Includes 100 creative activities and strategies for the home and community! More and more people-hundreds of millions around the world-are living in bilingual homes. In the U.S. alone, more than 54 million people over the age of 5 speak a language other than English at home. Yet once children enter school, the pull toward one language becomes stronger and maintaining the bilingual advantage requires a serious family commitment - a bilingual choice. The good news is it's worth it. Research shows that bilingual children are known to have more social, cultural and economic opportunities as they grow to adulthood and that learning a second language from birth can even result in protection against Alzheimer's later in life. Bilingual By Choice provides families with specific activities, games and insights that will show them how to not only teach their kids more than one language but also to help their kids retain and develop those language skills. For parents, educators, immigrants and expatriates, Bilingual by Choice deals directly with the obstacles to sustaining a second language, including unsupportive relatives, issues at school, frequent relocations and discrimination, countering each one with the author's firsthand experience with both sides of the growing-up-bilingual journey, as a child and as a parent. Commit to the choice, and help your children become bilingual - for life.

Code Choice in the Language Classroom argues that the foreign language classroom is and should be regarded as a multilingual community of practice rather than as a perpetually deficient imitator of an exclusive second-language environment. From a sociocultural and ecological perspective, Levine guides the reader through a theoretical, empirical, and pedagogical treatment of the important roles of the first language, and of code-switching practices, in the language classroom. Intended for SLA researchers, language teachers, language program directors, and graduate students of foreign languages and literatures, the book develops a framework for thinking about all aspects of code choice in the language classroom and offers concrete proposals for designing and carrying out instruction in a multilingual classroom community of practice.

There is growing recognition that ‘context’ is important for bilingual language development, but understanding of that context remains underdeveloped. This innovative study, spanning the fields of bilingualism, ethnicity and family studies, shows how language use in intermarried families is deeply intertwined with the experience of everyday childrearing, in specific socio-historical contexts. This is why, despite good intentions, expert advice and effort, bilingual-child rearing often encounters difficulties. Conversely, drawing on in-depth interviews of twenty eight Japanese mother — British father families in the UK, the study uses a focus on language issues to portray actual childrearing dynamics and ‘situated ethnicity’ in intermarried families. Presenting a vivid picture of the ‘invisible work’ of mothers in these families, and how they attempt to resolve conflicting pressures and demands over childrearing, language and education, the author shows the importance of ‘recognition’ and shared responsibility. This book will interest researchers, practitioners and parents interested in bilingualism, ethnically diverse families and multicultural education.

The ability to speak two or more languages is a common human experience, whether for children born into bilingual families, young people enrolled in foreign language classes, or mature and older adults learning and using more than one language to meet life's needs and desires. This Handbook offers a developmentally oriented and socially contextualized survey of research into individual bilingualism, comprising the learning, use and, as the case may be, unlearning of two or more spoken and signed languages and language varieties. A wide range of topics is covered, from ideologies, policy, the law, and economics, to exposure and input, language education, measurement of bilingual abilities, attrition and forgetting, and giftedness in bilinguals. Also explored are cross- and intra-disciplinary connections with psychology, clinical linguistics, second language acquisition, education, cognitive science, neurolinguistics, contact linguistics, and sign language research.

Does your family or community speak more than one language? Do you wonder how to help your children successfully learn or keep those languages? Do you want your children to have the gift of bilingualism and aren’t sure where to start – or how to keep going? Every multilingual family has unique language needs. Bilingual Families is a guide for you and your family. It combines academic research with practical advice to cover the essential elements in successful bilingual and multilingual development. Use this book to: Learn about language goals – and how to set them Create a 'living' family language plan that develops and grows with your family Learn how to talk about multilingualism with your children and other key people in your children's life, like teachers and relatives Recognise when you might need further support An indispensable guide for your family’s language journey.

This book discusses multilingual postcolonial common law, focusing on Malaysia’s efforts to shift the language of law from English to Malay, and weighing the pros and cons of planned language shift as a solution to language-based disadvantage before the law in jurisdictions where the majority of citizens lack proficiency in the traditional legal medium. Through analysis of legislation and policy documents, interviews with lawyers, law students and law lecturers, and observations of court proceedings and law lectures, the book reflects on what is entailed in changing the language of the law. It reviews the implications of societal bilingualism for postcolonial justice systems, and raises an important question for language planners to consider: if the language of the law is changed, what else about the law changes?

In this accessible guide to bilingualism in the family and the classroom, Colin Baker delivers a realistic picture of the joys and difficulties of raising bilingual children. This revised edition includes more information on bilingualism in the digital age, and incorporates the latest research in areas such as neonatal language experience, multilingualism and language mixing.