Cameron reminds us about the silent period (it is so easily forgotten!) –
“My son was 3 years old when we moved to Japan. He started at a Montessori preschool at 3 1/2 years old. We were worried when at 5 years he was still only producing words and phrases in Japanese. We speak Spanish at home. We were trying to decide if we should move him to the American school or not. We decided to keep him in the Japanese preschool instead of moving him to the American school. At 5 and 1/2 years he began to produce tons of Japanese! He told everyone our family’s life story. He spoke to every Japanese person that would listen to him. He surprised both his teachers and his parents. I still remember the day his teacher came running to us when we went to pick him up, telling us our son speaks Japanese, lots of good Japanese! That was two years after we moved to Japan. There is a silent period and we need to respect it.”