How To Raise Successful Kids While Living Overseas

Balloon photo by jesse.millan. Feature photo by ^riza^.

Here are some practical tips on how to raise happy, well-adjusted children while living overseas.

Your daughter is twelve years old and on her second passport. Her first passport is tattered and filled with stamps from Asia and the Middle East. This one looks set to go the same way.

Photo by broma

She was born in Boston but has only visited there during Christmas.

Her birthday parties are like a UN General Meeting. You watch in amazement as she moves between three languages while collecting her gifts .

When you took that first overseas posting, you weren’t even thinking about children. Back then, you never thought past the next contract. Then you got married, and suddenly there were diapers in your suitcase.

While your friends back home recreate their own childhood with their families, life as an expat parent is very different.

But traveling and living abroad with your family can be the most rewarding thing you’ll do together. You just need to make a few preparations and adjustments.

Who are the Expat Kids?

Some children think a nomadic life is normal; they’d put any Khao San road backpacker to shame.

Children from military, missionary and business families clock up the miles, sometimes before they’re even old enough to understand what’s happening.

Researchers working with these children call them ‘Third Culture Kids’. They discovered that children take what they know or remember from their home culture, and mix it with their host culture to make a third mixed-up bag that works just fine for them.

So, for example 90% of those recently surveyed here said they felt they understand foreigners better than the average American and 80% said they can make friends with anyone.

Photo by Cia de Foto

What do Expat Kids worry about?

Well, you need to listen to them. Your own relocation issues might seem bigger but knowing that Santa will find her little sister is a big deal for your twelve-year old.

Take the time to find out as much as you can about the new culture so you can recognize things like tasty fruit or dangerous spiders.

If your children look radically different to the people in your new home, be ready for some healthy curiosity and prepare your kids for life as a minor celebrity if you’re moving to a rural area.

Playing games is a big part of life for many kids, but ice-hockey isn’t big in the tropics and the football isn’t quite what you’re expecting. Talk to other expat parents online and find out what they do and how to join in.

What language should you speak abroad?

Sure, everyone at your workplace will speak English, and the staff provided for your home will probably do the same, but do you want your kids to continually impose English on their friends or learn some local words?

Even a six-month stay can leave them with an appreciation for the way the non-English speaking world runs.

Schooling for Expat Kids

Your choices for longer stays usually include:

• an international school
• the local school
• home schooling

The familiarity of English and the curriculum are the benefits of the international school system. Most countries have American schools and if not, then the UK system comes a close second.

Photo by LizMarie

Your kids can mix with other expat children and their local classmates are the perfect way for your kids to find out what the country is really like.

But because of the exclusive nature of most of these schools, some parents take the local option. If your kids are younger and not facing exams, then this could be a great experience for them with guaranteed local friends.

But do remember that their first weeks here will be tough. Being the new kid on the block is never easy, and if they don’t speak a word of the language, it’s even harder.

The third option is home-schooling, which is easier than ever before, with so much support online. Home-schooling is a good choice in countries where one parent can’t work because of visa restrictions.

Expat Kids at College

When your little girl grows up, you’ll be making college choices from Kuwait to Switzerland. Once again, the internet comes to the rescue. Whether your kids are seen as local or international students varies from school to school, so make sure you ask before completing the applications – are they in the smaller and coveted international pool or competing with everyone else?

Photo by Josiah MacKenzie

Give your child time to investigate colleges online, and think about whether they want to go back to their native country or not.

For some Third Culture Kids, going back to a normal life isn’t all that exciting. It might be a shock to discover that your kids are bored rigid at the thought of studying where you call home, but think of the savings in tuition fees.

Expat Kids Love Life

Don’t stress too much. Most expat kids are incredibly well-adjusted and have friends all over the globe. They get to visit worlds that most teenagers just see on television and are comfortable with traveling in a way many older people only dream about.

And it’s not just about travel; these kids tend to be more tolerant than children raised in only one culture. If you’re still not convinced, just look at the most famous Third Culture Kid in the world today: Barack Obama.

5 Techniques for Writing Bilingual Dialogue

Including dialogue in your travel narratives is a great way to flesh out characters, keep the action moving, and to tell a story that feels real.

Photo: Soylentgreen

But when you and the people around you are speaking a language other than English, or English and another language, it can be hard to figure out how to recount your conversations. Here are some techniques to try.

Technique #1

“No lo conozco,” he said: I don’t know him.

The most obvious: give each line of dialogue in the language it was spoken in, and provide a translation afterwards when necessary.

While this technique has the advantage of accuracy, it can get tedious in longer pieces with a lot of non-English dialogue. It works best when used sparingly, when dialogue is sparse, but key.

Technique #2

Don’t worry, I tell her, I’ll be okay in a little while.
“¿Segura?”
“Sí.”

Punctuation is your friend, especially when you want to make a subtle distinction between what was actually said, and what you’re translating. Try putting direct quotes in quotation marks, and indicating translations with dashes, or just commas.

With this technique, you don’t waste words, but there’s some potential for confusion on your readers’ part—“wait, did someone just say that or did they only think it?” It probably works best in fairly long pieces, where readers have a chance to get accustomed to your punctuation-signposts.

Photo: Eye2eye

Technique #3

“Will you allow me to do the honor of accompanying you, mujer divina?”

She’s not a travel writer, but we can learn a lot from the way Sandra Cisneros nails this technique in her novel Caramelo. When someone in the novel is speaking Spanish, she lets you know by using translated expressions that sound a little off in English, but are common in Spanish (“what a barbarity!” for example) and by throwing in the occasional (easily understood) Spanish word.

She also changes up the phrasing—rather than translating into standard English, she leaves traces of Spanish grammar. It makes for beautiful reading, and if you can pull this technique off, you’ve got it made.

Technique #4

“Have you been here long?” he asked in English.

When the dialogue is predominantly in one language, you can just advise the reader when you switch to the non-dominant language—he said in Russian, she shouted in Chinese, he muttered in French.

You don’t want to have to do this after every single line of dialogue, so it works best when there’s a primary and a secondary language.

Photo: Bah Humbug

Technique #5
Of course, there’s always the option of just not worrying about it—when you don’t care if your readers know who said what in which language. Or use a mix of different techniques.

And finally, remember that you can’t be a writer unless you’re also a reader. Pay attention to the different ways different writers of all kinds deal with issues like this, and try out the techniques that work best. After a while you’ll hit on something that’s just right for your style and experiences.