Raising a bilingual baby

Hello, Bonjour, G'day, Hola, Guten Tag and Buon Giorno!

In this episode of Little Baby Steps we sat down with Isabel Tremblay again to chat about her experiences in raising a bilingual baby. When you listen to the podcast, you can hear Isabel's French roots so it's no surprise that she's speaking French to Estelle.

Selin is speaking Turkish with her baby Sienna and Rita speaks Greek with Aria, however they primarily speak English while introducing a little bit of a second language.

Isabel's mother tongue is French and learned English when she was 17, so instinctively she speaks exclusively in French with Estelle. This can be difficult when they are around non-French speaking people because not everyone will understand what Isabel is saying to Estelle, however it's very important for Estelle's development to identify one person with one language. Isabel's husband speaks Italian and English however he speaks only in English to Estelle. Isabel teaches Estelle through reading, demonstration and speaking to her in French. She has done a lot of research in the area of language development and brain wiring and expects that Estelle may speak a little bit later than her peers to give her brain time to catch up to both languages.

Estelle attends an English daycare (as it's hard enough to get into a daycare, let alone a French daycare!) but will attend an exclusively French school when the time comes.

For anyone trying to raise a bilingual child, Isabel recommends that one parent associated with one language and the other parent associated with the other language. This helps the child identify one parent to one language and to be consistent.

If you are raising your child to speak in multiple languages, please share your feedback and tips with us! For more resources, check your local book store to find books on French language skills and be sure to listen to Isabel's interview here:


PS. be sure to listen until the very end as Taylor has something very important to share with everyone!

In this episode, our Mommy-Sentials focus on reading. Here are a few of our favorite books that we're reading to our little one's right now:

• The very hungry caterpillar
• I love you forever (it's a real tear jerker!)
• Dogs (touch & feel book)
• Wiped by Rebecca Eckler - she talks about "the first year" in a very open and honest way