I'm not a language teacher so what is an MT error?penelope wrote:The type of error is also a factor in correction strategies. I had this discussion with some of my (adult) students last week. One of them admitted he is always saying "he" when he means "she" (typical Finnish MT error, but such a basic error is rather surprising from a student who is otherwise a good "intermediate" level).
strategies for bilingual kids?
I have a couple of Finnish friends whose English is superb, and they still make the he/she mistake.penelope wrote:.... it's just me being lazy.... mother tongue.
There is no "he" vs "she" in Finnish (han) (BTW also the case in many other languages), I have noticed some of my students use "he" and "she" quite interchangeably, even in the same sentence. And we are not talking about beginners here!!!
Hmm... maybe it'sh eashier to shay "she" than "he" when you're drunk?Richard wrote:I have a couple of Finnish friends whose English is superb, and they still make the he/she mistake.penelope wrote:.... it's just me being lazy.... mother tongue.
There is no "he" vs "she" in Finnish (han) (BTW also the case in many other languages), I have noticed some of my students use "he" and "she" quite interchangeably, even in the same sentence. And we are not talking about beginners here!!!
Well, neurologically speaking that is harder to explain. It is more unusual for a native speaker to acquire uncharacteristic errors, even after many, many years.Cory wrote:I'm a native English speaker and after 9 years in Finland, I'm using he or she and vice versa.Richard wrote: I have a couple of Finnish friends whose English is superb, and they still make the he/she mistake.
It's a bit like counting 1,2,3.... most people count in their mother tongue and rarely ever switch. Though some mental math is very "graphic" in fact and doesn't involve much "language" at all.
Talking to teachers in the bilingual schools math is quite often a problem area. Kids who have been taught maths in English have had problems with the wording in Finnish entrance exams (ylä-aste and lukio) even though they have no problems with the concepts and arithmetic. So raising kids to be fully bilingual is not as strightforward as it might first appear.
I'm a switcher when it comes to counting. If I'm speaking Finnish I count in Finnish and v.v. with English. Multiplication, division etc works too. I'm not too comfortable with fractions in Finnish though.penelope wrote:It's a bit like counting 1,2,3.... most people count in their mother tongue and rarely ever switch. Though some mental math is very "graphic" in fact and doesn't involve much "language" at all.
Talking to teachers in the bilingual schools math is quite often a problem area. Kids who have been taught maths in English have had problems with the wording in Finnish entrance exams (ylä-aste and lukio) even though they have no problems with the concepts and arithmetic. So raising kids to be fully bilingual is not as strightforward as it might first appear.
I was brought up with 4 languages and ended up trilingual. English was the language of instruction at school.When I came back to Finland at 18, I still had the vocabulary and sentence structure of a 4-5 year old (in Finnish). I counted for quite a bit in English and wrote a journal in English. Reading my journal now I noticed that I'd slowly start having Finnish phrases and words in my writing. I completed my studies here in English language programmes so I didn't have issues with counting or maths etc, until I transferred to another school and joined a Finnish class. The beginning was really difficult, because I might have known the concepts but it was difficult expressing them in Finnish, especially when I only knew specific terminology for the field in English. Slowly I learnt what square roots and raising the power of a number to another were in Finnish.
Markings were also different to those in English (or those I was taught) like having a point for a multiplication sign instead of a times (x), or having commas for decimals. It was confusing at first and it's been a long road, but I can know count in Finnish and have managed very well at uni where I'm in a Finnish language programme. The only 'special' arrangements that are made for me is that I can answer questions in my exams in English and do written reports in English.
I think that it's important to consider early enough what the language of instruction will be when your child goes to school. I wish that I knew about the different marking systems in maths, it would have saved me months and months of agony. Though in all fairness to my parents, they hardly expected me to stay in Finland as long as I have.
saving chimpanzees is a big hairy deal
I am in the unusual (or not?) position of 3 yr old son refuses to speak Finnish, even though I am the only person in the whole country that speaks to him in English! My husband & all his family have always (till now!) spoken to him in Finnish but he only really said a few Finnish words & never understood, or so we think! I have always spoken to him in English, read to him regularly, have BBC CBeebies toddlers probgrammes on satellite, which have helped his English enormously! As a result, he speaks English like a 7 yr old (according to my mum in UK!) & Finnish rarely, even when he goes to the kerho 6 hrs a week, just with Finnish kids & "teachers". My 2 yr old son, however, is happy in both languages! My hubby talks to me in bad American english & I often correct his grammar!!!! Now he & many of his family have sort of given up on the eldest & talk to him in Finnglish, despite me asking them not to.
Frustrating!
Allie
Frustrating!
Allie
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villasukka
- Posts: 4
- Joined: Tue Oct 03, 2006 12:11 am
- Location: Helsinki
Just a hint
Check out a book called Bilingualism, written by Professor Suzanne Romaine from University of Oxford.
Quoting the introduction from the book cover:
'Since it was first published in 1989, Suzanne Romaine´s book has been recognized as the most authoritative intoduction to the sociolinguistics and psycholinguistics of bilingualism. (...)The author also assesses the positive and negative claims made for the effects of bilingualism on children´s cognitive, social and academic development, and examines the assumptions behind various language policies and programs for bilingual children.'
This book is really interesting. I strongly recommend it to all of you interested in learning more about bilingualism and its affects on your kids!
Quoting the introduction from the book cover:
'Since it was first published in 1989, Suzanne Romaine´s book has been recognized as the most authoritative intoduction to the sociolinguistics and psycholinguistics of bilingualism. (...)The author also assesses the positive and negative claims made for the effects of bilingualism on children´s cognitive, social and academic development, and examines the assumptions behind various language policies and programs for bilingual children.'
This book is really interesting. I strongly recommend it to all of you interested in learning more about bilingualism and its affects on your kids!
We speak English at home though it's not our native language (mine is Finnish and my wife's Estonian). English was the language we started with and it just has felt more natural to continue speaking it than to switch to Finnish (by now my wife is fully fluent and is studying and working in a completely Finnish speaking environment). My wife is now expecting our first child and we will naturally use our native languages when talking with him/her. We now wonder whether we should give up English. Maybe it would complicate things too much? In any case the mutual closeness of Finnish and Estonian will probably somewhat complicate the situation as many of the words are identical (but some with completely different meanings) and the differences in grammar are sometimes very tricky, so it might be hard to separate the languages very clearly.
I agree with Tadpole's Mommy.
A quick update: my little girl finally said what I've been waiting to hear though not in the language I expected
I'm now äitäää! But we still refer to me as mummy. Also she's got a few more Finnish words. But it's so funny that some things are clearly Finnish (joo, äiti) and some English(no, daddy) and two she can clearly say in both languages (byebye-heihei and nose-nenä). It's amazing how quickly this is going.
A quick update: my little girl finally said what I've been waiting to hear though not in the language I expected
I'm now äitäää! But we still refer to me as mummy. Also she's got a few more Finnish words. But it's so funny that some things are clearly Finnish (joo, äiti) and some English(no, daddy) and two she can clearly say in both languages (byebye-heihei and nose-nenä). It's amazing how quickly this is going.saving chimpanzees is a big hairy deal
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scoobymcdoo
- Posts: 675
- Joined: Tue Jun 22, 2004 9:46 pm
That would be my instinct as well. We haven't really thought about the issue yet that seriously (soon we have to) but in any case these "expert" advices as to child rearing are bit suspicious as it seems that they are regularly changed in 15-20 years and often to quite opposite positions, expressed of course with equal selfconfidence as before... I suppose you better use your own common sense as far as possible.Tadpole'sMommy wrote:I think you should continue with English the way you use it now. Your child will figure it out and it never hurt anyone to be exposed to additional languages.