second language

[Fred Genesee]

Annette:

There is, as Barbara points out, no research evidence concerning
bilingual/second language acquistion of children with speech impediment so
it is difficult to be conclusive about how such children would fare if
introduced to a second language around 4; but, it is also the case, that
there is no evidence to suggest that all such children would be burdened or
slowed down by L2 exposure once the L1 is in place.

I think an additional factor to consider is exposure -- how much French
and for how long would your grandson be exposed to French? In particular,
is there real incentive value for his learning it -- that is, would French
be useful for  him in his extended family or neighborhood so that his
French language learning would be supported more broadly? Simply exposing
children to some L2 when it is not likely that their exposure will be rich
or long enough for them to become competent in it may not be advisable,
especially when children have language-related impairments, not because
such children cannot cope with an L2 but because a little bit of language
exposure may be a waste of time and cause some frustation. It is a matter
of WHY would the child learn French. In Montreal, for example, where both
French and English are useful on a daily basis with most people, there is
considerable merit in giving all children the opportunity to learn French
and English; to not do so would deprive some of them of a life-skill. This
means that there are children with impairments who might be exposed to an
L2  with good reason in Montreal, but not so in a monolingual setting.

My own professional and personal experience over many years suggests to me
that bilingual acquisition and second language acquisition need to be taken
seriously and dabbling in other languages may not be useful -- I do not
wish to imply that this is the case with your grandson; this is a more
general comment. In fact, it sounds like your grandson could have some
opportunities to use French with cousins on his mother's side. If this is
true, then it makes French daycare more meaningful and useful. For me, this
could be the deciding factor since there are no a priori reasons to think
that he would have serious linguistic or cognitive problems with French.

	With respect to the mother's language, many children are very resistant to
parents changing their languages since they have established an initimate
bond with the parent, and language is a fundamental part of that
relationship -- thus, changing the language used by the mother with the
child can upset the relationship.

	Knowing another language is often a life-long advantage, but one has to
look at the immediate circumstances when ascertain whether exposure to an
L2 is sufficient and meaningful enough to make the decision to exposure
young children to another language after their L1 is in place.

Fred

At 09:27 AM 12/6/01 +0000, Annette Karmiloff-Smith wrote:
>A personal question to blingualism experts please.  My grandson is
>almost 4.  He is for the moment monolingual - English - and has a
>slight speech impediment for which he has speech therapy.  It seems
>to be entirely at the articulatory level as far as I can see.  He had
>a hearing problem for some time and now has grommets and hears far
>better.  My daughter is bilingual French-English and would like her
>son to learn French too.  She feels that she herself should continue
>speaking English to him.  But there is a French playgroup he could
>now join and he does anyway hear French from time to time in his
>environment.  The question is would it be wise/unwise for him to
>start hearing another language at this time, when he is still having
>speech therapy for English?
>Any advice most welcome.
>Annette
>--
>________________________________________________________________
>Professor A.Karmiloff-Smith,
>Head, Neurocognitive Development Unit,
>Institute of Child Health,
>30 Guilford Street,
>London WC1N 1EH, U.K.
>tel: 0207 905 2754
>fax: 0207 242 7717
>http://www.ich.ucl.ac.uk/units/ncdu/NDU_homepage.htm
>________________________________________________________________
>
Psychology Department           phone: (514) 398-6022
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