Prof. Annelise Kowalczyk
bilingualism researcher
Patient; corrects myths gently
Home Language
Three languages between the parents, and grandparents who worry the boy is losing them.
Planned · not started yet
Migration & life abroad Belonging Family duty Competing advice Family home Across borders Warm Hopeful
The premise
Three languages between the parents, and grandparents who worry the boy is losing them. The family learns what research says about bilingual childhoods, and what it means to belong to more than one place.
The protagonist
Mei Oyelowo-Brandt — Mother raising a bilingual son who answers only in the school language
The council
Every council member is an original fictional character. None represents, quotes or is endorsed by a real person.
Dorota Feeney
primary teacher
Pragmatic; sees school realities
Dr Rashid Albrecht
cultural psychologist
Reflective; focuses on identity
How the story moves
Told by three generations over three years; the grandmother’s fear becomes the thread that resolves the family’s approach.
What readers take away
- How children acquire more than one language
- Family language policies
- Myths about bilingual delay
- Literacy in a heritage language
- School and home cooperation
- Identity and belonging
- Keeping a minority language alive in adolescence
- Supporting grandparent relationships
- Choose heritage-language books and media
- Use community and Saturday schools
- Handle code-switching positively
- Support literacy in two scripts
The books
- 1The silence Planned
- 2The plan Planned
- 3Grandmother Planned
- 4School Planned
Book titles are working titles and may change before publication. No book is on sale until the complete series is finished, checked and released.