A New Year's Resolution to Learn a New Language

Danny Glover, the famous American actor, onceunderstand more than 5% of what is going on in
said that his new year's resolution was to learnyour class, go up a level he said! If 95% seems
French, because everyone he wants to speakgooblety-gook to you, then that's perfect he said!
with in West Africa speaks French. If you wouldTake heart. It means you are soaking up as much
like your fun new year's resolution to be to learnof that foreign language as is humanly possible!
a new language, then there are quite a fewAccording to Ellen Bialystok and Kenji Hakuta in
different ways you can go about it.the book "In Other Words", adults are more
Perhaps you've been wanting to learn thecapable of learning a second language than most
language of your Grandmother. Perhaps youpeople assume. In the book "What's Going On In
would benefit from learning an official language orThere", Lise Eliot explains how Noam Chomsky
unofficial second language of your country, suchdiscovered in the late 1950s that all of the world's
as French in Canada or Spanish in USA. Or Greeklanguages share the same fundamental structure.
in Melbourne Australia! Apparently the secondHe called it "Universal Grammar". The language
largest Greek-speaking city in the world afteryou already speak and the language you want to
Athens, in terms of number of people who speaklearn both have sentences, grammar, nouns,
Greek, is Melbourne Australia! Or perhaps you feelverbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions and
like learning something that feels exotic likeconjunctions. You may not be able to label those
Japanese or Swahili. One Saturday in Novemberparts of your speech, but your brain is applying
2004, the national Canadian newspaper the "Thethose concepts to your speech every day, and
Globe and Mail" put its entire front page inhas been doing so ever since you were a baby.
Chinese, explaining that with the globalization ofExperts believe that our brains have specific
jobs, Chinese will probably be a necessarylanguage circuits, like a computer has specific
business language of the future.circuitry to do certain tasks. If you can
A fun way to start learning a new language,communicate in one language (and if you are
especially if you're not a disciplined type ofreading this, then obviously you can!), then you
student, is to enrol in a language course. Youhave the necessary brain circuitry to
meet other people in your class who have thecommunicate in any language.
same language interest as you which is fun inWhich brings us to the subject of babies, kids and
itself, you're being taught by a real teacher, andlanguage. My father observed that French children
the once a week schedule of the classes meansmust be very clever. While English-speaking
that you are practising your new languageteenagers are struggling with French in high school,
regularly and steadily. Local community centersapparently French children are fluently speaking
offer these courses. Colleges, private languageFrench right from toddlerhood! (!!!)
institutes and continuing education programs atLanguage courses for children exist in our
university offer them. You may be lucky enoughcommunities, particularly in communities that have
to have cultural organizations nearby that offervibrant ethnic members. Fun but academically
language courses. For instance, a local immigrantserious Saturday language classes for children are
organization in my town offers courses in Swahili,very popular among immigrant families. They are
a language spoken in many east African countries.created so that children can learn the language
Downtown, a cultural organization funded byand culture of the old country that their ancestors
France called Alliance Française, offers Frenchcame from, and they usually embrace the
courses. A nearby Saturday Chinese school offersparticipation of other children from outside their
courses in Mandarin Chinese for both adults andculture. So if you want your child to get a head
children, and it's quite encouraging to seestart in a foreign language, to reap the IQ
Cantonese-speaking adults there having as muchbenefits of being multilingual, and to share and
trouble pronouncing Mandarin as the non-Chinesepractise with you while you also learn a foreign
adults!language, enrol them in Saturday school for
If you can't get away to a class, then there areChinese, Italian, Greek, Croatian or whatever
lots of language courses you can study at home:language school you find available for kids.
books, audio cassettes, video cassettes, DVDs,As with adults, lots of multimedia resources are
music, interactive computer software, and onlineavailable for teaching foreign languages to children.
courses on the Internet. Your local library probablyThe latest craze is language videos for babies!
has language learning resources that you canSmall children find these videos very entertaining
borrow, if you don't want to start off the yearand love to watch them. Some well-known titles
with the expense of buying these materials. Wheninclude Bilingual Baby and Lyric Language. On the
studying on your own in this way, try to devoteInternet, offers fun free games for babies and
10 minutes every day to a bit of study orpreschoolers to learn Spanish and French.
revision, instead of doing 1 hour one day but thenHave you ever thought of learning Sign Language?
not finding the time to look at it again for a coupleAmerican Sign Language (or ASL) is the first
of months. With 10 minutes of study each day,language of half a million people in the United
you probably won't feel like you are makingStates and Canada, and is probably the third most
progress because the progress is so gradual.used language in USA. Dr Bill Vicars at the ASL
However, the progress will also be steady, and inUniversity at tells us that many deaf people
3 months time when you look back on how muchcherish and enjoy their language and deaf culture
you have learned, you'll probably impress yourself.so much that given the chance to hear, they'd
To get you started learning your new language inrather remain deaf so as to remain part of their
the next 5 minutes, here are some links to freeculture. On that website you can find a free online
online courses - On the BBC website, you will findASL course and visual dictionary.
free online courses for French, Spanish, German,The benefits of hearing babies and toddlers
Italian, Greek, Portuguese and Mandarin Chinese.learning sign language are very exciting. The
And also for Scottish Gaelic, Welsh, Irish andresearch of the past decade has shown that
English, and links to British Sign Language. - Thehearing infants that learn sign language learn to
Word2Word website contains links to freespeak verbally earlier, have higher IQs, have less
language courses all over the Internet. As oftantrums during the terrible twos because they
January 2005, it has links for 114 languages, fromcan communicate their needs, and are generally
Abenaki, Albanian and Arabic, to Urdu, Vietnamesehappier! There is now quite a choice of
and Xhosa. In all, there are 288 links to onlineentertaining videos for small children that are very
courses. So whether you want to learn Cree,effective at teaching kids signs, such as the
Croatian or Korean, hopefully you'll find a freeSigning Time videos at and the We Sign videos
course for the language you want here.that you can preview at In some areas, it's
A great way to learn and practise anotherpossible for children to take signing classes such
language is "language immersion" - beingas those of or to join reverse integration
surrounded by people who speak that languagekindergarten at deaf organizations or signing
and you having to get things done in thatplaygroups.
language environment. A holiday in a foreignHave fun carrying out your new year's resolution
country is a very interesting and fun "languageof learning a new language. Find some music in
immersion" opportunity. People amaze themselves,your target language that is in a music style that
speaking words in a foreign tongue that theyyou enjoy and has the words to the songs.
didn't realize they knew, when they have toRobert Fisher in the book "Head Start" explains
function in a foreign language environment. Closerthat there is a link between music and
to home, local immigrant community events mayremembering language. He reports that the
be able to provide you with a language immersionAncient Greeks would listen to the whole of the
environment without the expense of travel.Iliad chanted to soft lyre music, and this allowed
My Japanese teacher told us that if youmany people to be able to remember long
understand more than 5% of what is being said inpassages from the Iliad.
a foreign language, then you are not at theHave fun! ¡Diviértase! Amusez-vous
optimum level for learning the maximum amountbien!
possible of that foreign language. If you