Vivian Conley grew up in Mexico. Naturally, she and her family spoke Spanish. So when Vivian and her American husband had a son 4 years ago, she knew she would teach her child to speak her native language, even though they lived in the U.S.

"All my family is down in Mexico and they don't speak English at all," Vivian says. "We are extremely close and we go to visit once a year. That's the main reason I want him to know the language."

From the moment of son Tristan's birth, Vivian spoke to him exclusively in Spanish. Her husband, who understands some Spanish, spoke English to Tristan. And so began their bilingual family.

In that respect, the Conley family is like millions of others in the U.S. More than six million children ages 5 to 17 speak a language other than English at home, according to the 1990 Census report. And between 1980 and 1990, the number of American school-aged children who spoke a language other English at home rose by more than 40 percent, reports the National Association for Bilingual Education.

That might sound exceptional. In a way, it is, but not because the numbers of multilingual people are growing. It's exceptional because those numbers are probably much higher in most other countries.

"All you have to do is look throughout the world. In almost every [other] country, children are exposed to more than one language," says Irma Olmedo, assistant professor of education at the University of Illinois at Chicago. "Multilingualism is more the norm."

While multilingualism may not be the norm in the United States, the changing face of America is affecting the speaking voice of America. The Census Bureau predicts that by 2025, the Hispanic and Asian populations combined will have gained 44 million people. Those two groups together will make up 24 percent of the population, compared to 14 percent in 1996.

Interestingly, there is a large group of Americans who -- although they have no background with a language other than English themselves -- want their children to have a larger language repertoire than they do.

"There are some areas where people are very interested in their children becoming bilingual, English-speaking people," Olmedo says. "In Chicago, there are several dual language schools in which children who are English-speaking are learning the curriculum in Spanish."

When young children begin learning a second language, they are often still learning to grasp the formalities of their first language. While it might seem this would cause confusion for kids, quite the opposite is true. Not only are they able to balance different languages, there also are real cognitive benefits to doing so.

"There's an extensive body of research done on children growing up bilingual and how they gain cognitive flexibility," Olmedo says. "In part, this is explained by that fact that they have to negotiate two different systems. That kind of skill transfers over into other kinds of tasks."

Conley has recognized that ability in her own son.

"He has an American accent when he talks, but his grammar is perfect," she says. "It's just incredible how he switches from one language to the other."

"When he started talking he would respond to me in English, but I kept talking to him in Spanish," says Conley of her son Tristan. "Everything he said to me in English, I repeated in Spanish. When he was almost 3, I started telling him that I didn't understand when he talked to me in English, that he needed to talk to me in Spanish."

When Conley told her son she only understood Spanish, he realized something didn't add up.

"At one point he was saying, 'How come you understand what Papi (Dad) is saying?' So I said, 'Yes, I understand, but I like when you speak to me in Spanish.'" From that moment on, her son has spoken to her only in Spanish.

Tristan also speaks Spanish with his mother's family in Mexico when he visits for about 3 weeks each year. But his Spanish education is missing one element that might have made helped his mother's efforts: regular exposure to the language outside the home.

"It's critical to have children in an environment where they have peers who aren't just speaking English," Olmedo says, noting that other parents sometimes have the same difficulty that Conley had. "It's very difficult to get the child to speak [the second language at home], but that doesn't mean that you should give up. Even if he's not actively using it, he's hearing it. The literature [says] that the parents should continue to use the language at home with the child."

When a family lives in an area where bilingualism isn't common, getting exposure to a second language can be a big challenge. But Olmedo says there are ways; it simply depends on how motivated the parents are.

"Are there [other] children who are native speakers of that alternate language? If not, there might be other institutions. Does your church have a group [of speakers of that language]? Maybe you can get your child involved," Olmedo says. "There are also materials on video on audio for children."

And if your repeated efforts to get your child to communicate with you in a language other than English are met with resistance, don't stop trying. He is still learning with every word you speak.

"Children will learn the language that they're exposed to in their environment," Olmedo says. "If they're hearing multiple languages, they will learn to understand and speak those languages, but it depends on the exposure continuing. [If you stop], they will lose it."

Now that Tristan has accepted the Spanish language, Conley feels her son will reap great benefits from it.

"He will be more open to the idea of learning a third language when he gets older by observing and experiencing how important and easy is to communicate with people from other countries," she says. "And if in the future he decides not to go to college (I would have a fit, of course), he will have this important skill for the rest of his life."