Me camina aqui
Of course, Isabel is hardly a baby any longer (boohoo!) but Bilingual Toddler just doesn’t have the same ring and when in doubt go for the alliteration!
Here we are 2 years and 2 months old and my daughter is constantly surprising me with the things she says. It’s amazing and wonderful and super interesting and if I had more brain power, I would totally use her as a research subject. As it is, I’m trying (and failing!) to remember to write down some of the more interesting things she says.
One of the biggest things that I’ve noticed in her language development is her use of chunking. Language teachers will probably recognize this term but for the rest of you, chunking is the concept of learning “chunks” of language, rather than word by word. So if you were teaching people who knew nothing of English, you might start with teaching them to say “Hello, How are you?” and then teaching them to respond “I’m fine, thank you and you”. In essence the student is learning the chunk of language as a linguistic whole rather than each individual word.
(And then when those same students arrive in your class as intermediate students and become confused if you ask “How’s it going?” or “What’s up?” or can only answer “I’m fine thank you and you” each time you ask “How are you?” you as a teacher feel an irrational rage at the mechanics of that stupid chunk of “I’m fine thank you and you.” And proceed to spend the next 20 minutes of class time teaching /drilling them other phrases (chunks) like “What’s up? Not much” or “What’s new? Not much” “How’s it going? Great!” “How’re you doing?” I’m OK/tired/awesome!” Anything other than the dreaded “I’m fine thank you and you”.)
Ahem, excuse that little aside. (But really, ask your friendly English language teacher about this and they’ll all agree).
So as I was saying – Isabel has been chunking and it’s pretty cool to see it in practice after studying Language Acquisition during my Master’s all those years ago.
Some of her everyday chunks are: Help you, Pick you up, cary you, I love you. And then she adds a modifier usually, but not always, at the end to indicate who or what is doing or receiving the action. For example – “help you me” usually means that she wants to help me, but “mommy, help you me” means that she wants me to help her. “Carry you me” means she wants me to carry her. And my favorite “I love you me” She loves me!
She does this in Spanish too. “ayúdame me” or “ayúdame daddy” and “No me gusta me” “Mommy no me gusta” (Mommy doesn’t like that). She pronounces the modifying “me” as an English me, but the Spanish object “me” in Spanish (which makes sense as she’s only heard it and can’t read yet).
Apparently talking on the telephone is a Spanish speaking activity. When play talking on her telephone the conversation is always the same. “Hola, ¿Como Estas? Bien. Bye Bye.” and repeat. and repeat. and repeat.
She is also mixing the two languages. Mostly she uses the structure and grammar of English but then slides in a Spanish word here and there, which leads to utterances like:
- me camina aqui
- mommy stand acá
- ayúdame this
- donde estas oink oinks (her slippers – they’re pigs)
- now me see avión
- bring pelota al parque
- daddy come con me
- daddy acompaño me
- (the bag) too pesa
- me hambre / me frio
- me pon la mesa napkins
And more and more and more…. I’ll probably hit publish and think of (or hear) 10 better ones!
I am not alarmed or worried by the mixing and nor should you be dear reader. Frankly, I love it. I think it shows the flexibility of her growing brain. She uses the word that she knows. My reading and research on the subject tells me that as she get older the two languages will sort themselves out.
She also sings in both English and Spanish. One of her favorite songs to sing are the ABC’s, which she’s got down pretty well (which surprised me considerably!). But her favorite is “Tengo un Osito,” which we listen to daily, if not more. I cannot open Spotify and listen to any of my music without listening to osito first. “Osito Mommy!” she demands. Although she is a somewhat reasonable dictator. After requesting osito (and maybe a few more) she’ll say, “Now mommy songs.” Thanks sweetheart.
She can sing this one too.
Home is Here 