Looking for English-speaking families in and around Toluca

traceyp · #1 (**permalink**) 2nd October 2009, 11:26 PM

Hi, My name is Tracey and I'm originally from the UK. I live in Toluca with my Mexican husband and two children, 6 and 4 years old and I'm looking for other English-speaking families with young children in and around Toluca in order to get together occasionally and speak English. Although my kids understand English 100%, they refuse/find it difficult to speak it... Thanks. Tracey

RVGRINGO · #2 (**permalink**) 2nd October 2009, 11:34 PM

Welcome, Tracey. I hope the forum helps you to find others for your English fix. As for the children, just keep speaking English to them. I assume that your husband speaks Spanish to them and that they are immersed in Spanish at school and with their friends. If they want something from you, you could make a game of it and insist that they use English to ask for it. Being fully bilingual will be a great advantage for them and I hope you can find some other English speaking children for them to play with on a regular basis.

Hound Dog · #3 (**permalink**) 3rd October 2009, 02:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RVGRINGO

Welcome, Tracey. I hope the forum helps you to find others for your English fix. As for the children, just keep speaking English to them. I assume that your husband speaks Spanish to them and that they are immersed in Spanish at school and with their friends. If they want something from you, you could make a game of it and insist that they use English to ask for it. Being fully bilingual will be a great advantage for them and I hope you can find some other English speaking children for them to play with on a regular basis.

Speaking English is not enough you must force them to answer back in English or they will not speak English.
I have a Peruvian friend who lives in Portland and has 5 children. With the first 3 she only spoke Spanish to them but allowed them to answer in English, she found out later that none of them could speak Spanish. They learned Spanish at school and speak it with an American accent.
With the two young ones she spoke to them in Spanish and forced them to answer back in Spanish and they learned English with the father and at school they are both perfectly bilingual.
You are right to look for other children who could play with them in English if you want them to be
The passive and active form of language are two separate exercises and both must be used. The passive vocabulary is always larger for anyone including in your mother tongue but if it is not used on a regular basis it gets lost with time.
Good luck in finding other English speaking children.

traceyp · #4 (**permalink**) 3rd October 2009, 04:46 PM

Thanks to both of you for your advice. I try to speak most of the time to them in English but my poor brain now thinks more in Spanish than English as I don't know any native English speakers here. I will definitely have to make more effort to force them to answer me in English. Hopefully there are some other English-speaking children out there too...

RVGRINGO · #5 (**permalink**) 3rd October 2009, 04:54 PM

Though they sometimes come slowly, I just had another thought: Here, we have TeleCable and some of the cartoon channels have the SAP (Secondary Audio Programming) feature, which allows you to switch the programming from Spanish to English. That feature is also available on Discovery, History and a few other channels.

traceyp · #6 (**permalink**) 3rd October 2009, 05:06 PM

We have Sky here which also has the English/Spanish option for most channels so they watch 99% of TV in English - my 6 year old daughter even complains if the TV is in Spanish which I guess is a good start but kids will be kids and they just won't speak it! A couple of years ago we moved to Canada for about 18 months and my daughter went to a preschool and started speaking some English so it's obviously related to speaking the language of your friends in order to fit in whereas she knows mummy understands Spanish so why make an effort!!! In fact she makes more effort with her "English" teacher at school than with me! Thanks for all your advice.

Hound Dog · #7 (**permalink**) 3rd October 2009, 07:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by traceyp

We have Sky here which also has the English/Spanish option for most channels so they watch 99% of TV in English - my 6 year old daughter even complains if the TV is in Spanish which I guess is a good start but kids will be kids and they just won't speak it! A couple of years ago we moved to Canada for about 18 months and my daughter went to a preschool and started speaking some English so it's obviously related to speaking the language of your friends in order to fit in whereas she knows mummy understands Spanish so why make an effort!!! In fact she makes more effort with her "English" teacher at school than with me! Thanks for all your advice.

You are right , it is so tough continuing speaking a language when it is not spoken around you. This is how I lost the German I knew and this is how my grandmother whose first language was Basque lost the ability to speak it after many years of not speaking it. She continud understanding it but would answer back in French.
My Zapotec friends who live in Ajijic have children who understand Zapotec but do not speak it, they keep saying that after a summer in Oaxaca they will speak it but the 11 year old will not learn how to speak it correctly anymore unless they sit down and teach it to him.
May be some vacations around an area in Mexico where many people speak English will help.
I met a little French girl in a store here in AJijic who was blown away when she heard me speak French to her. She asked me where I had learned French not realizing that they were other people in the world who spoke French other than her family.
When all the friends speak Spanish the kids want to fit in and speak Spanish so it is a tough problem if they do not speak English before they go to school.