Reflection

During this project my language belief has not changed because I still believe that language is more than just words and is the best form of communication. Learning about bilingualism hasn't really reinforced it either though, because it only shows what communicating in two different languages is like.

Recommendations

I recommend for further research, to look at what languages parents speak with their children, or to see if certain languages are easier to speak together than others. I would also recommend looking at what ages children are becoming bilingual and if it helps with fluency later in life.

Interview

Conclusions

Based on my primary and secondary research I can conclude that many people believe bilingualism is important and is a skill that should be passed on to the next generation. There are some drawbacks to living in a bilingual home, but those cannot compare to the many many benefits that one receives. From my research, you can see that bilingualism is becoming an increasingly important part of everyday life. From my research you can learn about who thinks bilingualism is important and what benefits and drawbacks there are to being bilingual.

Above is a clip of Cathy and I discussing bilingualism

Interpretation of Data

The data that I have collected shows that many bilingual adults are also currently living in bilingual homes with their families. Of the people I surveyed, many also thought that being bilingual was very important to them both at work and at home. Being bilingual can connect you to your heritage and can come in handy especially if you want to communicate with older generations in your family. A lot of people also mentioned how being bilingual can help in the work place and provides more job opportunities because as the world is becoming more globally connected, companies and big businesses want people who can communicate with a variety of people from different cultures and areas. As for raising children to be bilingual, many said they believe it is important that our children are also bilingual for the same reasons stated above: to connect to their heritage, communicate with their elders, better job opportunities, etc. But they also said that they believe learning other languages will become easier if the children start young. The people I surveyed also said there were some drawbacks to raising children to be bilingual. For example: if you start speaking in two languages to a child before the child is starting to speak, the child may start speaking a lot later then his or her peers do, because they are learning both languages. Also switching back and forth between languages can be tedious sometimes especially when the society around you mostly speaks one language. I think my data shows that many people think that bilingualism is important and they want future generations to carry on being bilingual because it is a valuable skill that can be a big help in life.

Data

From my survey I found out that many of the people i surveyed became bilingual at a very young age and the same people that learned at a young age still find bilingualism very important today because it can provide job opportunities and gives people more knowledge about their heritage and cultures around them. Out of the people i interviewed, three spoke English and Spanish at home, one spoke English and Farsi, one spoke English and Mandarin and one spoke English and Urdu.

Primary Research

My subjects for this survey will be my mom's coworkers who are bilingual. I will try to gather between 6-12 subjects who can answer these questions:

-Do you currently live in a bilingual home?
-Did you grow up in a bilingual home?
-At what age were you bilingual?
-What languages do you speak at home?
-Is being bilingual important to you? Why or why not?
-Do you think it's important for your children to be bilingual? Why or why not?
-What are some benefits and drawbacks or raising your children to be bilingual?
-What are some benefits and drawbacks or living/growing up in a bilingual home?

Sources

Gardner, Marilyn. "Bringing Up Baby Bilingual" Christian Science Monitor 27 August, 2003. 9 October, 2008 .

Secondary Research

In the article "Bringing Up Baby Bilingual" by Marilyn Gardner, bilingual families are discussed. It says that many parents want to raise they're kids bilingual because they want to keep they're family heritage alive. But in other cases, the parents may speak little to no english, in which case when the child learns english, its necessary for them to speak both languages. Different families use bilingualism different ways. With some families one parent speaks one language while the other parent speaks the other language. In other families, they will speak English outside the home, but while inside the home they'll speak the other language. 

Some families would rather their children speak only English because they lived in repressive countries. For instance in Miami, there are Cubans who do not want their children to speak Spanish because they are trying to start a new life for both themselves and their children, and speaking Spanish will only bring back bad memories. 

This article will help me answer my research questions by giving me information on why parents would want to raise their kids bilingual, and also why parents would want their kids to speak english only. It also lets me know which languages are being spoken at home with younger kids

My Research Plan

My research plan is to survey people who work with my mom, because many of them are bilingual and are raising they're children bilingual as well. I'm going to ask them why they are choosing/chose to raise their children bilingual and what they think pros and cons of speaking two languages are. I also plan on summarizing articles that I find online that discuss raising children bilingual and why so many people today are choosing to. I hope that these sources can give me enough information to answer my research questions. If they don't I think I may be able to interview people at our school that are bilingual or at least speak another language at home. It'd be a very small sample of people, but it'd give me good information. 

My Research Questions

• Why is bilingualism important?
  
• What are the pro's and con's of raising children bilingual?
• Why would parents want to raise their children bilingual?
• What are the benefits and drawbacks of growing up/living in a bilingual home or family?

My Research Goals

For this research project, I want to know more about people wanting to raise their children bilingual. I want to know more about this topic because my cousin, who's turning two this month, is growing up learning English and Tagalog, (a language from the Philippines). I think its really cool that she's able to speak both languages pretty well.

My Language Beliefs

My language belief is that language can be more than just words. Language is different phrases and sayings and expressions. Learning a new language can be really hard, especially when you come across a new expression but, I believe that when you learn a new language earlier in life, you catch on faster. Ms. Lewis, for example speaks many languages: English, Spanish, Portuguese, and many others. She showed us that bilingualism can help us a lot in life, when we are traveling and trying to communicate.