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Is this "normal"?
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<blockquote data-quote="keista" data-source="post: 474939" data-attributes="member: 11965"><p>My other language is Lithuanian. Since marrying an "American" and moving away from friends and family I don't often get to speak it. I most often speak it with my Dad's wife because she's 'recently' from the old country and her English is very poor. I've forgotten more than I remember, but I still speak without an accent. Also, the language has become more casual and I learned the old 'formal' language. However, I sometimes still think in Lithuanian, especially in public. The reason being that when we were growing up, Lithuanian was a "chore", but we made good use of it when out shopping, so no one would understand what we were saying. In HS, I took German and unlike my peers who desperately tried doing a direct translation from English, I instead thought in Lithuanian and then translated to German. Much simpler since most European languages (except English) have similar grammar.</p><p></p><p>I was also very immersed in the language. School on Saturdays. Scouts, camps, song, dance and sports festivals all in Lithuanian, with other Lithuanian-Americans. It was/is a complete subculture.</p><p></p><p>As <strong>slsh</strong> mentioned, it sounds like J has now adopted French as his primary language. My friends and I all did this with English, but it did not diminish our capacity to learn and grow in the Lithuanian language. For you and J, keeping up English may be a bit more difficult if you have fewer immersion resources, but I wouldn't give up. Being multilingual is a HUGE benefit in our global society, even if his English becomes "broken" I'm sure in upper grades, he will have opportunities to polish those language skills.</p><p></p><p>I would NOT drop English as was suggested. Again, I have only one friend who did this but for her it was a logical choice because her children weren't learning ANY language. It wasn't even a mix of the two languages.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="keista, post: 474939, member: 11965"] My other language is Lithuanian. Since marrying an "American" and moving away from friends and family I don't often get to speak it. I most often speak it with my Dad's wife because she's 'recently' from the old country and her English is very poor. I've forgotten more than I remember, but I still speak without an accent. Also, the language has become more casual and I learned the old 'formal' language. However, I sometimes still think in Lithuanian, especially in public. The reason being that when we were growing up, Lithuanian was a "chore", but we made good use of it when out shopping, so no one would understand what we were saying. In HS, I took German and unlike my peers who desperately tried doing a direct translation from English, I instead thought in Lithuanian and then translated to German. Much simpler since most European languages (except English) have similar grammar. I was also very immersed in the language. School on Saturdays. Scouts, camps, song, dance and sports festivals all in Lithuanian, with other Lithuanian-Americans. It was/is a complete subculture. As [B]slsh[/B] mentioned, it sounds like J has now adopted French as his primary language. My friends and I all did this with English, but it did not diminish our capacity to learn and grow in the Lithuanian language. For you and J, keeping up English may be a bit more difficult if you have fewer immersion resources, but I wouldn't give up. Being multilingual is a HUGE benefit in our global society, even if his English becomes "broken" I'm sure in upper grades, he will have opportunities to polish those language skills. I would NOT drop English as was suggested. Again, I have only one friend who did this but for her it was a logical choice because her children weren't learning ANY language. It wasn't even a mix of the two languages. [/QUOTE]
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