I Wanted My Children to Speak Yiddish, Here’s What Worked

By a Lubavitch mother

I’ve often heard parents say that they would love for their children to speak Yiddish, but they’re not sure how to make it happen, especially when everything around them is in English.

I don’t claim to be an expert in language or chinuch, but I can share what worked in our home. And now that my children are older, I can look back and see that the effort we put in when they were young really did pay off.

For us, the main thing was very simple: Yiddish had to be the language of the home.

From when my children were little, I spoke to them in Yiddish. Not just certain phrases, or when telling them to wash negel vasser or say a bracha, but regular, everyday Yiddish. Getting dressed, eating breakfast, talking about what happened that day, asking for something, telling a story, everything.

Interestingly, my husband and I actually speak English to each other (Yiddish is not our first language). Our children also read plenty of English books and, of course, speak English fluently. We never tried to keep English out of the house. We simply established that the language between parents and children, and among the children themselves, was Yiddish.

When they were very young, I also tried to make Yiddish the language of their books and stories. We bought Yiddish books, and when I read them an English children’s book, I would often just read the story aloud in Yiddish. With a small child, it doesn’t really matter what language is printed on the page. They are listening to Mommy tell them a story, and for us that story was told in Yiddish.

Of course, once they started going to preschool and spending more time around other children, English started coming home with them.

At three or four years old, a child suddenly comes home with a new English word or expression picked up from a friend. I found that the best response was not to make a big deal about it. I didn’t have to say, “We don’t speak English!” or keep correcting them. I would simply respond in Yiddish.

If a child asked me something in English, I answered the question normally, but in Yiddish. That alone was usually enough to bring the conversation right back into Yiddish. The message was natural and unspoken: to others, you might speak English, but with Mommy, we speak Yiddish.

As they got older, though, I discovered that there was another stage that required more effort.

At seven or eight, children begin expressing more complex ideas. Their world is getting bigger, and so is the vocabulary they need to describe it. If all the words they need are readily available to them in English, but not in Yiddish, naturally they will begin falling back on English.

That made me realize that if I wanted my children’s Yiddish to grow, my Yiddish had to grow too.

I began paying more attention to Yiddish words and expressions. We subscribed to a Yiddish magazine and listened to Yiddish story tapes. Without even noticing it, all of us were picking up vocabulary, expressions and ways of saying things that we might otherwise only have known how to say in English.

I would strongly encourage parents who want to maintain Yiddish at home to invest in Yiddish material. Buy the books, get the magazines, put on the story recordings. There are wonderful resources available today, and they make such a difference.

There is another benefit as well. I have found that the Yiddishkeit standard of Yiddish children’s material is often higher, and the content tends to be more eidel. So besides strengthening their language, you’re surrounding your children with stories, ideas and expressions that reflect the Yiddishe atmosphere you want in your home.

I also learned not to become overly nervous about an occasional English word. Sometimes I don’t know the Yiddish word. Sometimes I’m not even sure there is a commonly used Yiddish word. So we borrow the English word and keep going. When the sentence and conversation are taking place in Yiddish, one English word here and there isn’t going to change that.

Today, one of the nicest things for me is to watch the results.

My children are teenagers now. They are completely comfortable in English and read plenty in English. My husband and I still speak English to each other. And yet, when my children speak to us, they speak Yiddish. When they sit around talking to each other, they naturally speak Yiddish. It isn’t something they have to think about; it’s simply their language with each other.

They can pick up a Yiddish book or magazine and read it easily. They understand a broad range of Yiddish, and some of them have developed a richer Yiddish vocabulary than I have. Sometimes they’ll use a word and I’m the one who has to ask what it means!

For me, that is especially gratifying to see. Yiddish didn’t remain something they associate only with grandparents, school, or certain expressions. It became a living language for them, the language they grew up speaking to their parents and siblings.

It does take consistency and intention, especially when you live in an English-speaking environment. But looking back now and hearing my teenage children chatting naturally among themselves in Yiddish, I can say that the effort was very much worth it.