It was the summer
of 2008 in South Africa our first child had just started play school. Barely a
year and half, she was learning to make simple sentences. Initially, we thought
that the funny sounding words she sometimes spoke were attempts
at speaking Igbo. We eventually figured out that she was speaking bits of
several South African languages...but not Igbo.
We had
assumed that since we spoke Igbo at home that our children would naturally pick
it up. This was not the case. In direct contrast, our Swiss friend whose son
was about the same age with our daughter spoke some German along with a mix of
other languages. We noticed that this lady always spoke German to her son
regardless of where they were. This revelation led us on an ‘Igborization’
campaign! It was simple: speak Igbo to our child and in no time she would be
able to respond in Igbo.
HA! That turned out to be easier said than done.