Teaching your kids your language

This is something that usually comes naturally to every parent.  Living in a foreign country can sometimes make it difficult.  It was clear to me that because I was living in Italy and married to an Italian that our daughter would obviously speak Italian.  So while I was pregnant with her I resolved that I would only speak English to her no matter what.  That is all fine and good, but my in-laws were a bit concerned.  "How will she learn Italian?  How will we know what you are saying to her?  My answer... "That is all up to you".  The other question was... "Won't she be confused?"  My response was "Why would she be confused if I only ever spoke to her in English?"  A blog that I follow explains the delecacy of this very well.  But I figured having a clear definition of who spoke what would make it easier for our daughter to understand.

The funny thing that I noticed  was that her first words and sentences were in English even though we lived in Italy and though she didn't have the speach delay that most bilingual children she didn't start speaking much Italian until later.  I suppose it is because I only work part time and my husband works overtime, so she was exposed to English much more than Italian.  Even my friends spoke to her in English.  So I sometimes wonder what her first language is, in my opinion at the moment it is English since she speaks it much better than she does Italian, but she is getting better in Italian every day being in preschool. 

Being an English teacher I am keen to have her take the Cambridge English exams which according to the guidelines she could take as a L2 candidate.  According to their criteria she is not mother tongue since she lives in a non English speaking country, with one non English speaking parent and attends a non English speaking school.  I would beg to differ with them but if they don't classify her as mother tongue then I will take advantage of their exams and preparation (lord knows the English preparation in Italian schools is crap!)

Sometimes I wonder which language she will speak to her kids, or where she will prefer to study and work.  I suppose I am lucky that English is the international language, so she will always have some use for it, but as she grows I wonder if she will continue to speak better English than Italian or if they will switch. 

Finally to answer the questions posed in the blog post mentioned earlier, my daughter seems to dream in English (as she is a sleep talker), and plays in both languages (talking to her baby dolls and imaginary friends).  It should be interesting to see how she does this summer upon return from America...will she forget her Italian once again or will she retain it better this year?  I'll let you know come September!