Bilingual Milestones: What to Expect When Raising a Bilingual Child (Birth - Age 3)
As parents embarking on the bilingual journey with your little ones, you might wonder if your child is progressing "normally" in both languages. First things first - every child is unique and develops at their own pace! Bilingual children sometimes follow slightly different patterns than monolingual children, but they absolutely reach the same milestones, sometimes just with their own special timeline.
We’ve put together age-appropriate expectations for your bilingual little ones so you can celebrate their progress and understand what typically happens at each stage.
During a baby's magical first year, they absorb everything around them, including both languages! Here's what you might notice:
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0-3 months: Your baby responds to voices in both languages and can distinguish between them based on rhythm and intonation.
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4-6 months: They begin babbling sounds found in both languages.
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7-9 months: Your little one starts to recognize common words in both languages, like "mama," "dada," or their Spanish equivalents.
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10-12 months: They may understand simple commands in both languages and might say their first word, often in the language they hear most frequently.
Take advantage of this crucial time to introduce bilingual books for kids! This is the perfect age to introduce Binibi's animal sound books like "La Granja" or "La Selva" which are designed for babies to start making word-sound associations. These books feature animal sounds that babies learn to match to the keyword and associate to the illustration on each page.
1-2 Years: The Vocabulary Explosion
This is when things get exciting! Your toddler is absorbing words like a sponge:
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12-18 months: Expect 10-50 words across both languages combined. Don't worry if they use "dog" in English but "gato" for cat in Spanish - this mixing is completely normal.
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18-24 months: Your little bilingual is likely putting two words together ("más agua," "more milk") and has a combined vocabulary of 50-200 words across both languages.
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Language separation: Don't be surprised if your child knows a word in one language but not the other. This is perfectly normal - their brain is organizing two language systems!
At this stage, bilingual children might appear to have smaller vocabularies in each individual language compared to monolingual peers, but their total vocabulary across both languages is typically comparable or even larger.
2-3 Years: Sentences and Grammar Emerge
Your child is now becoming quite the little communicator:
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Simple sentences: They're putting 3-4 words together in both languages.
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Grammar development: They're starting to use past tense, plurals, and possessives, though they might apply rules from one language to another (saying "foots" instead of "feet").
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Language preference: Many children develop a preference for one language during this period - usually the one they hear most often or need most in their daily environment.
Supporting both languages during this period is crucial. Bilingual children's books like Binibi's musical book Los Pollitos Dicen are perfect for this age, as rhymes and repetition help cement grammatical patterns in a fun, engaging way!
Remember, these are just guidelines - your bilingual superstar might move through these stages at their own rhythm! Stay tuned for our next blog where we’ll cover bilingual milestones in children ages three to seven.