Afraid that your young child may get addicted to play instead of studying?

I realize our lives have changed a lot from the time I was a kid...all the nieghborhood kids used to get together and play for hours every evening. Once we got back we had to catch up with homework and study, but that play time was exhilarating!

I realized the true impact of our rush to prepare our kids to be geniuses or atleast better then the rest when a mom asked me what if her child got addicted to playtime in the park? The child in question was five years old...I reassured her it was the best thing that her child could do at that age.

Before you rush to fill your child's days with hours and hours of direct instruction of skills how about letting them explore in their play? By the way that too is research based...

Click here to read more.


Oh! I will continue the posts on language activities...just getting ready for some interesting workshops:)

Ms. S

Fostering Second Language Development

How do we help our children develop fluency in a second language? 

 

The first requirement is of course, increased vocabulary. A child needs to know that a big ball can be described as huge, gigantic, humongous, large, giant, or enormous; the synonyms keep increasing with age. He can do that only when we provide him with the opportunity to learn these words. Does that mean we do a drill? No, there are fun ways to increase your child’s vocabulary.

You, the parent, are your child’s first teacher in this as with all other skills. So, talk, play, sing and engage with your child. If English is not your first language, no matter! Do so in your native tongue. A strong foundation in the first language is necessary for the acquisition of a second language.

Read to your child. Children’s books, children’s section of the newspapers, articles of interest are all excellent materials. You can read with your children…and ask them questions that are just beyond the text. If the answers can be found in the text, that is practice/repetition. When the answer is beyond the text, it forces the child to make inferences, understand cause and effect, and feel with (or against) the character. The child has to use known vocabulary words to express himself in new ways (not given in the text). That challenges the child with developing second language skills.

Narrate stories. One of my favorite childhood memories is eating dinner on the terrace with all my cousins during summer vacations. One person was usually assigned the role of ‘teller of tall tales.’ “What does that word mean?” was the most common question as we were from different age groups.

Play descriptive language games. One game I play a lot is as follows: I say “I’m thinking of an animal” and describe three or four moderately tough traits before giving an easy hint. For example, I might say, I’m thinking of an animal…

• It is a large cat
• It is carnivorous (a meat eater)
• It lives in the jungle
• The babies are called cubs

If the child is unable to identify the animal I’d add more information.

• It can camouflage well because the body is covered with dark brown/orange strips
• It is the national animal of India     

This gives me the perfect opportunity to explain the meaning of words like camouflage, carnivorous in context.

More tips to follow...

Ms. S 

Bilingualism-Part 3

I am back after a long hiatus...a back and shoulder injury kept me away. But I am on the mend and hoping to post regularly again:) I guess the order of the day is to complete my rambling thoughts on bilingual education in the Indian setting.

Why do I talk about so much about second language acquisition? In the current environment where parents pay so much money right from their child’s elementary years, there is a very strong emphasis on learning English. In the rural areas, the emphasis on English is for a very different reason…upward mobility—socially and financially. No matter how much we talk about the importance and love for our native tongues, it is an undeniable fact that knowledge of English is a must for our students. As with any other investment, parents should be aware of the processes involved and help their children beyond the 'English Medium' instruction. 

There are other advantages to learning a second language. Besides opening new doors, acquiring a second language has a very big impact on your child’s cognitive ability. Learning a second language is shown to make your brain more flexible aiding creative problem solving. Studies have shown that being bilingual keeps the brain active even as we age. Additionally, a bilingual child finds it easier to learn a third language and approximate the sounds.

In the Indian urban setting most students are considered bilingual. If we were to evaluate their skills in the two languages (usually mother tongue and English) in most cases the fluency is not comparable. Yes, English is the medium of instruction and the students learn to read, write and respond in the context of the lesson. But fluency involves using a language to think and communicate in various milieus, comprehend beyond the text, and finally, to understand and appreciate the aesthetics of that language.

Next we'll look at what you can do a home to help your child improve his/her second language acquisition.

Ms. S

Insight into Bilingualism Continued...

Children who grow up in a native English speaking environment acquire this initial knowledge in English. Children who have learned their fundamental concepts in their native tongue only (up to the age of three) have to make new connections. They have to link the word Ball in English to the word in their native tongue. Their prior knowledge is in a different language. Next comes the shape, the function, the color, the size...this process takes time.

In some families, children are exposed to two languages right from the beginning. This child develops skills in both the languages simultaneously.  A child exposed to English after the mother tongue is established will need more time to develop conversational fluency in English (or any other second language). It takes about 3-4 years to develop conversational fluency and 8-11 years to develop academic fluency (which involves abstract language).

One of my friends, a speech language pathologist herself used to try to say the names of the Indians in our circle. Sharad became Sharat, Shruti became Shrewdi…my name didn’t sound anything like what it is, of course:) 

That is one aspect of learning a second language at a young age. Accent/pronunciation is closer to a native speaker’s if a child learns the language by six years of age. That is why we have our varied regional accents…isskool (school), aayil (oil), ij (is).  We transpose the grammatical/phonological processes of our native tongues to the second language. It is harder to correct these at an older age. While this may not be a big deal in a place like India (where we have so many variations for the same word thanks to our regional accents), it may be a problem if you live in a country where the native language is English. Your child will probably be referred to a speech therapist for articulation and reading errors.

Earlier, it was considered that there was a critical period for second language exposure—the child acquires a second language faster or easier at a younger age. This is now shown to be not true…one of the reasons given is that older children have greater cognitive learning skills and so they learn better.



To be continued...
Ms. S

Language Development and Bilingualism

The 15 month old cried out loudly pointing to the water cooler. "Oh, do you want water? You can say I want water," said his grandmother. No, this toddler is not a prodigy to start speaking in sentences right away but I noted how she gave him the words to make a request. When he is ready to speak, he will know how to ask for something instead of crying or demanding. It is fun to see the child make those leaps...even in the two weeks we've been here he has started to say yes or no when given choices.

"I speak to him in my mother tongue but he seems to say a few words in English. How can he pick that up from the play school but not what we speak?" the mom asked.

Let's look at the uniquely Indian concept of learning your mother tongue and English simultaneously in school. In countries with an established education system in their native language children start learning English when they are older (unless of course you go to International schools). In most other former colonies, education is mostly in English...even the primary language at home is English. In India, except for a very small percentage of the population, most parents prefer that their child learn their mother tongue first. They are happy to have their child acquire English language skills but mother tongue has a different resonance.

Most of us who grew up in urban environments in India assume that going to a school where the medium of instruction is English automatically makes us bilingual...but that is an over simplification. Almost all of us learn English as a second language, even if the medium of instruction is English. With years and years of education, constant usage in our interactions, (and other interventions), it may become our dominant language. Most of us start by learning English as a  second language.

Let's look at how a child acquires primary language skills first.

Language and cognitive development are tightly interwoven. So the first time your child understands what an object is, its label (name of the object), the purpose behind it and other attributes the child is developing his/her language and cognitive ability. 

Take a baby who plays with a ball—explores it by putting it into his mouth, touching and rolling—not purposefully (or intentionally) but accidentally. As he reaches his milestones he begins to understand that he can interact with you using this object. If it is a squishy ball, he squeezes it—maybe he gets a sensory feedback and he squeezes the ball again...all in all he is starting to see that he can do something with this object...again as he continues up the milestone ladder he starts looking for the object when you say, "Here is the BALL." He associates the name (or label) with that object...along the way he picks up information on the shape, that it can roll...the process goes on.

At every step the child makes connects the new information to what he already knows (prior knowledge). Next come newer concepts like big ball, small ball, red ball, blue ball. Every new information is built upon his prior knowledge that he has already acquired through play and exploration.


To be continued...


Ms. S