Multilingual children: pros and cons. Where do we stand today? part one.
January 8th 2008 06:26
Multilingual children: pros and cons. Where do we stand today?
When I was a little girl my mother started talking to me in her native language, German. Living in Paris in a French community, my first words where therefore German as she was my prime caretaker.
At this time doctors, scientists and also the society in general believed that learning multiple languages at an early age was dangerous for the development of the brain, and the stability of the personality.
Things have changed.
It is a fact today, that learning multiple languages at an early age is effortless, easiest and fastest.
Different studies around the world have also proved that it helps children to develop superior reading and writing skills.
Those children growing up in a multilingual environment tend to have in general a better analytical, social and academic skills comparing to monolingual children.
They tend to feel at ease in different environments much naturally, and have a natural flexibility and adaptability to changes. They also seem to have a better self-esteem and self confidence.
First of all, mums breeding in a community different from their native language should speak to their offspring in their first language. It will make them feel emotionally closer to their baby than if they were speaking to them in their second language.
Also as we know today, research have shown that between 0 and 3 years of age, nature has granted us with a busy little brain building the optimal neural pathways to use in the production of language.
This truly amazing ability decreases by the age of 6-7, when children as adults have to put more efforts in what they learn.
Was Darwin right? The fittest survive… therefore nature helped us to assimilate languages very quickly and very early, in order of survival needs.
The optimal period for learning languages is of 0 to 3, studies have shown that languages in bilingual infants are stored closer together in the brain than in later bilinguals, meaning that learning later takes greater effort and is treated differently by the brain compared to children acquiring them simultaneously.
When I was a little girl my mother started talking to me in her native language, German. Living in Paris in a French community, my first words where therefore German as she was my prime caretaker.
At this time doctors, scientists and also the society in general believed that learning multiple languages at an early age was dangerous for the development of the brain, and the stability of the personality.
Things have changed.
It is a fact today, that learning multiple languages at an early age is effortless, easiest and fastest.
Those children growing up in a multilingual environment tend to have in general a better analytical, social and academic skills comparing to monolingual children.
They tend to feel at ease in different environments much naturally, and have a natural flexibility and adaptability to changes. They also seem to have a better self-esteem and self confidence.
First of all, mums breeding in a community different from their native language should speak to their offspring in their first language. It will make them feel emotionally closer to their baby than if they were speaking to them in their second language.
Also as we know today, research have shown that between 0 and 3 years of age, nature has granted us with a busy little brain building the optimal neural pathways to use in the production of language.
This truly amazing ability decreases by the age of 6-7, when children as adults have to put more efforts in what they learn.
Was Darwin right? The fittest survive… therefore nature helped us to assimilate languages very quickly and very early, in order of survival needs.
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