My daughter is 2 years and 5 months. When I read to her, she likes to look at pictures in the book for a while but within a few minutes, she loses interest. I think it might be because she is not understanding English since we speak a different language at home. Please advise me how I should make her understand English and make her interested in reading.

First of all, she’s very young. Two-year-olds are just beginning their complex language development skills and if she is bilingual, then her development is doubly complex. That’s not a bad thing, but it might take her a bit longer to sort it all out because she’s translating in two different languages. The end result will be wonderful, but it makes for slower going in the beginning.

The best thing to do is to keep exposing her to both languages, both in the verbal form and the written form. You might be even able to get the same book in both languages–that would be a fun exercise–read the book in one language, and then read the same book in the other language. Again, keep in mind that she’s only two. Her attention span is about 2-4 minutes at the most. It’s not uncommon for children of this age to lose interest in a book after just a few pages and want to do something different. That’s OK. As she matures and as her language skills with both languages increases, her attention span will follow.