5 Things That Count as Bilingual Literacy (That You're Probably Already Doing)
What the research says about the everyday moments that count more than you think
There are days where I feel like I’m really doing it. We read together in the morning, I’m narrating everything in Spanish, she is repeating words back to me, and I think, okay, we’ve got this!
And then there are the other days. The ones where the guilt sits heavy and quiet. The book we didn’t open. The moment I defaulted to English because I was tired. The feeling that every ordinary Tuesday is a learning opportunity I let slip by.
This is the thing nobody prepares you for when you decide to raise your child in a language your household doesn’t fully share.
Here’s what I’ve learned, both as a bilingual mama and as someone who has spent years studying how children actually develop language and literacy: the ordinary moments you’re already living inside of are doing more work than you think. You don’t need a perfect day to raise a bilingual reader. You need to know what counts.
Bilingual Literacy: the ability to make meaning, communicate, and engage with the world across two languages. It develops not through formal instruction alone, but through the rich, repeated, everyday experiences a child has with language at home. Which means the ordinary moments matter more than most of us realize.
This is not a checklist of things you have been doing wrong. It is a mirror. And if you are not doing all of these yet, that is okay too. The bar to begin is lower than you think, and it is never too late. These five practices are probably already living somewhere in your home. You just did not know they had a name.
1. Singing Songs and Rhymes in Spanish
If you have ever caught yourself humming “Arroz con Leche” while doing dishes, or singing “Los Pollitos Dicen” during bath time, you were not just being a sweet mami. You were building your child’s phonological awareness, and that is one of the foundational skills for learning to read.
Phonological awareness is the ability to hear and manipulate the sounds in language, and research consistently identifies it as one of the strongest predictors of early reading success in bilingual children. When your child hears the rhythm and rhyme of Spanish songs, their brain is doing serious literacy work. Recognizing patterns. Distinguishing sounds. Building the auditory scaffolding that reading will eventually sit on.
You do not need a curated playlist to make this count. The songs your abuela sang to you count. The ones where you only remember half the words count. Singing in Spanish, even imperfectly, even once a day, is a bilingual literacy practice. And when you understand why it works, you can be even more intentional about it.
Reframe: The next time you sing in Spanish with your child, even if it is just one song, even if you forget the second verse, know that you are doing phonics instruction. Without the worksheet.
2. Telling Stories Out Loud (No Book Required)
This one is probably the most underestimated bilingual literacy practice on this list, and the one I want you to sit with longest.
Oral storytelling, whether that is a cuento your mom told you, a story about what happened to your tía that one time, or a completely made-up bedtime story you invented on the spot, is a rich, research-backed literacy practice. Studies on Latino families specifically identify co-constructive storytelling as a cultural practice that builds narrative comprehension, vocabulary, and the oral language skills that transfer directly into reading and writing development.
The families in your community have been doing this for generations. Long before anyone had a literacy framework, abuelas were building readers by telling stories at the kitchen table. We love a good chisme! That was never just entertainment. That was education. Knowing that distinction is what allows you to do it with even more purpose.
Reframe: Your voice, your memory, and your family’s stories are a curriculum. Pull one out tonight.
3. Narrating Your Day in Spanish
This one requires nothing. No materials, no prep, no extra time carved out of a day that is already full.
When you talk your child through what you are doing as you do it, in Spanish, you are engaging in what researchers call rich language input during routine activities, and it is one of the most significant predictors of bilingual vocabulary development. “Ahora nos vamos a lavar las manos.” “Mira, estoy cortando la zanahoria.” “¿Qué color es esto?” These sentences, repeated across a thousand ordinary moments, are building a language system inside your child’s brain.
You have been teaching without knowing you were teaching. And that is exactly the kind of thing that becomes even more powerful once you see it clearly, because then you can lean into it, expand it, and build on it in ways that go even further.
Reframe: Your running commentary is not just noise. Every time you narrate in Spanish, you are adding vocabulary, building sentence structure, and showing your child that Spanish is a language for living in, not just performing.
4. Asking Questions About Books in Spanish, Even English Ones
Here is something that does not get said enough: you do not need a bilingual bookshelf to have a bilingual literacy practice.
If access to Spanish-language books in your home is limited, you are not behind. You are in the majority. And the move that many of us make instinctively, grabbing an English book and narrating or discussing it in Spanish, is a recognized and research-supported literacy strategy. Asking questions about a story in Spanish, regardless of what language the book is written in, builds critical thinking, oral language, and comprehension skills simultaneously.
“¿Por qué crees que ella está triste?” “¿Qué crees que va a pasar?” “¿Esto te recuerda algo?” These questions, in Spanish, about any book, are doing bilingual literacy work. Understanding the mechanics behind why this works is what takes it from an instinct to an intentional practice, and intentional practice compounds over time.
Reframe: The language you use to talk about a book matters just as much as the language the book is written in. Your questions in Spanish are the literacy practice. The book is just the starting point.
5. Switching Between Spanish and English
I saved the biggest reframe for last, because this is the one most of us have spent years feeling quietly ashamed of.
Code-switching, moving fluidly between Spanish and English within a conversation, is not a sign of confusion. It is not something you need to apologize for or correct. It is a sophisticated, research-supported bilingual practice with its own name in the field of bilingual education: translanguaging.
Translanguaging describes how bilingual speakers draw on their full linguistic repertoire as one unified system, not two separate languages competing with each other. When your child moves between Spanish and English, they are not failing at both. They are demonstrating a level of cognitive flexibility that monolingual children simply do not have access to. The research on this is clear: home translanguaging supports vocabulary development, heritage language maintenance, and even the socio-emotional wellbeing of bilingual children.
That natural mixing you do at the dinner table, in the car, in the middle of a bedtime story? It counts. It has always counted. And the more you understand about why it counts, the more intentionally you can nurture it.
Reframe: Code-switching is not a gap in your child’s language. It is evidence of it.
Honorable Mentions: These Didn’t Make the List, But They Absolutely Count
Labeling objects around your home in Spanish
Watching Spanish-language shows or YouTube together
Video calls with Spanish-speaking family members
Drawing or writing with Spanish labels, even just one word
Playing in Spanish, even if play is the only time you do it
Take This With You 💛
Maybe you have been measuring your bilingual parenting against a ruler that was never built for what you are actually doing. The workbook, the structured lesson, the perfectly bilingual home, that is one version of this. But it is not the only version, and it is not the version most of us are living.
The literacy is in the song you barely remember all the words to. The story you made up in the dark. The question you asked in Spanish about a book that was written in English. The way you move between two languages without thinking because that is just how you love.
You are already doing this. The question is not whether you are enough. The question is whether you can start to see it clearly, and what becomes possible when you do.
¿Y tú? Which one of these did you not realize counted as a literacy practice? Tell me in the comments!
Hasta la próxima
Dr. Jatnna
References
¹ Kirsch, C., & Hornberger, N. H. (2024). Multiple lenses to understand and shape multilingual literacy practices in early childhood education. Language, Culture and Curriculum, 37(3), 289–309.
² Translanguaging in the home learning environment: A scoping review synthesizing empirical studies on bilingual practices, home literacy, and heritage language maintenance. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism (2026).
³ Research on Spanish-English dual language learners in Migrant and Seasonal Head Start programs documenting links between home literacy activities and emergent bilingual development. NIH/PMC (2022).
⁴ Melzi, G., Schick, A. R., & Scarola, L. Latino families and co-constructive elaborative storytelling as a culturally grounded literacy practice supporting oral language and reading readiness.