I have had several children. My first was Egyptian and the family spoke Arabic. The dad spoke almost fluent English and they moved to Canada when the little boy was 18 months - he hadn't learned to speak Arabic or English. The dad had tried to speak a bit to him and his school age sister but he was away for long periods of time due to his work. The mom spoke almost no English so it was dad I dealt with. The mom tried to learn English - the daughter was about 8 and picked it up quickly at school. Mom started ESL classes. Over time she would come with the dad for pickup and try to talk to me asking about the child's day. I had to speak slowly, distinctly, use lots of hand gestures with her but at least she was trying. The child was over 2 before he said much of anything. He quickly learned to understand the basics in both languages. He followed the others around and I spoke to him in segments like Mark shoes off - as in leaving out unnecessary words so he was concentrating only on the basics. Over time I could add in the other words and he still understood.

I have had a couple of Asian children - one that was adopted at 13 months and one where the family spoke both languages but the mom that was with the child spoke only Chinese to him. He learned to follow instructions faster than Mark because he was already familiar with some of the words.

In Ottawa of course there are often French/English to deal with. I have had parents that used only French at home bring their child to me so they would learn English - ie by immersion. What they didn't want was a bilingual daycare because they were afraid the child would be able to function totally in French and not have to rely on learning English.

I try to ask the family how to say certain words in their language for basics like eat, hungry, come, sit, basic commands we would do or the child might say like dog or tree or bird, block, ball. Not so much that I would use the words but that I would understand what the child was referring to and I would say the word in English as I gave them what they asked for.

You might luck out and they have learned some sign language or be able to teach them some basics like more.