Anna Sharp (October 10, 2011) - When I hear about parents who are bilingual or have a rich cultural heritage that they fail to share with their children, I am outraged. I would like to believe that if I were fortunate enough to speak fluent Farsi or could bake a killer Baklava, there is no way I would be so lazy as to not at least try to share that gift with my children! Then I remember...D’OH...our girls have yet to visit their grandparents in Botswana...and frankly it might take them a few tries to even find the continent of Africa on a map. Their grandpa, visiting Chicago this month, said the most basic Setswana greeting to the girls this morning ("Dumela" which means "hello" or "good day"), and they spared him the briefest of blank glares before returning their gaze to the TV. (I wish I could say they were at least watching The Lion King, but it was probably The Princess and the Frog.) Still, teaching our children about Botswana is my husband's responsibility, right? You better believe that if I had an interesting background or anything linguistically or culturally unique to share with them, I would totally be all over that!

My daughter gave me a reality check when she asked me today, "Mommy, what is y’all?"

I grew up in the south: cornbread, Johnny Cash, NASCAR ! Fun for the whole family! But it never occurred to me until that moment that there was any value in sharing this particular culture with my children. Linguistically, I don’t really want my children to use double modals (i.e. might could) or the word "yonder" as a locative. But I do love the precision of the word "y’all" as a second person plural pronoun, and those little bugs that roll into balls when you touch them? I can’t imagine calling them anything but roly-polys. And then there’s pecan pie. Not pi-KAHN, thank you very much. (That’s one my three-year-old would be totally on board with--getting to say PEE-can pie.)

So, one child in Language Stars, one in French immersion preschool--it can’t hurt to add in a little Lion King and some pecan pie, right? Then the next time I have a Ricky Ricardo-style outburst in "southern" ("For crying out loud, get up off your bee-hinds, stop all this carryin on, or y’all will be in a heap of trouble!"), hopefully they won’t stare at me like I’m speaking Setswana.