5 things I’d tell parents whose children are starting Heritage Language School
Both my children go to Bulgarian Heritage Language School and the new school year started for us last weekend. My son is in Grade 4 this year and my daughter - in Grade 1. It’s her second year at the school, but her first time actually in a Grade 1. It somehow sounds small and trivial written down, but, in fact, is a huge milestone.
When we arrived last Sunday, I was genuinely surprised by how she reacted. It was raining, so all the festivities had been moved to the classrooms. An important bit here is that, in Bulgaria, the first day of school is a very big deal - with flowers, fanfare and your Sunday best. My daughter is a child who is very outgoing and social by nature - always talking to people (known or unknown) and telling them about our life - yet last Sunday she was terrified. What bothered her were things like potentially not knowing anyone or having new teachers. Normal, of course, but a very important part of the day was also that she doesn’t feel very confident speaking Bulgarian and some of the other children were not only great speakers, but also already even knew how to read or write a little.
Another aspect was also something she brought from home - her Bulgarian had developed nothing like her brother’s did. For a long time she was largely a receptive bilingual - understanding almost everything, but saying very little. There has been real progress over the last two years with a lot of mutual effort on both our parts, but she still struggles. And, as older siblings often are, he is her benchmark for everything, including language.
We’ve talked about it many times – children are different and they learn differently, which is also valid for adults, by the way. I even went to speak about my journey learning Dutch in front of her class in school, hoping to connect the dots a little more for her as well, but theory and logic don’t always align with practice. Especially not for 7-year-olds.
So, last weekend, all of it came crashing into the classroom at once. We celebrated the start of the school year and Emma ended up being teary-eyed when the parents were asked to leave. She asked me not to go. Normally, she is the first one to send me on my way, no matter the setting because she is a “big girl” and can handle things on her own. But not this time and, so, I sat outside and tried to work, but really I was just paying attention to her - giving little waves, making eye contact whenever she looked for me through the gap in the door, while trying to tell her without words: I am here and you are okay.
At one point, the director walked by and gently suggested that it would probably be better if I left since other parents might complain. I agreed with her but stayed anyway. I didn’t want Emma to walk away from that first day, associating Heritage Language School with fear or being left alone and feeling exposed somehow because she obviously still needed to know I was there. And I stayed, but not because I wanted to make her dependent on me but because she needed her Bulgarian speaking mum, in a Bulgarian room, in a place, a school no less, where she felt she was supposed to already know so much more than she actually did, a place where she wanted to feel at home but couldn’t quite get there just yet.
I tried to leave a couple of times, but she begged me to stay a little longer and I did. Then, about an hour and a half later, she looked through the door, waved goodbye on her own and turned back to what she was doing. She was happy, raising her hand to speak up, to participate, her body language definitely showing that she felt a bit more like she belonged. She was ready.
When she came out three hours later, she was beaming – proud of her first bit of homework, thrilled that she was going to be “very busy” this upcoming school year, already super impatient to start with the homework and practise her first cursive letter in Cyrillic. She was so elated, in fact, she announced on the spot she had decided to go to this school until Grade 8 or 9, or however long they will let her. And I could feel her pride and happiness in my bones.
I’ve spent years on multilingual development as a linguist. That morning, I felt all of it as a parent, standing outside a door instead. And here are five things I’d tell any parent whose child is starting Heritage Language School.
1. Confidence isn’t the same in every setting
A child can be outgoing, sociable, chatty and confident in everyday life and still feel deeply insecure, even come apart a little, in a Heritage Language classroom. Because suddenly, the language they are supposed to already know, becomes visible, comparable, assessable, more tangible and very very vulnerable. Your child would notice the child who speaks more, reads more, writes more or overall sounds more fluent or authentic than they do. Do the other children belong more? That can be intimidating and rattle even a very confident child because belonging in the Heritage Language School hits different than belonging at their regular school.
2. Expect wildly different levels even at the same age
One child speaks fluently but can’t read yet; another understands almost everything, but says very little; another already reads a little because a parent has taught them at home; another only hears the language from one parent or only on summer visits, or almost never outside the house; for yet another child the language is but a mere background hum. Therefore, age can’t tell you a child’s level and it definitely doesn’t tell you how fluent they are or how comfortable or confident they feel in what they know.
So, if your child looks around the room and sees children doing things they can’t yet do, remind them (and yourself!) that this isn’t failing. It’s simply a different starting line.
3. Staying close isn’t the opposite of supporting independence
Sometimes a child needs you nearby before they can let go. Especially in a room where they want to belong, but can’t quite feel it yet or in a language that isn’t quite theirs yet. Especially in a language that isn’t quite theirs yet and you are the parent who connects them to that language. That doesn’t automatically mean you are making them dependent by not letting go earlier. Emma needed to know I was there and once she felt safe enough, she let me go herself. That was the part that mattered and that was the difference between helping her build independence and preventing it from happening. Or throwing her in the cold water and hoping she would somehow figure it out.
4. Watch who your child is quietly comparing themselves to
It’s easy to assume the pressure comes entirely from the room – from the other children, the new teacher(s), the unfamiliar setting or their (perceived) level of fluency and competency. But Emma wasn’t only comparing herself to the classroom. She walked into that classroom already comparing herself to her older brother, who had gone through the Grade 1 excitement, three years before her, apparently effortlessly. Or so she thinks.
Every parent of more than one multilingual child has experienced some version of this because the very dynamic that develops is often unique. The older sibling becomes the benchmark and the younger one measures everything against that benchmark: how much they speak, how confident they sound, how “behind” or “ahead” they are, what they strive towards. There’s hardly any grey area there and nobody has to say a word for the comparison to be running quietly in the background.
If your child has an older sibling further along on the language journey, it’s worth asking, gently and preferably more than once, who they’re actually measuring themselves against, because sometimes the room is only one part of the issue.
5. Help them move from fear to belonging
Some children arrive at Heritage Language School already, knowingly or unknowingly, carrying a quiet story about their own ability. Maybe an older sibling who speaks more confidently and fluently, maybe cousins who read and write already, maybe a comment they’ve once overheard about who is “better” at the language, maybe they just feel there hasn’t been any real need to speak and simply don’t see the point. Then they walk into a classroom and watch other children their age do it with ease, so the first day of school can end up feeling like an enormous load to carry. And one of our jobs as parents here is to gently pull the focus away from comparison and put it back on belonging. It can be as simple as:
You are starting to learn how to write the letters this year. Isn’t it fantastic?! That’s yours too!
instead of
Look how well everyone else already speaks.
That was the biggest shift I saw happen in Emma last Sunday. She walked in feeling intimidated by what some of the other children were already able to do, quietly also carrying a load of comparison from home. She walked out feeling proud of having homework and excited about going back (for many years to come!). Her language level had not transformed in these couple of hours. What had changed though was her sense of herself and her language ownership in that room.
She started to feel a stronger sense of belonging and that, I think, is the goal underneath the goal in multilingual parenting. Not simply raising a child who can speak a language, but helping them, over time, to feel that the language is theirs.
