George Saunders just landed on my doorstep.....

George Saunders is arguably the most well known non-native bilingual parent of them all. His book "Bilingual Children: From Birth to Teens" is held in the highest of esteem and has become somewhat of a bible for many people who are considering or who have already begun bilingual parenting.

Born in Australia, both George Saunders ("GS") and his wife speak English as their first language. GS also speaks German (and French) and, due to his great interest in language, linguistics and bilingualism, decided to raise his three Australian born children to be bilingual (English/ German). His book chronicles the process and contains a wealth of information and advice.

I have hunted high and low for this book. It is out of print and sells for a king's ransom. I thought all my Christmases had come at once when the local librarian found a copy on the library catalogue... only to see his crest fallen face moments later when he realised it had been nicked six years ago.

Oh well... King's ransom or not... I just have to read this book.

It arrived this morning. I can see me not getting much sleep this week as I try to cram all 258 pages in during Poppette's downtime.

Our Budding Bilingual Baby Says Her First Word

Sunday was an exciting day ... it marked seven months since Poppette was born. I have to pinch myself sometimes ... I can't believe she has already been with us this long. Practically every day sees her learn a new skill... rolling, picking up with her pincer grip (most notably grabbing my eyelashes one day between her finger and thumb as I leaned over her crib!) and then on Sunday came her very first word.

Dada.

Hmmm. Well this is an interesting one. As I understand it, from a linguistic point of view this is one of the easier sounds to master and very often a baby's first sound. I do wonder though whether this holds true world over or just with Anglophone children. If anyone knows, please do drop me a line.

Now Poppette definately hears the words Papa and Daddy more than Maman and Mummy simply because whilst Papa is away on business mid-week I talk about him lots and we skype every night... and, as I switch on the computer to Skype, I always say ''Daddy, Daddy, Daddy, Daddy, Daddy''...... I'm not sure why, since the rest of the time I definately refer to him as Papa.

Anyhow... this is not a competition, right? I am more intruiged by the linguistics behind this chosen word/ sound and whether Poppette's next one will be Francophone in nature - bearing in mind she definately hears more French than English right now.

If anyone has any information or experience on what sounds Francophone children tend to commence their speech with (or indeed any other nationality), I would be really really interested to hear from you.