The number of bilingual children with two native languages is increasing in the modern cosmopolitan world. Unfortunately, the bilingual children are not raised in harmony in all bilingual families, where both languages are equally spoken. The issue of preserving the Russian language, Russian identity and culture is of great current concern to Russian expats in Germany.
The specific features of upbringing and education of bilingual children and teenagers were discussed during the seminars on the 4th of February in Tchaikovsky House in the Russian Center in Hamburg. The host of the seminars was a writer, child psychologist Ekaterina Murashova (St. Petersburg). The event was orginized by the School Teremok, T(H)EMA Freundeskreis russischer Kultur e.V.
Seminars’ participants could get answers to the most important questions about children and teenagers’ upbringing in the bilingual environment:
- Why genetically inherited Russian culture of children should be developed in German environment and culture?
- Motivation of children (teenagers) to study the Russian language.
- Correct and equal development of children in two cultures in bilingual family (approach to teenagers).
- Should a child have a priority language in the bilingual environment? Which language should prevail?
- Should a child from Russian family start learning German first?
- What arguments could be used to make teenagers of Russian descent to continue learning Russian?
- Reaching mutual understanding and avoiding conflict situations in the family during upbringing children (teenagers)
- Age peculiarities of children, and teenagers’ phycology development.
- Overcoming by parents the child’s (teenager’s) “the Head of the Family” or “the Center of the Universe” syndrome.
- Can additional education be an overload for a child?
Ekaterina Vadimovna Murashova is a family phycologist, writer, and author of teenage drama books. She was born in 1962 in Leningrad, graduated from the biological and psychological faculties of Leningrad State University. Her first publication was a novel “Talisman” in the story collection “Druzhba” (1989). She received two national Russian awards on literature for children “Zavetnaya Mechta” (Cherished Dream) for her novels “ Klass Korrektsii” (2005) and “Gvardiya Trevogy” (2007). In 2010 she was nominated for the International Literature Prize in memory of Astrid Lindgren. She is a practicing child phycologist with years of experience, she also works with bilingual children.
Ekaterina Ivanova, Hamburg
