A number of people now recognize the importance of learning foreign languages. Unfortunately, the longer one waits to begin learning another language, the harder it becomes. Accordingly, young children have more advantages at language acquisition. Furthermore, younger children who do not attend school have more free time to study different languages.
Younger children tend to easily learn a different language and also learn at a faster rate than older children. A number of studies have proved that younger people are more likely to succeed in learning a foreign language faster than older people. To take my personal experience, I started learning English when I was 9. However, I still encounter numerous problems when communicating with people whose mother tongue is English. Unlike me, my sister started learning English when she was 3. She is now 13, and she speaks English as if she were born in America. Moreover, my sister gets A+ on exams although she does not study for English. My sister and I both have been learning English for the same number of years, but only her English is remarkably outstanding.
Furthermore, children who are not yet in school have much more free time to study a foreign language. In other words, It is possible for them to completely focus on acquiring another language. To illustrate this point better, when I started learning English, I could not spend most of my time on studying English because I had homework to do and exams to study from school. Therefore, I could not spend as much time as my sister on her language study. Thus, my English skills and my sister's differ in mastery.
Younger children have a number of advantages in acquiring a foreign language. Therefore, I personally think younger children should start learning another language as soon as possible for their own good. People around me always make fun of my English skill because it is not as good as my sister’s despite the fact that I am older. I made a decision that when I have a child in the future, I will help my child to learn a foreign language as soon as he or she starts to walk. |