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Re: Connglish

From:Mark J. Reed <markjreed@...>
Date:Sunday, November 19, 2006, 13:53
On 11/19/06, Benct Philip Jonsson <bpjonsson@...> wrote:
> I wonder if there has been any > research on the difference between children learning a > language being immersed in a community, or only from a few > adults in an immigrant milieu?
Only lots. :) Most of it is driven by either (1) the desire to improve the language skills of children raised bilingually with limited exposure to the minority language, or (2) the desire to measure the impact of the above on majority language skills. The results of the former which I've encountered are what one might expect: the more exposure the better, but even one daily interlocutor is sufficient for the child to gain fluency in the language. The most important thing is consistency. In the second case, there have been conflicting results as to whether or not the minority language learning is harmful to progress in the majority language, but the consensus seems to be that it isn't. It'd be nice if more professionals (educators, speech therapists, etc) were familiar with such research. At least in the US, it's very common for parents raising bilingual children to encounter resistance or hostility from professionals who are far too ready to lay any problems at the feet of the bilingual environment. -- Mark J. Reed <markjreed@mail.com

Replies

Lars Finsen <lars.finsen@...>
Dan Sulani <dansulani@...>