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Comment by pavel_lishin | Hacker News Reader

I feel very bad because I'm having a hard time getting enough Russian in with my kid. We live in America, and I'm the only Russian speaker at home - I think once she's a little older, I'm going to have to find a Russian kid-friendly meetup group.

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I commented up above. I was in your daughter’s position. She may not know what’s she’s missing now, but please use it as often as you can!

Even little stuff like “grab the ketchup from the fridge” is enormous. I can’t do it with my dad’s language, but I can with Spanish and I do things like pointing at the light:

Me: What’s that

Kid: Light

Me: What’s that in Spanish?

Kid: -shrug-

Me: La luz

It doesn’t have to be a dedicated lesson, just sneak it in. I’ve got three kids under five, I know there’s 50 billion things going on, but man I wish my dad would’ve kept it up with us.

> I’ve got three kids under five

Congratulations and condolences - my single one is pushing me to my limit as a parent and a person :P

It's a good suggestion. She knew a few words for common, frequent words - like "give me", and "here, take this". I'm trying to work it back into her vocabulary again; I need to get my wife to start using those terms as well.

One thing that I've found with my kids is that TV (yes, the dreaded TV) is the best way for kids to pickup a language.

Mom/Dad speaking French? Boooring. PJ Masks or Paw Patrol en français? Oui c'est super!

Netflix recently made available lots of voice-over / subtitle options for most of their original content, and even some non-original stuff. It's super exciting time to be a multi-lingual parent.

This was a supplement to their French-langauge preschool (2d/wk,immersion) and the corresponding playdates and such with their French-speaking friends.

Do you have a trick to finding this stuff on Netflix? I've always been disappointed about the language options for shows on Netflix in the USA.

Most of the "Netflix Original" content is translated, but no there's no real way to search for language friendly content.

My parents had a rule where we'd only speak Spanish at home and English everywhere else, and now I'm fluent in both languages. It might be a bit difficult for you to implement since you're the only Russian speaker, but it's something to consider.

That rule is more realistically enforced when both parents speak the language fluently. Even with families that try to enforce this rule, much depends on the aptitude and character of the children, as we know many that can listen but never bothered to expand their fluency beyond a narrow set of home topics which unfortunately in many cases never extended to conversations dealing with emotions.

Don't forget about the aptitude of the parents! My Russian is so rusty it's liable to give people tetanus. My mom laments my loss of language, and I can feel myself stumbling every time I speak it.

>>[...] I can feel myself stumbling every time I speak it.

I'm in the same boat, and the kids pick up on our hesitation and lack of confidence in the language. Since so much of language acquisition is being able to speak confidently so that children aren't confused by the implicit context within which phrases and vocabulary are used, our impaired fluency adds more friction (and detracts from the implicit enjoyment) to the process.

Get a Russian speaking nanny or Russian daycare. There got to be those where ever community is large enough.

We did look for a Russian daycare, but there wasn't one close enough to where we live. A Russian nanny was also a bit hard to find. Our daycare staff is fluent in Spanish, and our regular babysitter speaks Spanish as well, so hopefully she'll pick up at least enough of that to be able to speak without an accent.

I learned English easily and fluently at 10 years of age, so at least I'm telling myself that I've got about a decade before she's linguistically crippled as we all are :P

Have you looked into getting an "au pair"? Even better option than a nanny for language immersion because an au pair lives in your home. Also more cost effective!

I'm in the same boat, being the only speaker is a really complicated spot to be.

My father spoke German and French, but it was the ability to receive French FM broadcasts on our southern coastal hilltop in England, which I think is the difference between my ability to understand the spoken languages. I was later, from high school on, exposed to far more German and Russian than French. As anecdotal as my experience is, possibly having Russian radio stations playing around the house might be helpful.

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