Part 22 of 29 in Helping Your Children Learn: What Parents Need to Know← Part 21Part 23 →
I remember a young patient’s father who came to my clinic, not for fertility advice, but for a worry that seemed to weigh on him just as heavily. He was anxious about his child’s ability to speak English fluently. He confessed, almost with a sense of guilt, that at home they spoke Tamil, and his child’s English was peppered with the kind of delightful errors that come from thinking in one language while speaking in another. It struck me then, how deeply rooted this anxiety about English is in Indian households, and how it shapes the very walls of the house we actually live in.
In India, the anxiety about English is an expensive one, both financially and emotionally. Parents who think in Hindi, Tamil, Bengali, Marathi, or Kannada often conduct domestic life in a language they do not speak well, just because a visitor might hear. It’s not uncommon to see children growing up with a thin language at home and a performed language at school. They can answer a textbook but cannot tell a funny story in either tongue. John Holt would have recognized this pattern; the child is being asked to perform a part, instead of using a whole.
English matters in India. It’s a hard truth that colleges, jobs, and a significant portion of the internet still gatekeep through it. Pretending otherwise is a luxury. However, the mistake we make is in the method. Language arrives by use with people who can actually speak it, and by stories the child wants to hear. It does not arrive by a ban on the mother tongue, or by a phonics class at four, or by shaming a mixed sentence. Mixed sentences are not a defect to be ironed in front of guests; they are how bilingual children think.
In my experience, a workable language house allows English to be a language of use: a show you watch together and talk about, a book read aloud, a shop where your child has to ask. It should not be a language of correction at the dining table. Speak the language you are fluent in when you are loving, angry, or funny. Those are the hours language sticks.
Let me tell you about Imran, a nine-year-old from Malegaon. Imran could narrate an entire cricket match in the language of the lane, with timing, grievance, and joke. In English class, however, he wrote three dead sentences. His teacher called him weak in language. He was weak in a performance. His father began to ask for the match report at night, then for one paragraph of it in English, written for a cousin in Dubai who would actually read it. The cousin replied. The reply did what no red pen had done. It made the English necessary.
The key is to correct by repeating the sentence properly, once, inside the conversation. Do not stop the story for a grammar trial. Keep books in both languages. A child who has finished twenty Hindi stories will learn English faster than a child who has finished none, because she already knows what a story is for.
When a chapter is stuck, let her hear it in the language she thinks in. Eklavya’s CBSE path can explain NCERT chapters in the scheduled Indian languages. Ask her afterwards to tell you one idea in English. That is use. A scolding is not.
In my view, the anxiety about English in Indian households is a reflection of a larger societal pressure to conform to a certain standard. But in doing so, we often forget the beauty and richness of our native languages. We forget that language is not just a tool for communication but a vessel for our culture, emotions, and identity.
The question I find myself sitting with is this: Which language is allowed to be alive in your house, and which one is only allowed to be correct? The answer to this question might just change the way we approach language learning and use in our homes.
It’s a complex issue without a one-size-fits-all solution, but I believe in allowing our children to live fully in the languages they speak. It’s about creating a home where language is alive and vibrant, not just correct. Maybe then, we can raise a generation of children who are not just proficient in English but are also deeply connected to their roots and culture.
In conclusion, let’s not let the anxiety about English overshadow the beauty of our native languages. Let’s build a language house that is as rich and diverse as the country we live in.