertise in bilingualism and her ease in relating with parents would make her an ideal expert for the panel. In fact, she helped us launch this site by writing the very first Ask an Expert.

Author and bilingualism researcher Barbara Zurer Pearson was the second expert who agreed to come on board without hesitation. Reading her insightful book, Raising a Bilingual Child, was one of the first things both Ana Lilian and I did in the initial stages of SpanglishBaby. It was our bible. I still remember writing Barbara an email explaining what we were doing and telling her we’d be honored if she’d agreed to join us as one of our experts. Getting her positive response remains as one of the most memorable highlights from those early days.

A special MUCHAS GRACIAS goes out to both Simona and Barbara for believing in us way before anybody else.

If you’re new here or you don’t really know exactly how our Ask an Expert category works, it’s pretty simple. If you have a doubt about anything related to raising bilingual and bicultural children, all you have to do is submit your question here. We’ll try to match it to the expert who best fits your needs. Every week we post one of question with a practical answer you can implement in your daily life. Just remember: no question is too big or too simple. If you have a doubt, most likely it’s shared by all.

And, now, just so you get a taste for what we’re talking about, here’s a sample of some of the most popular questions we’ve received in the last year:

1. Should I do Something about my Son’s Grammar Mistakes?
2. How do I Continue to Reinforce Exposure to Spanish?
3. Does my Son Have a Speech Delay Because he is Bilingual?
4. How Do you Raise a Child from an English Speaking Home to Speak Spanish?
5. When Should my Child Learn to Read in a Second Language?
6. What Should I do if my Child Mixes Languages?

I know some of this will surely resonate with you, but this is only a small sample. If you’d like to read more answers to some of the burning questions we all have about raising bilingual kids, go here.

Oh, and don’t forget about our daily giveaways in the SpanglishBabyFinds section in celebration of our first year! We’re having a different one every day this week and you can still enter all of the ones we’ve posted so far!

What do you think of our experts?  We’d love to read your thoughts.

----------------- FEATURED SPONSOR -----------------
--Ingenio-Bilingual Toys

--Latino Educators- Bringing Bilingual Educators and Parents Together
------------------------------

Photo credit: http://www.wordle.net

Where to Start?

We’re celebrating our first anniversary this week with lots of new features and awesome giveaways. We know many of you have been following us from the beginning—and for that, we are extremely grateful—but for some, SpanglishBaby is a recent discovery. Regardless of which category best describes you, it’s never a bad idea to get a refresher on some of the great content we’ve covered since inception—after all, it has been a whole 12 months!

If you’re brand new here, I suggest you start with the following general articles related to raising bilingual + bicultural children. These articles contain the kind of background information you’ll need if you’re just getting started:

• Why Raise Bilingual Children and Even More Reasons to Raise Bilingual Kids: The Latest Studies and Yes, it is a Great Idea to Raise Them Bilingual
• Away with the Myths and 3 Common Myths Debunked by a Speech Therapist
• Two Languages, Many Methods
• The Mistakes we Make
• Is There Such a Thing as a Critical Period for Language Learning
• Top 10 Books for Parents Raising Bilingual Children

For tips on how to successfully raise bilingual kids and ideas on how to deal with some of the most common issues/problems related to bilingualism, you can read the following:

• Five Ways to Boost the Minority Language Outside the Home
• Are Playgroups Really that Important
• Simple Tips for when Your Child Refuses to Use the Minority Language
• How to Create a Perceived Need for the Minority Language
• 5 Ways to Enrich Your Child’s Vocabulary
• How to Turn any Event into a Learning Opportunity

We’ve spent a lot of time writing about bilingual education and we’re happy to say we’ve learned a lot along the way. Now you can too:

• Bilingual Education: A Definition
• What are Dual Language Immersion Programs
• Foreign Language Academies of Glendale: A Dual Immersion Case Study
• What if There are No Dual Immersion Programs in Your City?
• Useful Links to Resources: Bilingual Education
• Full Immersion Language Schools: An Explanation

We also spent a whole week writing about the most popular method used by those raising bilingual children, the OPOL method or the One Parent/One Language method:

• An In-depth Look at the Most Popular Method of Raising Bilingual Kids
• Why this is the Way to Go if You’re Raising a Bilingual Child
• Why and How this Method Works for Our Family
• Useful Links: OPOL Method

Finally, we’ve had the opportunity to interview some awesome role models who are poniendo su granito de arena in this great journey of raising bilingual kids. Check them out:

• Jorge Ramos…On Raising Bilingual Children
• Pat Mora: El Día de los Niños/El Día de los Libros
• Jeannette Kaplun and her Bicultural Family
• How Dora the Explorer was Born
• Alina Rosario: Los Niños en su Casa + Her Bilingual Family

Looks like a lot of reading, huh? The good thing is that now it’s all in one post which you can refer back to whenever you need. Come back tomorrow for  highlights of some of the questions we’ve gotten in our most popular category: Ask an Expert. And don’t forget to check out all of this week’s giveaways in celebration of our very first anniversary! (By the way, thanks for bearing with us while we worked out all the little issues with the new design and the different browsers.)

What would you like us to write about more? We’d love to know, so please leave us a comment!

----------------- FEATURED SPONSOR -----------------
--Ingenio-Bilingual Toys

--Latino Educators- Bringing Bilingual Educators and Parents Together
------------------------------

As a tutor and someone who learned Spanish en la escuela, I have encountered many methods of presenting new vocabulary. The search for effective Spanish materials for young children can be a grueling one.

Julie and Krisse, sisters and creators of the Kids Love Spanish DVD series, have come to our rescue with this set of entertaining lessons organized by theme and intended for children ages 1-8. With topics like family, food, and animals, the lessons present relevant vocabulary, regardless of difficulty. For those of us who have seen the benefits of verbally challenging our niños, this is refreshing. The best thing about these DVDs is that they are each just a half hour long – a manageable length for even the youngest aspirant bilinguals. You can fit them in around your daily schedule (pop one in while you’re making dinner or before bed).

Kids Love Spanish succeeds in providing enough repetition and does not overwhelm the viewer with information. An array of moms, dads, and little ones pronounce the words over and over, accompanied by exciting, diverse visuals.

Each DVD begins and ends with the “Kids Love Spanish” song: a catchy way of explaining the importance of learning Spanish. Given that dancing to esta linda canción was my son’s favorite part, I am excited about the forthcoming Kids Love Spanish music CD. The song’s message and the many children featured in the DVDs are particularly valuable for reinforcing widespread usage of Spanish with kids who might be reluctant to start or continue speaking it outside the home.

Although the single word focus introduces little linguistic context, which could be valuable for children who are already familiar with basic vocabulary, these DVDs achieve their aim of giving English speakers a command of introductory Spanish. In each DVD, Julie and Krisse define the Spanish words by placing them in English sentences; this is most helpful for children at the higher end of the suggested age bracket because they are most likely to inquire about meaning and need English as a reference.

Whether your family is just beginning to learn Spanish or has a command of the language, Kids Love Spanish can be a great supplement to your efforts. You can order just one volume at a time or try out the whole 7-DVD set. Visit their informative website or La Tiendita to get your copy.

THE GIVEAWAY!

We have one complete Kids Love Spanish 7-DVD box set (Retails for $99.99) for one of you to win! All you have to do is visit the Kids Love Spanish website and leave a comment here telling us one thing you learned while there.

That’s all you have to do to enter this giveaway. If you want to up your chances at winning, then this is how you can get additional entries (only after you´ve completed the step above):

**Please leave a separate comment for each so we can count them and avoid mistakes.

1. Subscribe to our feed via email or RSS and leave us an extra comment letting us know you did so or that you’re already a subscriber. Make sure to leave the comment using the same email you subscribed with.

2. Follow us on Twitter and tweet about this giveaway including a link to the post. Copy the link to the tweet in an additional comment on the giveaway’s post.

3. Blog about this giveaway making sure to include our link, and you’ll get TWO additional entries.

This giveaway ends Friday, March 12 at midnight EST and you must have a valid US address to enter.

For the part that nobody likes, but we’ve gotta have, check out the Giveaway Rules.

----------------- FEATURED SPONSOR -----------------
--Ingenio-Bilingual Toys

--Latino Educators- Bringing Bilingual Educators and Parents Together
------------------------------

Photo by kiz

We’re celebrating a tremendous milestone today: our first year!

It seems really hard to believe that we’ve been around for a whole year and, although we can’t deny it’s been a lot of work, we couldn’t be more thrilled with what has happened in these last 12 months. I have no doubt saying the most gratifying accomplishment has been the extraordinary connections we’ve made with readers from around the world who—like Ana Lilian and I—have embarked in this amazing journey of raising bilingual and bicultural kids. We always meant for SpanglishBaby to become the kind of online community where parents who’ve chosen to gift their children with more than one language and one culture could come to ask, share and explore this alternative way of life. We humbly think we have.

In the last year, SpanglishBaby has become exactly what we originally envisioned: the place to ask and get peer and expert advice, plus honest answers to all those conflicting opinions about raising bilinguals. It’s also a community where you can share your stories, tips, concerns and even recipes with other parents on the same mission. But more than anything, it’s a space for you to explore this rewarding way of parenting.

New Look + New Features

As you can see, we’re celebrating our anniversary with a brand new look. It rocks, ¿no creen? Although our look is completely different, you can still find all the same useful information. We hope you take some time to take a look around so you can get to know the new SpanglishBaby. In the meantime,we’d like to highlight some of the main changes we’re implementing this second year.

For starters, we’ve merged SpanglishBabyFinds with SpanglishBaby, so now you can find all the awesome and useful reviews and giveaways you’ve come to love in just one site. In fact, in honor of our first anniversary, we’re having a different giveaway every day this week.

Another big change is the addition of our Directory. We’re working on putting together a comprehensive directory that will make it easy for you to find the resources you need to help you in your mission of raising bilingual and bicultural children. We’re going to make it easy for you to search for a local language school, a bilingual activity, a local bookstore or website that carries bilingual books, a speech therapist, music lessons in Spanish, etc…

In terms of where things are, every time you visit our Home page, you’ll always be welcomed by our featured articles. You’ll be able to read our latest review in our SBFinds section and to keep you up to date on our on-going giveaways, we’ve added a specific area just to the right of our Daily Blog. If you scroll all the way down, you’ll find one of our most popular categories, Ask an Expert, which will always be on our Home page for easy access. Right next to it, we’ve added a new category: Your SpanglishBaby. Send us a picture of your child and we’ll feature him or her on our Home page for a whole week. For more information on how to do this and what we need, go here.

As we announced last week, we have added five regular contributors to our family. Each of them, as you found last week, brings a completely different perspective on raising bilingual and bicultural children. You can expect to read their weekly posts on Thursdays. We are so lucky to have them!

There are some other changes we haven’t implemented yet, but that you can look forward to in the near future. One has to do with my very probable journey into raising my children trilingual. We’re still undecided, but my daughter has shown an interest and I think I can’t ignore it. The other one has to do with vlogging—or video blogging—books and reading. We’ll let you know more soon…we promise!

Same Great Content

We do want you to know; however, that even with all these changes, one thing you can continue to count on is our great (if we do say so ourselves) content. Our articles are organized into categories, making it simple to find the topic you’re interested in:

• Daily Learning: What our kids teach us everyday and what we learn through others on the same mission.
• Ask an Expert: Readers get their questions answered by a panel of experts with varied backgrounds.
• Must Reads: Informative posts about bilingualism and relevant topics.
• The Culture of Food: Recipes we find and share. Food brings us closer to our culture.
• Traditions + Culture: Ways of keeping our native traditions alive at home.
• Your Story: We invite you to share your family story with us. How are you doing it?
• ReadMe: A monthly exploration + giveaway of a children’s bilingual book and in-depth author interview.
• Directory: Comprehensive and searchable bilingual resources directory (currently a work-in-progress.)
• Forum: The place where our readers connect.
• La Tiendita: Our online store where you can find bilingual and Spanish books, music, movies, toys and more
  

Ok, enough with the explanations. Go explore! But before you do, we’d like to say MUCHAS GRACIAS for making this a remarkable first year. We couldn’t be happier with the results and we know we couldn’t have done it without you. As you can see, we have a lot of awesome changes and additions in store for this second year and we hope we can continue to count with your loyal support. Finally, as usual, we’d love to hear what you have to say about our new look and all our changes, so please leave us a comment below or send us an email. You know we value your opinion!

----------------- FEATURED SPONSOR -----------------
--Ingenio-Bilingual Toys

--Latino Educators- Bringing Bilingual Educators and Parents Together
------------------------------

We are so excited to bring back SpanglishBabyFinds, and even more so that it’s all merged into one rocking site! We definitely missed telling you about our Finds and hosting fun giveaways.

To kick off a new SpanglishBaby season we found a book that’s the perfect companion for any parent raising a proud bicultural Latino or for parents that want their children to have a well-rounded knowledge of Latinos in America: A Kid’s Guide to Latino History–More than 50 Activities, by Valerie Petrillo.

I found this book at a local neighborhood bookstore and was immediately drawn to it by the illustrations on it’s cover. I contacted the publisher hoping they’d send us a copy to review and some to give to you. I did get my copy in the mail and I’ve been enthralled by what this book offers–a simple and entertaining, yet complete history of the many Latin nationalities that make up the thread of the United States and how we all came to be in this country. It’s nicely organized chronologically, starting with the pre-Colombian cultures to present day issues, and by national heritage-Mexico, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Central America, Perú, Colombia and Ecuador.

What makes it entertaining and perfect for the family with elementary and middle-school age children are the hands-on activities, games and crafts-more than 50-that follow each short chapter and that enhance on the information that was just written about. You and your kids can learn to make champurrado, create corn husk flowers, make a Puerto Rican güiro, or even learn how to start a conga line.

This is a beautiful book to have handy to explore with your child the diversity of the Latino culture in North America and to be inspired by the people and events that have significantly contributed to shape this country’s history. I must admit, I learned a lot more than I thought I would!

THE GIVEAWAY

Here’s your chance to grab one of two copies of the Kid’s Guide to Latino History that we have for you. Just leave us a comment telling us why you want this book for your child or for a child in your life.

That’s all you have to do to enter this giveaway. If you want to up your chances at winning, then this is how you can get additional entries:

**Please leave a separate comment for each so we can count them and avoid mistakes.

1. Subscribe to our feed via email or RSS and leave us an extra comment letting us know you did so or that you’re already a subscriber. Make sure to leave the comment using the same email you subscribed with.

2. Follow us on Twitter and tweet about this giveaway including a link to the post. Copy the link to the tweet in an additional comment on the giveaway’s post.

3. Blog about this giveaway making sure to include our link, and you’ll get TWO additional entries.

This giveaway ends Friday, March 12 at midnight EST and you must have a valid US address to enter.

For the part that nobody likes, but we’ve gotta have, check out the Giveaway Rules.

----------------- FEATURED SPONSOR -----------------
--Ingenio-Bilingual Toys

--Latino Educators- Bringing Bilingual Educators and Parents Together
------------------------------

Photo by dino_olivieri

We’ve spent the last four days introducing you to our recently chosen regular contributors. Today, we bring you our fifth one. But before we let you meet her, we’d like to recap who the first four ones are and what you can expect to read in their posts.

Chelsea – a 20-something single mom of a little boy she’s raising bilingual even when Spanish is not her first language!

Susan – a non-native Spanish speaker mother of two boys she’s raising trilingual (English/Spanish/German).

Elsie – a Latina mamá of a daughter she’s raising bilingual and multicultural even though it’s not as easy as it might seem.

Kimberly – a bilingual and bicultural mom who’s bringing up her twin boys—both of whom have special needs—bilingual against all odds.

Finally, we’d like you to meet Suzanne. She’s about to become a mamá for the first time, but she already knows she’ll be raising her child not bilingual, but trilingual. She’ll bring an interesting perspective to raising children with more than one language both as a mother and as a student of bilingual education.

Suzanne Garcia Mateus is an expectant first-time mother and a first-year doctoral student in bilingual and bicultural education at the University of Texas at Austin. She continues to explore her research interests and the various ways to nurture a trilingual home via her blog titled: Interpretations of a Bilingual Life

Bilingual Parents in Search for Adding One More Language into the Mix

As I research the Internet for useful sites or literature about how to raise a trilingual child I am stunned with the simple fact that there is very little information available. I have found several parents blogging about their attempts to raise trilingual children all hoping to receive tips from others trying to do the same. I have to stop and ask myself, “What does this mean to me as a future parent? What does this mean to me as a doctoral student in bilingual and bicultural education? What can I do with this lack of information and how can I contribute to the missing pieces as a parent and researcher?” So many questions!

Luckily, I have a tentative plan. My husband and I will speak in Spanish to our baby. S/he will learn English because we live in the US, learning English should be inevitable, and s/he will attend French immersion schools. Done deal. Problem solved, right?

I wish it were that easy. As a bilingual teacher, I know it will take more than my tiny, tentative, and well-intentioned plan. I decided to start with what I know works best when learning two languages based on my experiences of growing up in a bilingual home.

As I prepare to register for my baby shower I plan on adding French and Spanish books for my guests to purchase to develop a multilingual book collection for my baby. My husband has promised to practice his conversational french by attending “French meet-ups.” I will continue to learn french the best way my schedule will allow me to: via videos and CD’s. My goal is to eventually attend beginning “French meet-ups.” These are some of our short-term goals.

Our long-term goals are much more adventurous and unpredictable at this point in our journey. We plan on taking advantage of my summer breaks by traveling to Spanish and French speaking countries for an extended period of time. This will allow the whole family to use and practice the targeted languages in authentic settings. In addition, we will also be exposed to French and Spanish-speaking cultures, which I believe is crucial in order to fully become multilingual.  It’s not enough that we just learn how to speak the language(s). Luckily, we have the best of both worlds living in North America. Mexico is a five-hour drive and Quebec, Canada is a lengthier “road-trip” away. One-day and six hours to be exact! In addition, I plan on gathering literature that will guide us in this trilingual venture as a family and meet other families in our local community who are trying to do the same.

My most recent search has led my to a book called, Growing up with Three Languages: Birth to Eleven (Parents’ and Teachers’ Guides) by Xiao-lei Wang. Dr. Wang is a professor at Pace University in New York City in their School of Education. What I love about this book, as simple as it may be, is that it was published in 2008, which means the ideas are current and that there is bound to more literature in the making for parents and educators interested in raising trilingual children.

So, as I prepare to head off to the overly anticipated sonogram appointment that will determine whether our baby will be named Sebastian or Siena, both names we consider to be “multilingual,” my mind continues to stir as to how we will create lives that will embrace and nurture three languages.

We hope you’ve enjoyed meeting all our five regular contributors! You should expect to find their regular posts every Thursday beginning in a couple of weeks. Plus, we’re almost ready to unveil our new look and couldn’t be more excited!! So go ahead and subscribe either by email or RSS so you don’t miss out!

----------------- FEATURED SPONSOR -----------------
--Ingenio-Bilingual Toys

--Latino Educators- Bringing Bilingual Educators and Parents Together
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Photo by tibchris

We hope you’ve been enjoying reading about our first three regular contributors. In case you haven’t had a chance to “meet” them, so far we’ve introduced you to Chelsea (a single, non-native Spanish speaker raising her son bilingual); Susan (another non-native Spanish speaker raising her two boys trilingual); and Elsie (a Latina raising her daughter bilingual who has promised to share her abuela’s recipes with all of us!).

Today we’d like you to get to know Kim who brings a completely different perspective to the subject of raising bilingual children and one where there is a lot of confusion and contradicting information – raising children with special needs to become bilingual. We’re thrilled to have her on board because we strongly believe in providing all of you with credible information. Thanks for being willing to share your trials and triumphs, Kim!

Kimberly Stevens Lane was born to a Costa Rican mother and an American father and was raised in both countries.  She is the mother of four-year-old twin boys, both of whom have special needs and are in full-time special education programs.  She has a Master of Arts degree in Conference Interpretation and is a freelance translator and interpreter in the Washington, D.C. area.

Raising Bilingual Children: An Awesome Challenge

I had it all planned out. I always knew that I wanted my children to grow up speaking Spanish, years before I had them, before I even knew who I would marry. When I married a Midwesterner who spoke not a lick of Spanish, I knew we would use the one-parent, one-language method. At the time, I don’t think I even knew what OPOL meant. I just knew it was what my parents had done in our household, and that it worked for them. When I learned I was pregnant with twins, I was ecstatic. We had two boys that we call Primo and Secondo.

So we did OPOL at home. I spoke to my children in Spanish, my husband in English. We built up a library of books in Spanish that we read every day. Except Secondo didn’t seem too interested in talking. He was more interested in rolling his toy cars back and forth, over and over. When he did speak, he was echolalic—he parroted whatever we said back to us. He rarely made eye contact or responded when I said his name. All of these things became increasingly difficult to ignore.  A few months before his third birthday, we found ourselves in a drab room with two-way mirrors and a bunch of doctors holding clipboards.  Then the child psychiatrist diagnosed my boy with autism and people scrambled to pass me the tissues.

I’m a little foggy on some of the details of that day, but I had one moment of clarity. As we walked back down the hallway to her office, I asked “What do you think about the fact that I speak to Secondo in Spanish?” I still remember exactly how I phrased the question. Not, “Do you think I should?” or “Should I stop?” And I remember her answer. “Oh, it’s absolutely wonderful,” she said, and her demeanor was dreamy, almost zen-like. “It will create so many new pathways in his brain. You can’t even imagine.” That was all the encouragement I needed. I knew, even then, that I would not have stopped even if she had suggested it. I knew that I had to keep speaking to Secondo in Spanish and see what happened.

Raising a bilingual child can be challenging and autism added an entirely new element to that challenge. Secondo had some significant speech delays as well. The school system evaluated his speech when he was 30 months old and the results were sobering. He tested as low as in the six-month range in some areas. And so he started preschool and we entered the world of special education. Language acquisition lost some of its spontaneity. Instead, we had specific goals–goals that were written out in his Individualized Education Program, a legal document.

It was more than a little intimidating, but we broke things down and took baby steps. Goal number one, for example, was to teach Secondo how to ask for what he wanted, as his inability to do that led to constant meltdowns. So for months, at home and at school, we worked on “I want x or y, please.” I thought that if he could learn to do that, he could just as easily learn to say, “Quiero tal cosa, por favor.”  Progress was slow, especially in the beginning, but there was progress.

I am far from an expert on bilingualism and special needs. It feels presumptuous to list what I’ve learned, but I have learned a few lessons along the way.

• Every child is different. I’m going to fall back on two sayings that are popular in special education.  One, if you’ve met one child with autism, you’ve met…one child with autism. You just can’t generalize when it comes to children with special needs—or any child, for that matter. Two, you are the expert when it comes to your child. I’ve largely followed my instincts and they have steered me the right way.

• You will find a lot of conflicting information out there. When I googled bilingualism and special needs, what I found made my head spin. The information boiled down to: “Yes! Teaching your special-needs child a second language is great!” And also, “No! Don’t do it!  It’s too much!” This made me throw my hands up and trust my instincts.

• What you do at home matters. I was despondent when I sent Secondo to preschool when he was only two years old, because that hadn’t been in our plans. I feared English would take over once he started school, but it just hasn’t been an issue.

• A support system is essential. You know how I just said you’re the expert? The other experts—teachers, psychiatrists, speech therapists—are all invaluable. They show me new ways of doing things. They encourage me. They are a part of our team, and they feel like family. And they all think that it’s wonderful that Secondo’s learning Spanish. Support at home is no less important. I’m lucky to have a husband who’s in this with me all the way and thinks raising the boys to be bilingual is as important as I do. Without him, it would be much harder.

And finally, never, ever underestimate your child. It’s only been a little over a year since Secondo was diagnosed, and he still has many delays, but he gets it. It’s taken a lot of work, but he understands that Mama knows Spanish and Daddy knows English. He loves music and books in both languages. Recently, he came sobbing to me because his brother wouldn’t play with him. “You have to tell him, ven conmigo,” I explained, trying to put it simply. He walked over to his brother and said, “Primo, ¡ven conmigo a jugar con el tren!” I was bowled over.

It may not be working out exactly as I had planned. But it’s definitely working. And my boys surprise me every day.

We’re so lucky to have all our new contributors because we’re sure they’ll be teaching all of us lots of new ways of looking at bilingualism. We hope you’ll come back tomorrow to meet our fifth, and final, regular contributor.

----------------- FEATURED SPONSOR -----------------
--Ingenio-Bilingual Toys

--Latino Educators- Bringing Bilingual Educators and Parents Together
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