Bilingualism in Children

Bilingualism can be viewed in two divers(prenominal) ways. One way of viewing bilingualistism is that it is a commendable trait for a person to have, that is alongside the thinking that it is a mark of high intellect. an other(prenominal) way of viewing bilingualism is that it is a disallow upshot of Globalism, that it is a adulteration of culture. It is undeniable that bilingualism is a prevalent thing in todays bon ton. Some even consider it as an essential trait for endurance in the context of the modern world.This notion of bilingualism is especially prevalent in the US, where immigrants should adopt a snatch linguistic communication to be competitive in terms of employment. That is why children from immigrant families be advised by their parents to learn a second language early as early as possible. The caper bilingualism arises when parents fail to consider that children are still in the stage of master their beginning language. Acquiring two language simultaneously i s would be arduous for anyone regardless of age. It is a jet notion that the children would eventually learn the second language.That is alongside the thinking that, as the children are exposed much to the society chating the second language, the children would rude(a)ly the language. Although, it is observable that children from immigrant families gradually become more and more comfortable with second language done time. notwithstanding it is in any case observable that the process that the children have to go through is not an diffused one. The difficulty of childrens acquisition of a second language is evince by Eva Hoffman in her take hold Lost in Translation. She had thrown in a very helpful query for this discussion how does an single wrench toward another culture with disclose stumbling all over? (Hoffman 209) Hoffmans semi-autobiographical book is just roughly her defend to acquire a second language when family had migrated from Poland to Vancouver. The bul k of the book is about her lost of her sense of place and belonging in her new society. But the fact that the acquisition of the second language would come as natural would not necessarily mean that the children would not be subjected to the consequences of beingness bilingual.Another book that would be helpful to the discussion at hand is Natasha Lvovichs The bilingual Self An inquiry to language learning. In contrast to Hoffmans work, Lvovichs book had taken a more attention-grabbing approach. Lvovichs work is about the struggles that her daughter had to face when they had moved to America. Although there are virtually pip-squeak differences between the two books, they are both talking the same topic of language acquisition. Both of the books had depicted how a child is subjected to consequences of being bilingual.A common consequence of bilingualism as Lvovich had depicted through the story of her daughter she is dismissal through a very difficult period of adjustment as a teenager growing into adulthood (Lvovich 101) There was even a point in the book that Lvovichs daughter became reluctant to speak their first language. Hoffman argued that a reluctance to speak the first language would dissolvent to the atrophy of the mother language of the child (Hoffman 98) ConclusionFor children of immigrant families to succeed in being multilingual, their parents should first do careful planning and learning about the disposition of language acquisition. The parents should always keep in mind that childhood is already full of challenges as is. They should be aware of the consequence of being bilingual and they should also have at least an idea of how to counter them. whole kit and boodle Cited Hoffman, Eva. (1990). Lost in Translation A Life in a New Language. NY Penguin Lvovich, N. (1997). The Multilingual Self An inquiry into language learning. Mahwah, NJ Lawrence Erlbaum AssociatesBilingualism in ChildrenBilingualism is the production and/or comprehension o f two languages by the same individual (Cummins, 1981). Many children of varying nationality, acquire this ability of learning two languages through cultural maintenance and educational enrichment. Furthermore, the media continuously bombards children of stimulation of the other language (Cummins, 1981). Cummins (1981) stated that there is a strong tendency among children of replacing the first language with the other. A series of tests were made by Feldman and Shen (1969) about some language-related cognitive advantages of bilingual five year olds.Three tasks for children were made accordingly to fall in information. These tasks of increasing difficulty were (1) object constancy, (2) naming and (3) employ labels in sentences, respectively . In object constancy, children were primarily shown with objects such as cups, plates, sponge, match and sucking cup soap holder. These objects were later physically transformed in movement of them. Crushing the cups, burning the match and pa inting the plates were some examples of transformation. Transformed objects are placed beside an identical pre-transformed objects.Afterwards, the children were asked to identify which among the two was primarily shown. Naming, on the other hand, purposely tests the childs ability to use literal labels to name familiar objects. The experimenter move to confuse the children by switching the names of the familiar object and designating paradoxical names to objects. For example, calling an airplane as car and relabeling the cup as wug. The children were asked which among the objects was really an airplane. They were also asked which one was called a wug and then they were asked what it really was.In the leash experiment, the child was requested to show his ability of using three sorts of labels in simple relational sentences such as The cup is on the plate. These labels, as discussed in naming, were common names, switched common names and nonsense names. The principle for using s imple relational sentences was that referential word meaning is the simplest sort of meaning. voice communication like cup, plate and even the part of the predicate on can all be thought of as referring to things. Results showed that bilinguals perform meaningfully interrupt in the said three tasks than monolinguals do (Feldman & Shen, 1969).Moreover, bilinguals advantage over monolinguals was more apparent in comprehension than production measures. These means they turn tail better where nonverbal pointing responses were required. In addition, functions related to labeling would be more groundbreaking by having two languages. Research by Bialystok (2004), on the other hand, has shown that bilingual children develop control processes more readily than monolinguals do. They respond more cursorily to conditions that placed greater demands on working memory and carry out controlled processes more effectively (Bialystok, 2004).On the other hand, Macnamara (1966) argued some studie s have reported negative effects of bilingualism (as cited in Bialystok, 2004). In Feldman & Shens (1969) experiment, it was found out that monolinguals do better in the use of either common names alone or nonsense names alone. Furthermore, Fishman (1967) added that disadvantages commonly associated with bilingualism would not appear in bilinguals whose languages were stake specific (as cited in Feldman & Shen, 1969). It was an accepted notion that bilinguals had deficits compared with monolingual peers.Nonetheless, studies show significant cognitive advantages of children with bilingual capacities. These advantages were dominant in comprehending rather than performing verbal actions. Other research pointed out bilingual advantages in the areas of creativity, problem resolving power and perceptual disembedding (Bialystok, 2004). These advantages of bilinguals can be uniquely attributed to an early development in association and labeling skills (Feldman & Shen, 1969). Bibliography Bialystok, E. , Craik, F. I. M. , Klein, R. & Viswanathan, M. (2004) Bilingualism, Aging, and cognitive Control Evidence From the Simon Task.Psychology and Aging, 19 (2), 290-303. Feldman, C. & Shen, M. Some Language-Related Cognitive Advantages of Bilingual Five Year Olds. Retrieved from http//eric. ed. gov/ERICWebPortal/ use /portlets/recordDetails/detailmini. jsp_nfpb=true&_&ERICExt Search_SearchValue_0=ED031307&ERICExtSearch _SearchType_0=no&accno=ED031307 Cummins, J. Bilingualism and Minority-Language Children. Retrieved from http//eric. ed. gov/ERICWebPortal/custom/portlets/recordDetails/detailmini. jsp_ nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=ED215 557&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=no&accno=ED215557