Category: daddy

Changing from Hungarian to English and vica cersa

Published on by nonnativemommyLeave a comment

Just a short post about how to sign that we are using one or the other language. At present I’m trying to use every time to talk in English to E. So for instance, when D. takes the dog out for 20-30 minutes in the morning or in the evening E. and I change into English.

Before I start speaking English I sing the ‘Hello’ song. It is taken from the BBC programme called Something Special. (Jump to 0:20 for the song)

http://youtube.googleapis.com/v/d8nbGJFkEp0&source=uds

Before we change into Hungarian, I sing the “Goodbye song” from the same programme. (You can find the video below – just jump to 13:20. This is where the “Goodbye song” starts. Otherwise it’s a great episode on birthdays. Worth watching the whole). I also use the MAKATON signs while I sing. E. takes pleasure in it and the songs make it clear when we use one language and the other.

https://youtube.googleapis.com/v/YVIyDADR8vQ&source=uds

I’m sure there are several other ways to give a signal for changing between the languages. I look forward to your comments on how YOU do it.

About our family

Published on by nonnativemommyLeave a comment

The most important of all is that the close family are all Hungarians. There might be an exception in the near future. My sister-in-law-to-be is a Spanish speaker, which is great news for us if we take the possible other languages for E. to learn apart from English into account.

D. is daddy, my husband who I met in 2009 December.
2010 (July): we moved to our newly bought home
2011 (May): we got married
2012 (May): E., our daughter was born

D. speaks several languages: English and German in the first place on high levels. He also speaks Spanish and French. I don’t know much about his other languages, like Italian Serbian, Croatian, Chinese as I haven’t heard him talk in these languages but he spent several years learning them. No comment I guess.

My brother-in-law lives in Germany with his Spanish speaker girlfriend. So he has English, German, Spanish, too. (July 2013. – they got married so official we are a multilingual family 🙂 )

E.’s grandparents on D.’s side speak German as well. One of D.’s uncles lives in the UK with his Spanish speaker wife. Their daughter is probably the first bilingual in the family as she speaks Spanish and English as well. What a pity they don’t pay attention to her Hungarian so much. She would be multilingual then.

My Mom learnt Russian as everybody else here in Hungary at her school time, but, alas, she has forgotten all of it, though she used to be really good at it.

I, myself, speak (and teach) English, but also learnt German and French. Unfortunately, they are so deep down I cannot see them anywhere in me. However, in the future I’ll brush them up, when E.’s going to learn some other languages.

As for languages, we are well-off. We can’t complain.

If you are more interested in our family in more detail you can find it on a separate page.