Encouraging speech development, learning a foreign language and the presence of dialect and traditional values are very important for children of early and preschool age. The first part of the paper discusses the history and multiculturalism of Istria, ie the history of government in Istria, especially the presence of Italian government. In the continuation of the theoretical part, the terms language in touch and bilingualism are clarified with special reference to vertical bilingualism. Special emphasis was placed on the development of vocabulary in preschool children. The second part of the paper focuses on the research "Italianisms in the spoken language of children". The survey was attended by 117 children from 7 preschools in seven different cities / towns. The measuring instrument was a worksheet created for research purposes. The analysis of the results was carried out according to the location of the educational institution, ie for each individual kindergarten, age and gender of the examined children. It was found that there are visible differences in the results achieved. Depending on the place of the research, the best results in the knowledge of Italianisms were achieved in Žminj, while the worst results were achieved in Pula. The results showed that older children better recognize the given terms, but no significant differences were found depending on the gender of the examined children. With this research, we wanted to point out the importance of preserving the cultural heritage of the area from which children come.