Second Language Learning and Bilingualism

First of all, it must be stated that there is a distinction between Acquisition and Learning, according to Krashen (1982), acquisition is a process by which children unconsciously acquire their native language; and learning is a conscious knowledge of a second language, knowing the rules, being aware of them, and being able to talk about them.

Therefore, a bilingual speaker uses two languages, that differs in speech sounds, vocabulary and syntax; that is why bilingualism may also involve a dialect and a standard language. For example, there are countries in Africa where one official language (often one of the former colonizers’ languages) coexist with diverse other vernacular languages.

Early Bilingualism

As it was stated previously, acquiring a language strongly differs from learning a language, since a child acquires or picks up a language informally, mainly by being exposed to them, whereas an older child (or an adult) learns a language through conscious effort and often using formal methods (such as, school, e-learning, etc). So, we can distinct early bilinguals (those who have acquired their languages before about 6 years old) from late bilinguals or second/foreign language learners (those who have learnt their languages in adolescence and adulthood). As a consequence, early bilinguals are more likely to attain native-like proficiency than late bilinguals are.

The previous idea can have strong consequences in the person’s life, since a language acquired in early childhood (even when “forgotten” from long years of disuse) can leave some residue in the mind, making later learning of the same language easier. A so called completely forgotten language can reemerge under special circumstances, such as hypnosis.

Advantages of Early Acquisition of L2

Some of the most important are:

- Neurologically, the brain functions of young children are more “plastic” than those of older people.

- Sociologically, children enjoy ten favorable conditions for language acquisition (some of them are: they have a compelling need to communicate, they have imitative impulses, family members tolerate children’s ‘cute errors’, speech is used in a concrete way, in a context of here and now, etc.

- In Phonology, older people have lost some ability to discriminate and pronounce sounds that do not occur in their early language.

Early Acquisition versus Late Learning of L2

Although all the convicing ideas exposed above, some researches claim that early adolescence is the optimal period for L2 learning, considering that older children are superior to younger children in knowledge of the world, cognitive capacities, ability to read, disciplined classroom behaviour, study habits and test-taking experiences.

Despite younger ones are superior in listening comprehension and interpersonal communicative skills, older students are superior in reading comprehension, cognitive – academic aspects of language proficiency and can also learn certain linguistic items and rules faster than younger children.

As a conclusion, we can state that by starting L2 acquisition early, a child can reap the benefits of both early acquistion and late learning, but by starting late, he/she misses the benefits of early acquisition. Furthermore, L1 acquisition and L2 learning have outstanding advantages and some so called disadvantages.

L2 Learning Stages

To learn about the stages of L2 learning in a more entertaining way, watch the video below:

However, if you are a more “traditional” learner, click on the following link: L2 Learning to
read about the five stages of L2 Learning.

Important Concepts on Bilingualism and L2 Learning

- Language (Code) Switching: refers to a bilingual tendency to switch from one language to another, which does not need to take much time, is not disruptive and a bilingual can not turn off one language while he/she is turned on to another.

- Linguistic Interference: refers to the involuntary intrusion of one language into another (usually from L1 to L2) in phonology, vocabulary, syntax and conversational conventions, which is less likely to be permanent and intractable in children than in adults. The types of interference can be predicted by comparing the two language systems.

- Keeping Languages Apart?: words from two languages can be stored:

- in one common store for both languages,

- in separate stores for two languages, and

- in a distributed way, with both overlapping and separated elements across related words from the two languages. If you want to understand this better, look at the following representation:

If you want to learn more about Bilingualism and L2 Learning, click on the following link: Bilinguals and L2 Learners