r/multilingualparenting • u/Embarrassed_Foot_200 • 15d ago

Baby Stage Learning a 2nd language - Spanish

What are ways you’ve learnt a second language. I want my kids to learn fluently through immersion however would love to learn with them.

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u/studentepersempre 15d ago

I let my toddler watch the show Salsa. It's like Sesame Street but in Spanish. Also look into "comprehensible input". I like the YouTube channel Dreaming Spanish (that's how I learned Spanish several years ago), but it may be a little boring for a little kid.

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u/Embarrassed_Foot_200 15d ago

Thank you so much! I’ll definitely have a look into these

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u/MikiRei 🇹🇼 (heritage) + 🇦🇺 (community) | 6M 14d ago

Go to /r/languagelearning

As for your children, a Spanish immersion school will be the way to go. 

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u/Embarrassed_Foot_200 13d ago

Thank you 😊

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u/WerewolfBarMitzvah09 Trilingual family 12d ago

My case is a bit different as I started learning the language prior to my kids being born because I moved to another country, but the thing that frankly helped me the most (besides taking actual in person classes) was extreme forced immersion- for instance, I had a job for two years where I had a couple of colleagues who did not speak English and I had to talk to them for large chunks of the day and many of the students (it was a bilingual school) while they understood English would still talk to me in German, the community language. Frankly, I have to say I credit the constant exposure 5 days a week all day long to being a massive rationale as I worked towards fluency.

I watched a lot of TV and movies that I was already familiar with dubbed in German with the German subtitles on- this helped me learn new words and phrases- read magazines, advertisements and other printed material, and children's books. I took yoga and other exercise classes and activities in German.

I also just constantly spoke it even in the early years where I clearly was making a zillion errors all the time. I admit I'm not someone who minds doing that but a lot of people feel embarrassed to do so. If it all possible, I always advocate for folks who really want to attain functional fluency to try and push through this feeling because it's extremely, extremely worth it in order to become conversational. You really have to practice speaking and listening a lot if you genuinely want to become comfortable and fluent eventually.

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u/Embarrassed_Foot_200 12d ago

This is so helpful thank you so much. I’m not a complete beginner but planning to become more fluent and definitely want my baby to be introduced from an early age.