Our Decision
The ability to communicate lays a foundation for living and learning
the rest of our lives. As home educators, my wife and I want to provide our
children with the best opportunity to advance scholastically according to each
child’s potential. We want them to be fully equipped when they enter college or
the workforce. Being multilingual opens a huge host of career opportunities
that simply wouldn’t be possible otherwise. So, early on in our parenting we
made a decision to raise multilingual children.
What Age?
We were certain that at least a second language would be
critical in our children’s overall education, but we weren’t sure how early to
begin. What is the best age to introduce a second language? How early is too
early or how late is too late?
According to Multilingual
Children’s Association, the earlier you introduce language the better.
Here’s what they said in an article on bilingual children and language
development:
“With the help of
modern technology in neuroscience, we now understand how language develops
during infancy and early childhood. Also, based on countless studies,
researchers can safely conclude that as your child grows older, her uncanny
language abilities decrease significantly. This 'critical period' means that
you should strike while the iron is hot!”
With this in mind, we have elected a course of education
that incorporates a second language as early as preschool and certainly by
early grade school ages. Multilingual parents can actually begin teaching their
children from birth. The longer you wait to introduce additional languages, the
more difficult it becomes to learn.
What Method?
My wife was introduced to foreign language in high school,
but that proved to be completely insufficient in actually gaining fluency in
that particular language. She can only remember a few words or at best a phrase
or two. I’m curious how you can get straight A’s in Spanish for three years in
a row and still not be able to carry on a conversation in that language. I have
even known people that majored in foreign language in college, but still
struggle with fluency. Apparently the predominant grammar based language
programs are not working too well.
We found ourselves in a dilemma because we were not
multilingual. As parent teachers, we needed a method that would work without us
actually knowing the language first. We needed a way for our entire family to
learn a language together. This seemed unlikely since there is such a vast gap
in age and understanding of our primary language. We discovered that the best
way to learn a second language is the same way you learn your first – vocabulary
immersion.
Immersion means to be placed into a setting where you hear only
the language being learned. There’s not a comparison from one language to
another. You simply hear words in the new language that your mind naturally
links to things being experienced by your other senses. This is how babies
learn language. If you want a baby to learn the word nose, you say the word and
point to your nose. If you want them to lean the word cold, you put an ice cube
in their hand a say cold.
Immersion schools and
programs outside the home weren’t an option, so we researched and discovered a
computer-based program for homeschoolers that uses the vocabulary immersion
strategy. We have four children between the ages of ten and fifteen months and
we’re all engaged in a natural way of learning language that pairs real-life
imagery with the voices of native speakers. There is a lot of interactivity that
promotes proper pronunciation as well.
It’s been fascinating learning a new language together as a
family. I’m really excited to see what experiences and opportunities open for
our children as a result of our decision to equip them with an additional
language early in life. It’s a lot of fun speaking to each other in a new
language too.
Matthew Anderson – A stay-at-home father and primary
educator of four amazing children. I’m currently learning Mandarin Chinese
along with my family and enjoy researching linguistic tools and services such
as Transparent Language and others.
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