forgotten Russian - how to restore it?

[Emily Saunders]

I had an odd experience with a young boy in a summer camp for typical  
U.S. kids aged 5-10.  He'd been adopted at the age of 2 (and was about  
5 or 6 at the time of our camp) and had completely forgotten all of  
his Russian.  We looked for glimmers of understanding with certain  
basic vocabulary words (мать, отец, кошка, собака), but nothing until  
we introduced to the kids a simplified version of the fairy-tale Репка  
(Repka).  While the presenter was telling the story started to  
interrupt with corrections -- not собака/sobaka but Жучка/zhuchka, not  
кошка but Муська and so on.  I'll bet you that she has childhood  
rhymes and stories kicking around in her memory banks that could be  
triggered.

Emily Saunders

13.03.2011, в 11:10, Katya Burvikova написал(а):

> Dear Seelangers,
>
> I have a young student who is trying to learn Russian. She was  
> adopted from
> Russia at the age of 8, she is 14 now. Her Russian is absolutely  
> gone, all she
> remembers are few basic words like hleb, maslo and oy. I noticed  
> that some
> things she would say automatically - for exmple, we didn't learn  
> construction "U
> menya net..." and Genitive case yet but she said "u menya net  
> akvariuma" using
> the right ending. Has anyone had  students with same problem and how  
> did you
> make them remembering forgotten things? Are there any know  
> strategies to take
> out things from lingsuitical subconscious?
>
> Thank you!
>
> Katya Burvikova
>
>
>
>
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