# Learning a language at different ages?



## Cathurian

I was wondering at what age(s) it gets harder to learn a new language, and why. I've heard a lot of things...that it gets harder after 5, after 10, after 60(!), and so on, and I thought some posters more enlightened than myself could tell me exactly how this works.

Personally, I began my first foreign language at age 13, and I noticed that even though I didn't learn it at a very young age, the system did imprint itself very well in my head. Not quite fluently, but well enough that I have a good "feel" for the language, and it comes naturally.

I started learning my third language later on that year, and I have similar proficiency in it, but not quite as good.

Now that I'm older, though, I've noticed that it's MUCH harder to get that general feel like I used to, and I've had to struggle to think in a new language. Around my fifteenth birthday I noticed my patterns of speaking in English becoming more set, and at the same time it became harder to get that "feel" for a foreign language, even though there was only a few years' difference. It seemed a bit sudden and drastic.

So I'm quite curious about how the brain changes with age, in regards to language...it's very odd!


----------



## Axl

It is generally held that one can pick up a foreign language easily when under the age of eight.
If you immerse a child (under 8) in a foreign language than he/she will pick it up within months.  When a child is under 5, this can be a matter of weeks.
This, very simply, is because the part of the brain that learns language is still developing and that it is easy for that child to pick up and copy sounds.
I know a young French girl (3) who came to England without a word of English.  Within a few weeks of playschool she had picked it up to 3-year-old fluency level with only the tiny hint of an accent.
The human brain is an *incredible* thing!

Axl.


----------



## Lamante

Which is the exact reason our school system does not teach us a foriegn language until we are 14! [/sarcasm]


----------



## DesertCat

There was an article in my local paper about this very subject today.  One of things it said was that it was never too late to learn a language.  However, they pointed out that you learn differently as an adult than you do when you're  a child. The other thing they said is that a child will be able to learn without an accent but the  older you are when you learn the language the less likely you'll be able to sound like a native.


----------



## JLanguage

DesertCat said:
			
		

> There was an article in my local paper about this very subject today. One of things it said was that it was never too late to learn a language. However, they pointed out that you learn differently as an adult than you do when you're a child. The other thing they said is that a child will be able to learn without an accent but the older you are when you learn the language the less likely you'll be able to sound like a native.


 
It seems that the older you get, the more the rigid and set your brain becomes so that it is much harder to learn a new language than if, for example you were a teenager. I think that as a child you learn a language intuitively, just absorbing the language around. As you get older, you have to study the language more intensively and analytically, studying grammar and such. 

In a family of Russians that I know, the husband is barely passably fluent in English even though he has lived here for ten years. The wife is very fluent, but has a very strong accent. The child is bilingual in Russian and English. The child was only 3 when he came to the US.

I think that the cut-off for accents depends on the person, but a former Hebrew teacher of mine, moved from Israel to the US when she 15. Her English does not have even a trace of a Hebrew accent, while her Hebrew accent is less markedly Israeli, and almost sounds like it's been weakened by English. 

On the other hand, I know an Israeli who moved to the US when he was 8, and yet still has a marked Hebrew accent when he speaks English. (This was when he was 13). 

I think that most people cannot learn new languages without an accent past the age of 14 or 15. There are exceptions to this rule, but they seem to be few and far between. 


			
				Axl said:
			
		

> It is generally held that one can pick up a foreign language easily when under the age of eight.
> If you immerse a child (under 8) in a foreign language than he/she will pick it up within months. When a child is under 5, this can be a matter of weeks.
> This, very simply, is because the part of the brain that learns language is still developing and that it is easy for that child to pick up and copy sounds.
> I know a young French girl (3) who came to England without a word of English. Within a few weeks of playschool she had picked it up to 3-year-old fluency level with only the tiny hint of an accent.
> The human brain is an *incredible* thing!


 
There is another thing that's pretty obvious, but I'll mention it anyway. A 3 year old's level of language is much easier to attain than for a teenager's or adult's. An adult is immediately expected to speak on a level that cannot be attained in a few weeks, regardless of mental elasticity.

Sorry for my disconnected thoughts,
I'll add more to this post/thread.

-Jonathan.


----------



## CBFelix

Until my age 30 I had only one foreign language, English. After 30 I learnt French, Dutch and Portuguese. It was hard. Still I have so many difficulties with these last languages. Especially in French, I have an accent problem. No way that I can pronounce nasal sounds correctly (after age 30, it was too late to learn ). In two months time we will be stating to live in Guangzhou (that we are so happy with it. It is another amazing part of the world). I already started to learn Cantonese and of course I will learn Mandarin over there. (God help me !!! )

On the other hand, my little daughter who is 5 years old, can speak 4 languages, Dutch, Portuguese, English and Turkish,  just like that..  She is going to French school, already talks little bit French. I can assure that within couple of months she will talk Cantonese too. Other amazing thing about her is she pronounces each language perfectly, although they all require totally different sounds.  Some say it is too much for a little child. In one hand yes, It was not easy for her to learn all at the same time. But on the other hand, she is developing such an ability to learn and speak of a foreign language. 

I wish I had had same chance that my daughter has now.


----------



## Aeneas

I have heard that, generally, native speakers of Arabic have an easier time learning foreign languages and correctly pronouncing them.  This was due to the variety of sounds in Arabic.  Did you experience this phenomenon in the languages other than French, Felix?


----------



## CBFelix

Aeneas said:
			
		

> I have heard that, generally, native speakers of Arabic have an easier time learning foreign languages and correctly pronouncing them.  This was due to the variety of sounds in Arabic.  Did you experience this phenomenon in the languages other than French, Felix?



First of all I don't speak Arabic, Turkish is totally different than Arabic. We use Latin alphabet too. I don't know why people think that Turkish is Arabic.. But it is not. It belongs to Ural-Altay language family. 

Anyway, I can pronounce Dutch and Portuguse well, because I have a falmily who talks Dutch and I live in Brazil. If I had a chance to live in a francophone country, maybe I can correct my pronounciation of French. I thing , by hearing and speaking a language, one can learn it better. When we came here 4 years ago, I didn't know a world of portuguse and I didn't take any courses. But I lissened and spoke (I had to). After 6 months I was able to talk.. Same will happen with cantonese. One has to jump directly into a language , otherwise you can struggle with it forever.


----------



## JLanguage

CBFelix said:
			
		

> First of all I don't speak Arabic, Turkish is totally different than Arabic. We use Latin alphabet too. I don't know why people think that Turkish is Arabic.. But it is not. It belongs to Ural-Altay language family.


 
The reason many people think that Arabic is spoken in Turkey is because
1. Turkey is very close to, and is sometimes considered part of, the Middle East.
2. Turkey is predominantly Muslim and most incorrectly associate the Muslim faith with the Arab ethnicity.

Please note that the Turkish are a separate ethnic group from the Arabs, and were converted to Islam as it diffused eastward from Mecca (Makkah).

Many people also believe that Iran is an Arab country that speaks Arabic. While Iran is a Muslim country, the major ethnic group is Persian, not Arab, and Farsi (Persian) is the dominant language. Farsi is part of the Indo-Aryan branch of Indo-European language family and is more closely realted to Hindi or any Indo-European language than Arabic, an Afro-Asiatic Semitic language closely related to Hebrew.

CBFelix, please correct me if I'm wrong about anything,
-Jonathan.


----------



## Markus

I will mention my favourite personal experience with this. It is related to accents rather than language, but there is a strong connection between the two.

I knew a family who immigrated from Scotland to Canada. There was a boy who was 11 years old and a girl who was 9 years old. When I first met them, of course they both had Scottish accents. I met them again about two years later and the boy still had a strong Scottish accent, while the girl spoke with a 100% Canadian accent.


----------



## jacinta

Lamante said:
			
		

> Which is the exact reason our school system does not teach us a foriegn language until we are 14! [/sarcasm]



I love this topic because I teach elementary Spanish.  I work in a Charter school so they have the ability to make foreign language part of their curriculum.  Most public schools can barely afford the essentials, like textbooks and teachers, let alone pay for foreign language teachers.  Some teachers, if they have the knowledge, throw in a few Spanish words here and there but not enough for the children to really learn the language.

My students amaze me every day. I speak entirely in Spanish starting in first grade. They learn so quickly and one of the reasons is that they have not developed any barriers to accepting another language.  By the time students reach jr. high and high school levels, most of them could care less about learning and most of them only take a foreign language because they need it for college entrance.  They do enough to pass.  It is a very tough job being a high school FL teacher.  Give me little kids any day.  They give me rewards day in and day out.


----------



## JLanguage

jacinta said:
			
		

> I love this topic because I teach elementary Spanish. I work in a Charter school so they have the ability to make foreign language part of their curriculum. Most public schools can barely afford the essentials, like textbooks and teachers, let alone pay for foreign language teachers. Some teachers, if they have the knowledge, throw in a few Spanish words here and there but not enough for the children to really learn the language.


 
I started learning Hebrew from a young age at my private school, but still I don't have the fluency I desire. It's probably because I didn't used to care about Hebrew much. Now that I'm in public school and am no longer enrolled in a Hebrew class, I'm scrambling to find the time to work on advancing my Hebrew.



			
				jacinta said:
			
		

> My students amaze me every day. I speak entirely in Spanish starting in first grade. They learn so quickly and one of the reasons is that they have not developed any barriers to accepting another language. By the time students reach jr. high and high school levels, most of them could care less about learning and most of them only take a foreign language because they need it for college entrance. They do enough to pass. It is a very tough job being a high school FL teacher. Give me little kids any day. They give me rewards day in and day out.


 
I can verify what you've said about high school students. You have basically two types of viewpoints. The regular Joes take 2 years of language because it's required and then stop once they have achieved the requisite credits. The overachievers and overall geniuses take 5 years of language, often taken two languages at the same so that they can have a higher GPA/get into a better college. I have met very few people who tell me about the joys of learning a foreign language. There may be a few, I don't know.


----------



## jacinta

JLanguage said:
			
		

> I can verify what you've said about high school students. You have basically two types of viewpoints. The regular Joes take 2 years of language because it's required and then stop once they have achieved the requisite credits. The overachievers and overall geniuses take 5 years of language, often taken two languages at the same so that they can have a higher GPA/get into a better college. I have met very few people who tell me about the joys of learning a foreign language. There may be a few, I don't know.



The funny thing is that I do hear all the time from parents who say, "Oh, I wish I knew more Spanish now." and "I wish I'd learned more when I was young.  I just don't have the time to learn it now".
You just can't tell young people what's good for them!


----------



## Benjy

nope. the only thing you can do is to make them live in a foreign country! 

ben, speaking from experience.


----------



## kathy_wylie

it's not just over achievers who take languages on and learn them to higher levels at school/college.

I went to a well known and prestigious grammar school and in my class, everyone (including high achievers) dropped languages after the 2 obligatory years, except me and 8 others. i'm not an over achiever (i never made the effort,  however I'm no way near to being an 'under achiever'. I'm very interlligent if I can say so myself!) however I love learning languages and believe it has made me a somewhat 'richer' person. Out of the other 8 people in my language class at school for the 5 years after the obligatory phase, 2 would have been considered 'high' or 'over achievers'. A few average others wished they hadn't have continued with languages, while the rest, including me, loved it and profited. (even if we didn't understand a lot!!)

theres my input!


----------



## charmingman

JLanguage said:
			
		

> It seems that the older you get, the more the rigid and set your brain becomes so that it is much harder to learn a new language than if, for example you were a teenager. I think that as a child you learn a language intuitively, just absorbing the language around. As you get older, you have to study the language more intensively and analytically, studying grammar and such.


 
My own theory is that language learning is very attitude or self-image dependent. Each person's self-image governs to what extent they are willing to absorb a new language. Clearly, children before they become self-consciousness are far less inhibited than young teenagers who have begun to worry what others think about them.

I've come across examples of self-conscious inhibition in adults when teaching pronunciation. Whereas children, who are still forming their own identity, seek to conform to their peers, adults, on the other hand, with an already firmly established self-image feel foolish when making unfamiliar tongue and lip movements. On one occasion, I've even seen inhibition cause a language teacher to take 2 weeks to master one foreign word.

Besides self-image, children and adults experience different types of peer pressure. Young children are often placed in a completely foreign language environment by their parents - leaving them with little choice but to learn the new language. Peer pressure is pushing them to learn. Adults on the other hand, almost never completely separate themselves from the native culture. When it becomes too hard they can easily break away from the foreign group and revert to their native language. Depending on the person's cultural, peer pressure can push them not to learn.



			
				JLanguage said:
			
		

> There is another thing that's pretty obvious, but I'll mention it anyway. A 3 year old's level of language is much easier to attain than for a teenager's or adult's. An adult is immediately expected to speak on a level that cannot be attained in a few weeks, regardless of mental elasticity.


Good point. And I'd like to point out that children play lots of games, sing songs, read/listen to lots of stories, that include lots and lots of repetition. While, adults are expected to produce complex sentences with almost no repetition.

CM


----------



## asm

I teach Spanish and I see every day that non-traditional students, although they work the most, they retain the least. It is clear that age plays a vital role in this topic. I think there is an age (different among people) in which you cannot learn a new language.





			
				DesertCat said:
			
		

> There was an article in my local paper about this very subject today. One of things it said was that it was never too late to learn a language. However, they pointed out that you learn differently as an adult than you do when you're a child. The other thing they said is that a child will be able to learn without an accent but the older you are when you learn the language the less likely you'll be able to sound like a native.


----------



## asm

An important idea we need to take into consideration is the definition of language, bilingualism and so on; into what extension are we bilingual? I my case the English I can talk is the lowest in my house, but I’d consider that to be better than others’.

To be 100% bilingual is extremely difficult and only few people can say they are, and most of the time it was not because of them but because of their parents’ decision or because of their environment.

For us who came to learn a second language when being “older” the experience has been difficult, comparing to those who had other opportunities, like international exposure and mixed families just to mention some.

 

According to what I’ve read we are equipped with “software” to learn at least one language by nature, with no more input rather than immersion. However, this is not the case for written language that only some can master. 

We learn our first language not for any other reason than solving problems (communicating something is a problem, and we develop our patterns to do so), when we have “covered” that need we don’t go further, unless we have an extra need (it could be the desire of having more languages, or the fact that we need to communicate with others, just name the new need). It is fascinating how we are motivated by those needs, that combined with proper exposure makes us learn a new language.

I do not know if there is a threshold for age, as many people have said, some people learn even being “old”, like John Paul II learned a lot of Spanish being a Pope! No time for studying it and not time for immersion, but we saw a big change between his first visit and the rest. 


			
				Cathurian said:
			
		

> I was wondering at what age(s) it gets harder to learn a new language, and why. I've heard a lot of things...that it gets harder after 5, after 10, after 60(!), and so on, and I thought some posters more enlightened than myself could tell me exactly how this works.
> 
> Personally, I began my first foreign language at age 13, and I noticed that even though I didn't learn it at a very young age, the system did imprint itself very well in my head. Not quite fluently, but well enough that I have a good "feel" for the language, and it comes naturally.
> 
> I started learning my third language later on that year, and I have similar proficiency in it, but not quite as good.
> 
> Now that I'm older, though, I've noticed that it's MUCH harder to get that general feel like I used to, and I've had to struggle to think in a new language. Around my fifteenth birthday I noticed my patterns of speaking in English becoming more set, and at the same time it became harder to get that "feel" for a foreign language, even though there was only a few years' difference. It seemed a bit sudden and drastic.
> 
> So I'm quite curious about how the brain changes with age, in regards to language...it's very odd!


----------



## asm

Are you familiar with ALberto Bandura's self-efficacy beliefs? This is similar to his ideas. I do not know if he has studied languages, but I am sure that one of his followers has. It is incredible that in some areas the mere fact that you believe you can do it is the best way to do it. However, your beliefs cannot substitute some skills you need.






			
				charmingman said:
			
		

> My own theory is that language learning is very attitude or self-image dependent. Each person's self-image governs to what extent they are willing to absorb a new language. Clearly, children before they become self-consciousness are far less inhibited than young teenagers who have begun to worry what others think about them.
> 
> I've come across examples of self-conscious inhibition in adults when teaching pronunciation. Whereas children, who are still forming their own identity, seek to conform to their peers, adults, on the other hand, with an already firmly established self-image feel foolish when making unfamiliar tongue and lip movements. On one occasion, I've even seen inhibition cause a language teacher to take 2 weeks to master one foreign word.
> 
> Besides self-image, children and adults experience different types of peer pressure. Young children are often placed in a completely foreign language environment by their parents - leaving them with little choice but to learn the new language. Peer pressure is pushing them to learn. Adults on the other hand, almost never completely separate themselves from the native culture. When it becomes too hard they can easily break away from the foreign group and revert to their native language. Depending on the person's cultural, peer pressure can push them not to learn.
> 
> 
> Good point. And I'd like to point out that children play lots of games, sing songs, read/listen to lots of stories, that include lots and lots of repetition. While, adults are expected to produce complex sentences with almost no repetition.
> 
> CM


----------



## Benjy

i think that there is only one thing you really need to be able to do in order to speak a language well. listen. if there is one thing i have noticed is that people just don't listen. or read. or when they do they don't compare it to what they say or write. listening is the key.. if you can learn to listen you can learn to speak.


----------



## jacinta

Benjy said:
			
		

> i think that there is only one thing you really need to be able to do in order to speak a language well. listen. if there is one thing i have noticed is that people just don't listen. or read. or when they do they don't compare it to what they say or write. listening is the key.. if you can learn to listen you can learn to speak.


Will you please come and tell my students that??


----------



## Benjy

jacinta said:
			
		

> Will you please come and tell my students that??



its funny. i was trying to teach this guy french. we would wander about town yakking away in french and he would make mistakes all the time. he enever listened to anything i would say. he wouldn't change and in the end i stopped doing it because i started to make the same mistakes as him. it was terrible. the force was to strong in him. i would have joined the dark side =[


----------



## JLanguage

kathy_wylie said:
			
		

> it's not just over achievers who take languages on and learn them to higher levels at school/college.
> 
> I went to a well known and prestigious grammar school and in my class, everyone (including high achievers) dropped languages after the 2 obligatory years, except me and 8 others. i'm not an over achiever (i never made the effort, however I'm no way near to being an 'under achiever'. I'm very interlligent if I can say so myself!) however I love learning languages and believe it has made me a somewhat 'richer' person. Out of the other 8 people in my language class at school for the 5 years after the obligatory phase, 2 would have been considered 'high' or 'over achievers'. A few average others wished they hadn't have continued with languages, while the rest, including me, loved it and profited. (even if we didn't understand a lot!!)
> 
> theres my input!


 
While most don't take two languages, the majority of kids at my school that take even a moderately rigorous courseload, take four or five years of a language. Most take Spanish, some take French, and a few (the brave ones) take Latin. There are at least 6 or 7 AP Spanish Language classes this year (4th year Spanish) and at least 2 AP Spanish Literature classes (5th year Spanish).


----------



## Cathurian

JLanguage said:
			
		

> While most don't take two languages, the majority of kids at my school that take even a moderately rigorous courseload, take four or five years of a language. Most take Spanish, some take French, and a few (the brave ones) take Latin. There are at least 6 or 7 AP Spanish Language classes this year (4th year Spanish) and at least 2 AP Spanish Literature classes (5th year Spanish).



In 10th grade I took two languages -- second year Latin and first year German -- while continuing out-of-classroom use of my second language. If one has decent skill and motivation, this is by no means impossible.


----------



## la grive solitaire

Here's my favorite language-learning story. One of my professors at university spoke Italian, French, Spanish, German, and English, as did her husband. Her mother-in-law, who lived with them, spoke German, French, and English, and the au pair who took care of their young daughter spoke Spanish and English. All five languages were spoken at home. When their daughter turned 2 and still hadn't begun to speak, she and her husband became concerned, but her mother-in-law counseled waiting before having her tested. About 6 months later their daughter suddenly began to speak--perfectly--in all five languages. Amazing, no?--and another tribute to the power of listening.


----------



## lainyn

That's a beautiful story, La Grive! It gives me new hope, and also motivation. I hope to be multilingual by the time I have children, so that they can benefit from my hard work.

There's no cut off for learning a foreign language and becoming fluent. It's a continuum, with many factors such as motivation and access to the L2 environment playing a role. Most linguists agree that after puberty, the chances of acquiring native-like pronunciation are very slim, but yet there are quite a few instances of people achieving this, so who knows?

As for people who learn languages just for the joy of it, why of course there are people who do! I was one of them. I took Spanish and French in high school, and I had started learning French in grade 5 (at age 10), which was the normal time for kids in my school district. I envy those who got to start learning French in kindergarten. 

As for the listening thing: a lot of times I can HEAR the difference between my pronunciation of a foreign word and the native speaker's, but I can't reproduce it. That situation is very frustrating for me. Other times, I just can't seem to make the memory of the sounds stick, or I get confused, but believe me, I do try. I learn a lot of good vocabulary by mimicking others. 

~Lainyn


----------



## te gato

I agree with Lainyn..Learning a new language is wonderful..Hard..but so rewarding when you can say something and be understood..

I also think that it is so very important to 'Hear' the language spoken..Maybe I am just a little dense..but I find it so hard to just 'read' the words..I am trying so hard to learn Spanish..and doing poorly just by books..yet when I go to visit all my friends in Mexico, and they talkt to me, I can pick it up so much faster. I can speak it back to them and make sense..and not Insult them at the same time!! Yet at the same time I do not think that I will ever have the accent..I will always sound like a foreigner speaking the language..(_the rolling 'r' kills me_) but that is ok..

Then there is my son..who I only have to say the words to him..maybe twice..and he catches on right away..so being young is a huge advantage..It is the 'Parrot' thing..repeat the words a few times..and they just Get It..So by the time he is older he will know how to speak..Alberta English, Spanish, Dutch, and French..

As for me..sadly my Parrot escaped a long time ago..I'll be lucky to remember how to speak Alberta English.. 

te gato


----------



## Like an Angel

I think, in my humble opinion, that it's easier to learn *everything* when you are under 5 or 8 years old. Your body is not _programed_ at that age yet, and it's just like _fresh clay_. I can't tell that it's hard for me to learn a language at my age, I'm studying a couple of languages, some of them are easier because of the similarity with my first language, but I believe it's a matter of _tastes_, I adore languages so I don't find learning a new language a hard task. English -phonetic- is the easiest because of the time I've been listening to it, I don't remember exactly but I think that I listen to English music since my 8 years old, although I know I have to improve it!!. My mother started to learn Italian at the age of 58 and it wasn't difficult for her.-


----------



## asm

But not only that. I agree, you need to listen, but there are many other skills you need to develop (many, according to my perception).
How did Hellen Keller learn to talk?




			
				Benjy said:
			
		

> i think that there is only one thing you really need to be able to do in order to speak a language well. listen. if there is one thing i have noticed is that people just don't listen. or read. or when they do they don't compare it to what they say or write. listening is the key.. if you can learn to listen you can learn to speak.


----------



## charmingman

asm said:
			
		

> Are you familiar with ALberto Bandura's self-efficacy beliefs? This is similar to his ideas. I do not know if he has studied languages, but I am sure that one of his followers has. It is incredible that in some areas the mere fact that you believe you can do it is the best way to do it. However, your beliefs cannot substitute some skills you need.


 
Thanks ASM, I'll look him up.

Something else for you thinking relating to the power of the mind is the "placebo effect". Even thought patients are given ineffective treatment they still manage to get better. Doctors can't explain it, but it happens.  

CM


----------



## charmingman

asm said:
			
		

> I teach Spanish and I see every day that non-traditional students, although they work the most, they retain the least. It is clear that age plays a vital role in this topic. I think there is an age (different among people) in which you cannot learn a new language.


 
What is a non-traditional student? It's not a term I'm familiar with.   

CM


----------



## asm

It's a euphemism for older students. In my opinion, they are the best hard-working students in the university I work at, but languages are almost impossible to (for?) them.





			
				charmingman said:
			
		

> What is a non-traditional student? It's not a term I'm familiar with.
> 
> CM


----------



## valerie

lainyn said:
			
		

> As for the listening thing: a lot of times I can HEAR the difference between my pronunciation of a foreign word and the native speaker's, but I can't reproduce it. That situation is very frustrating for me. Other times, I just can't seem to make the memory of the sounds stick, or I get confused, but believe me, I do try. I learn a lot of good vocabulary by mimicking others.
> 
> ~Lainyn



I do speak really fluently Spanish, but there are still sounds that I can not HEAR. For example, and especially, it is difficult for me, when listening to a new word to know immediately if the sound I hear is J or R. Just because the sound J does not exist in my native language. I have to think about how this word would be written, and then I know if J or R. Another example, I mix all the time, when speaking, the word Oreja, and the word Ojera.


----------



## valerie

Like an Angel said:
			
		

> My mother started to learn Italian at the age of 58 and it wasn't difficult for her.-



Thank you for your comment, I try to motivate mine so that she learn Spanish, and I am happy to see it is possible. How did your mother study? which problems did she have that could be attributed to age?


----------



## Like an Angel

valerie said:
			
		

> Thank you for your comment, I try to motivate mine so that she learn Spanish, and I am happy to see it is possible. How did your mother study? which problems did she have that could be attributed to age?


 
You're welcome Valerie!... she studied at home, alone, with some books and cassettes -cds now-, and watching Italian TV programmes as much as she could. I don't think she had had much problem because of the similarity of Italian with Spanish, but I think -as I said- that she could do it right because of her *wish* of learning it, if your mother is not intrested is going to be hard, maybe you better try giving to her some books with topics that she is intrested in. But I don't know how you can help her exactly, I'd like to help you but don't know how can I, I'm sorry... David Coverdale, my favourite song-writer/singer always says *If there is a wish, there is a way*


----------



## valerie

I agree with you, motivation is key. Thank you


----------



## lainyn

I think you meant to use the English phrase/proverb "If there's a WILL there's a way", Like an Angel, but what do I know - David Coverdale could have been changing the pat phrase for his song.

~Lainyn


----------



## Like an Angel

lainyn said:
			
		

> I think you meant to use the English phrase/proverb "If there's a WILL there's a way", Like an Angel, but what do I know - David Coverdale could have been changing the pat phrase for his song.
> 
> ~Lainyn


 
Hi Lainyn, it is not part of any of his songs, he says that just like that . For instance I wrote in his BBS "I wish Whitesnake come to Argentina" and he says "If there is a wish, there is a way", anyhow I think it doesn't change the sense of the sentence if you use will or wish


----------



## Cynethrith

I don't think age matters when someone wants to learn a new language. Two things matter: how much are you motivated to learn the language and how much is that language close to one you already know.

I started learning English at the age of 8, it was my first foreign language.


----------



## la grive solitaire

I've always heard, "Where there's a will there's a way" but I like "If there's a wish there's a way"--it gives fresh meaning to an old expression.


----------



## asm

Although motivation is a must, there are other factors that affect second language learning and age is one of them. 

I agree that you will never learn a new language if you are not motivated to do so, but first language patterns, internal thoughts and some social aspects (developed by time) make a (big) difference on the learner.

According to Montessori, there are “ages” to learn certain skills, and language is one of them.


			
				Cynethrith said:
			
		

> I don't think age matters when someone wants to learn a new language. Two things matter: how much are you motivated to learn the language and how much is that language close to one you already know.
> 
> I started learning English at the age of 8, it was my first foreign language.


----------



## Cathurian

Can you expand on that, asm?


----------



## asm

As a sample of Montessori: http://www.michaelolaf.net/1JC13language.html

Development: If you read Piaget, Vigtsky, Montessori, and many other educators, you will find that children develop different skills according to their age; language, which is one of the most important cognitive skills, is not the exception. I am not an expert on this area (searching for this question should take me hours of research), but all the forces aim to the same point.

My own experience: I came to the USA at 39 with decent English skills, my 2 yrs boy came with 0, no English at all. I was very motivated to learn more English, but I couldn't absorb as much as he could. Now my English is nothing compared to his (after almost 4 years). 
Although I was eager to "learn" English, he needed to communicate with his peers (his first day at Head start he took the bus with a Bosnian and an American, and the thre of them had a great time, with no one understanding each other). His command of English is much stronger than mine. 
I understand that many factors shaped my ENglish, as well as his, but one of the most important aspects is "age" (yo soy viejito ).

I found this as part of an abstact:

_The literature review suggested that a wide variety of variables influence degree of foreign accent. These variables include age of L2 learning, length of residence in an L2-speaking country, gender, formal instruction, motivation, language learning aptitude and amount of native language (L1) use. *Age of L2 learning appears to be the most important predictor of degree of foreign accent*. However, the relative importance of the other variables is uncertain._

*Factors affecting degree of foreign accent in an L2: a review *



*Thorsten Piskea, f1, Ian R. A. MacKayb and James E. Flege[url="http://www.sciencedirect.com/scidirimg/sci_dir/nextterm.gif"]http://www.sciencedirect.com/scidirimg/sci_dir/nextterm.gif[/url]c (authors, they focus on phonetics)*


By internal thoughts I meant that the way you think shapes the way you talk (and also the other way arround), if you think in a language ("talking to yourself") you are being exposed to your own language, even if you were in a total immersion program, and that interferes with your second language (this phenomenon affects in a different way to each person).

NO SINGLE FACTOR COULD BE "RESPONSIBLE" FOR HELPING PEOPLE LEARN A SECOND LANGUAGE; THERE IS A MYRIAD OF FACTORS, AND MOTIVATION (DIRECT MOTIVATION -LEARN THE LANGUAGE- OR INDIRECT MOTIVATION -COMMUNICATE WITH YOUR PEERS, ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL GROWTH, ETC.) IS ONLY ONE OF THOSE. I AGREE IF YOU SAY THAT MOTIVATION HAS TO BE PART OF THE FACTOR, I WILL DISAGREE IF YOU SAY THAT IS "THE" FACTOR.




			
				Cathurian said:
			
		

> Can you expand on that, asm?


----------



## Edwin

asm said:
			
		

> My own experience: I came to the USA at 39 with decent English skills, my 2 yrs boy came with 0, no English at all. I was very motivated to learn more English, but I couldn't absorb as much as he could. Now my English is nothing compared to his (after almost 4 years).



This seems quite common. I have a lot of colleagues for which English is a second language, but their children grow up here and from a young age master English and speak it accent free. Don't you think one reason for this is that the children learn from bottom up using a comparatively small vocabulary. Whereas adults for the most part must attempt to master a much wider vocabulary.  If adults had the leisure to first master a small vocabulary in a very limited context, don't you think their feeling for and mastery of the language would be much better.


----------



## asm

That might help, but I still think that there are some cognitive limitations, aside some social issues, like the shame of being different. Children don't care and try, we as adults have to think several times just to end avoiding "the shame". I will try to find some "scientific" information.
I am teaching Spanish at college level and I see how older students struggle with some issues, and in general the are more motivated than younger students who at the end learn "more".

I remember a student (the problem is common) who couldn't understand the pronouns; she couldn't answer with the correct pronoun when asked something. Ex. To the question ¿Como se llama ella? (the answer should be Ella se llama __________), this student would say: se llama es ella. In this case her problem was beyond motivation (she was very motivated), beyond shame (she was asking all the time), and beyond intelligence (she is very smart). She also had a hard time understanding that in Spanish there is a pronoun for "Y'all" , and we differentiate between they masculine and feminine.
If the older we get the more difficult for us to change personal behavior and habits, the same should be with the language.




			
				Edwin said:
			
		

> This seems quite common. I have a lot of colleagues for which English is a second language, but their children grow up here and from a young age master English and speak it accent free. Don't you think one reason for this is that the children learn from bottom up using a comparatively small vocabulary. Whereas adults for the most part must attempt to master a much wider vocabulary. If adults had the leisure to first master a small vocabulary in a very limited context, don't you think their feeling for and mastery of the language would be much better.


----------



## la_americana

I'm 21 and trying my best to learn Spanish. I went to Spain for 3 weeks last summer and stayed with a spanish family. It was easiest to pick up the language then. I went there knowing only a few sentences in spanish, by the 3rd week, I was understanding most of what was being spoken to and around me. I have continued on with my studies but since im not immersed in it, its much harder. I babysit a little girl who's 5. From the start her parents taught her English and Farsi and at age 4 they started teaching her spanish. Her Spanish level is decent, I wouldn't say its at a 5 year old natives level but she can do the basics. Like days of the week, say her name, etc.


----------



## suzzzenn

Hi, 
I have been very interested in this conversation because I am a "non-traditional" student. I went back to school to get a degree in linguistics at age 37! That was three years ago. At that time I spoke almost no Spanish. My late husband was Latino and so I had been exposed to some Spanish. I knew expressions like yo te amo, te quiero, tu me gustas,  and those types of phrases.  I probably had a vocabulary of about 100 words or so. I couldn't even conjugate verbs in the present tense! 

In three years of study I have learned to speak another language in my late 30s! My Spanish is far from perfect, but I can read novels, watch Spanish TV, and talk to my friends in Spanish. I have a few friends who speak no English and we are able to have serious conversations about our lives, hopes, problems, and ideas. I don't consider myself to be anywhere near fluent; I know that I still have a long way to go, but I can function in another language! It is a magical thing for me.  Sometimes I observe myself listening to a rapid stream of Spanish and am amazed that it all makes sense! I wonder if people who learn languages at earlier ages have that same feeling of amazement.  

There are a few younger students (late teens early 20s) in my class this semester that started out with me three years ago, and my Spanish is just as good as theirs. In fact there were many younger students who just couldn't grasp basic concepts and dropped out. I have several middle-aged classmates and they seem to be doing fine. 

I agree that age plays a factor when one is very young. But I am not how much variation there is among adults of different ages. Who knows! Maybe I'll hit a ceiling and my Spanish will stop improving due to some biological language clock, but my guess is that I will keep getting better as long as I keep working. 

Saludos!
Susan


----------



## charmingman

Edwin said:
			
		

> This seems quite common. I have a lot of colleagues for which English is a second language, but their children grow up here and from a young age master English and speak it accent free. Don't you think one reason for this is that the children learn from bottom up using a comparatively small vocabulary. Whereas adults for the most part must attempt to master a much wider vocabulary. If adults had the leisure to first master a small vocabulary in a very limited context, don't you think their feeling for and mastery of the language would be much better.


 
I mention this example to illustrate how sometimes accents change even for L1 speakers.

I spent several years working in England and like most adults who travel my L1 accent was pretty much unaffected by those around me. In my travels I met a couple of brothers who judging by their accents were Englishmen. When I got talking to them they explained that they'd moved to England from Scotland when they had been 12 and because they didn't 'fit in' with the other kids at school they decided to lose their Scottish accents. I've also met other Scots who had moved down around the about the age of 14. By that age they no longer had a choice of changing their accents. It had already become fixed.

My point is that accents appear to be flexible for every child up until the age of puberty when it becomes fixed. However, I suspect it has something to do with personal identity, as well.

CM


----------



## charmingman

asm said:
			
		

> If the older we get the more difficult for us to change personal behavior and habits, the same should be with the language.


 
I think this is the connection between age and learning. If the person has become accustomed to doing things _one_ way then changing their behaviour, for whatever reason, will be more difficult. However, I maintain, if a person's behaviour has always been flexible then new things will come more easily.

CM


----------



## Edwin

asm said:
			
		

> That might help, but I still think that there are some cognitive limitations, aside some social issues, like the shame of being different. Children don't care and try, we as adults have to think several times just to end avoiding "the shame". I will try to find some "scientific" information.



Looking over some high school and college Spanish textbooks it seems to me that students are expected to absorb too much material in too short a time. 

I wonder if anyone has ever tried to teach an introductory class at the college (or lower) level that covers a very small vocabulary in such a way that students can really master *all* of the material and internalize the grammatical structures --much in the way a child would.  Actually I know that some special language schools closely this method to some extent, e.g., Berlitz and the Defense Language Institute  (where I studied Japanese about 50 years ago).

The same is true of many other subjects: rather than slow down and allow/require  students to truly master a small amount of material, courses often attempt to cover tremendous quantities of material.  The end results being that many students learn almost nothing.


----------



## asm

suzzzenn said:
			
		

> Hi,
> I agree that age plays a factor when one is very young. But I am not how much variation there is among adults of different ages. Who knows! Maybe I'll hit a ceiling and my Spanish will stop improving due to some biological language clock, but my guess is that I will keep getting better as long as I keep working.
> 
> Saludos!
> Susan


 
I agree with this; as far as I understood your williness and determination overcame many other issues and you finally could speak the new language. 

There is no much difference between 25 and 35 in learning a new language as the difference between 5 and 15 (the same 10 years). Many participants in this forum had exposure to the language when they were young enough to learn it "by nature", on the other hand, there are others who came "late" ("me" included), but could at least grasp the basic (and a little more) of the language, but the difference is still huge. 
When people are looking for deep meanings in these threads, I am looking for the dictionary, just to later look for the deep meaning.


----------



## lainyn

I don't agree that second language curriculums require too much of a child. Honestly, I remember being INCREDIBLY bored with everything I was taught in French and Spanish in elementary and high school, to the point where I would seek out external stimuli so that I could accelerate my learning. Unfortunately, this only accentuated the differences between my peers and I. I don't think that it was ever a case of not being intelligent enough, for them, but rather that _so little was required_ that they thought of it as a slacker class and still pulled off fairly good grades (like B's for example). By challenging the student, you force him or her to take the subject seriously, and by presenting L2 learning as an important factor in world economics and society today, you can make sure the student will understand the value of such education. These are just my humble opinions, and I'm not incredibly stubborn, so please, by all means, point out the flaws. I admit a bias in my point of view, I'm still a student, I still excel at languages past my classmates, and I've never really understood the difficulties some people encounter when trying to learn nitpicky grammar points that I just seem to pick up on instinct. A lot of people take a language course _intending to forget it_ the moment they pass the exam, they use beginner's language courses as _easy credits_. It's an unfortunate thing that L2 professors and teachers must devote so much energy to "artificial learners".

Anyways, that turned into a bit of a rant, please excuse me.

~Lainyn


----------



## Edwin

lainyn said:
			
		

> I don't agree that second language curriculums require too much of a child. Honestly, I remember being INCREDIBLY bored with everything I was taught in French and Spanish in elementary and high school, to the point where I would seek out external stimuli so that I could accelerate my learning. Unfortunately, this only accentuated the differences between my peers and I. I don't think that it was ever a case of not being intelligent enough, for them, but rather that _so little was required_ that they thought of it as a slacker class and still pulled off fairly good grades (like B's for example). By challenging the student, you force him or her to take the subject seriously, and by presenting L2 learning as an important factor in world economics and society today, you can make sure the student will understand the value of such education. These are just my humble opinions, and I'm not incredibly stubborn, so please, by all means, point out the flaws. I admit a bias in my point of view, I'm still a student, I still excel at languages past my classmates, and I've never really understood the difficulties some people encounter when trying to learn nitpicky grammar points that I just seem to pick up on instinct. A lot of people take a language course _intending to forget it_ the moment they pass the exam, they use beginner's language courses as _easy credits_. It's an unfortunate thing that L2 professors and teachers must devote so much energy to "artificial learners".
> 
> Anyways, that turned into a bit of a rant, please excuse me.
> 
> ~Lainyn




Apparently you are one of those people who have a natural talent for learning new languages.  

It should be no surprise that there exits for some people an unusual innate skill for languages, just as there is for music, mathematics, athletics, ability to empathize with the less fortunate, etc.  

For some lucky people these abilities over lap, but not always.  There  are examples of brillant mathematicians who are tone deaf. There are also examples of exceptional people like William Rowan Hamilton who by the age of 5 had learned Latin, Greek and Hebrew and eventually learned 13 or so languages. He was studying the works of Newton and Laplace when he was 15.  No doubt he was a genius. 

There are also people that are naturally very slow. I don't think that needs an illustration.  

In between these extremes there is a spectrum of abilities for language learning just as for other subjects.  I think you are wrong to believe that all are equally endowed with the ability to learn.


----------



## lainyn

Okay, what you have said, Edwin, makes a great deal of sense. But it doesn't explain why we should cater to the lowest common denominator. IMHO, we already do. Gifted students' classes are the *first* thing to be cut when money is scarce, not that I don't think that alternate education pathways are important for those who need them (meaning those who are academically inclined). Isn't there something to be said for setting high standards and them *helping* students to achieve them?


----------



## Edwin

lainyn said:
			
		

> Isn't there something to be said for setting high standards and them *helping* students to achieve them?



Lainyn, I agree!  Whether or not and, if so, how it can be done is a pedagogical, financial and, perhaps ultimately, a political issue that my background doesn't permit me to address adequately.  

As it is, a single teacher in a classroom filled with students of varying abilities just does the best he/she can.  Ideally teaching should be done on a one-to-one basis, but practically for the great majority of people, it's apparently just not possible.


----------



## asm

I'd say small groups rather than individual basis, I think that way could be more effective. In essence it's the same point, I agree with you.

On the other hand, as a Spanish instructor I see that many students come to learn this or other languages just because they "have to".
Even if they "had to" learn something in that way, they could try (like many do); some students go to class just to breath the same air we do, a new learning technique they are trying to prove right.




			
				Edwin said:
			
		

> Ideally teaching should be done on a one-to-one basis, but practically for the great majority of people, it's apparently just not possible.


----------



## asm

From Johns K. How Children Learn a Second Language (Phi Delta Kappa Educational Foundation)

Age is anothre facto affectind second language acquisition, especially at the intermediate fluency stage. Older acquirers generally make faster rogress in the early stages of SL acquisition because of their intrumental motivation and their broader experience. In the long run, however, younger acquirers tend to attain a higher level of proficienty because of their lower "affective filter (AF)"

page 27
________

After the age of seven, the vast majority of people are never able to repfoduce certain sounds exactly as a native speaker would. The older person acquiring a new language subsitutes sound he "knows" to approximate those unique to the second language.

Page 20

AF = it's what occurs when acquirers are subjected to embarrassment, humiliation, and other negative responses when trying to learn a second language.


----------

