How do children in multilingual households differentiate between the two (or more) languages they’re being taught?
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When they’re really young they don’t. They just associate [table] == “mesa”, [cake] == gateau (to give examples) and run with it.
My friends have a ~2 year old who is exposed to Spanish, French, and English and they all come out together in a mish mash. I have another friend with kids exposed to Spanish and English and by the time the older kid was ~4 he knew the difference enough to exclusively respond in Spanish (but understood English). Yet other friends years ago had their children exposed to *5* languages (between themselves, where they lived, and grandparents) and I am just jealous of those kids, but I remember talking with them about how it can take longer for such children to get comfortable speaking fluidly.
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