You speak with an accent. I don’t. Accents are things that only other people have. They are, by extension, things that you don’t want to have. Accents are, in short, shortcomings. This is why, if someone tells you that “you speak with no accent”, you can be sure of two things: that you have received words of praise indeed; and that you speak with the same accent as that person.
So the person is actually not only praising her own accent, she is also giving evidence that she has no idea she’s got one. We seldom hear people say “We speak with an accent” or “I speak with an accent” – unless we’re talking about our uses of foreign languages. So let’s check out your accent. This is (choose the nearest answer – I was going to say “the best answer”, but I suddenly remembered that “best” has prescriptive connotations): a tomahto a potahto a tomayto a potayto I could tweak this test a little, like this: 1.1 a tomahto 1.2 ay tomahto 1.3 ay toemahto 1.4 a tomahtoe. FAQ: Raising Bilingual Children.
Why want bilingual children? There are many reasons, but the two most common are: 1) The parents speak different languages (say, an American woman and a Turkish man). 2) The parents speak the same language, but live in a community where most people speak something else (say, a Korean couple living in the USA). In the first case, both the mother and father may want to be able to use their own language when talking to their children. This is the bilingual home situation. Don't children get confused when they hear two languages spoken around them? The short answer is no.
Fifty years ago educators throughout North America used to tell immigrant parents that it was better for their children's schooling if they spoke English at home. Bilingual development sometimes results in slightly slower language development than for some monolingual children. Deb Roy: The birth of a word. Listen to Your Mother. Young children face a remarkable challenge in learning to use the language of their culture.
Toddlers vary widely, however, in the rate at which they learn new words.1 A team of Harvard Graduate School of Education researchers set out to ask whether and how children's language environment can impact vocabulary development. In their study of mother-child pairs from low-income families, they found that mothers who used many different words (not just many words) had toddlers with faster growth in vocabulary use. During the toddler and preschool years, most children learn to use hundreds of words, combining them into sentences and engaging in conversation with others. From previous research, we know that variation in vocabulary growth relates to child characteristics like gender, and also to parental factors. What did they find? 1Huttenlocher, J., Haight, W., Bryk, A., Seltzer, M., & Lyons, T. (1991). 2Bauer, D.J., Goldfield, B.A., & Reznick, J.S. (2002).
Let's Talk. What do babies need in order to learn and thrive? One thing they need is conversation — responsive, back-and-forth communication with their parents and caregivers. This interactive engagement is like food for their developing brains, nurturing language acquisition, early literacy, school readiness, and social and emotional well-being. A dispiriting number of children don’t get that kind of brain-fueling communication, research suggests. In early childhood policy (and in the wider media), much attention has been paid to the so-called word gap — findings that show that low-income children hear 30 million fewer words, on average, and have less than half the vocabulary of upper-income peers by age three. But putting that alarming number in the spotlight obscures a more critical component of the research, says Harvard Graduate School of Education literacy expert Meredith Rowe: it’s not so much the quantity of words but the quality of the talk that matters most to a child’s development.
Why does my toddler love repetition? Paediatric speech and language therapist It may test your patience when your toddler demands 'Row, row, row your boat' for the 10th time.
But there's a good reason for her insistence. Toddlers love repetition because it helps them to learn, and because it's familiar and comforting. From around the age of two, you will notice your toddler repeating the same words and phrases constantly. By the time she's three, she will also demand her favourite stories and nursery rhymes over and over again.
How can I help my child to start talking? (Video) Health visitor Sara Patience describes how you can help develop your child's language skills by talking and playing with her.
Show transcript Hide transcript. Multilingual Preschoolers. It’s amazing how young children learn to converse with others. They have to not only internalize grammar and vocabulary, but also develop an understanding of culture: how to take turns in a conversation, who to talk to, and how to narrate a story. For dual language learners (DLLs) — children under the age of 5 with a home language other than English — that process can be complex. These young children must constantly navigate between two languages and cultures, while learning the rules of both. And while the benefits of multilingualism are clear, these learners they may be excluded or teased because of their differences, which can hinder their development. As linguistic diversity skyrockets worldwide, early childhood educators need to be prepared to help DLL students meet and overcome these unique challenges.
The Diversity of Languages in Early Education.