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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 5, 2019 15:59:00 GMT
It would be just as fascinating to understand how tiny children can learn a new language so fast. Some day somebody will finally have the inspiration to make a documentary about this. (Even learning to talk the first time is an incredible mystery.)
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Post by mossie on Jan 5, 2019 16:44:32 GMT
ISTR reading somewhere that children are learning at the fastest rate as soon as they are born, and that the rate at which we learn falls off from then. Also that it is very important for parents to maintain contact with young children, the fashion now for parents to push the baby in a stroller facing forwards, fully occupied with a smartphone or gossiping with someone else, while totally ignoring the child is very bad for that childs development.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 5, 2019 17:36:04 GMT
"Baby talk" is also supposed to be a terrible thing to do. In France, parents are now advised to talk to babies totally normally, even when they are supposedly too young to understand. "It looks like your diaper is full again. I'm going to take care of it, don't worry..."
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Post by mickthecactus on Jan 5, 2019 19:37:18 GMT
"Baby talk" is also supposed to be a terrible thing to do. In France, parents are now advised to talk to babies totally normally, even when they are supposedly too young to understand. "It looks like your diaper is full again. I'm going to take care of it, don't worry..." I talked constantly to my children and grandchildren. There was no greater fun than taking them for a walk before they could talk but just constantly describing what was around us. All of them are articulate and I claim some of the glory!
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Post by rikita on Jan 6, 2019 0:36:25 GMT
it surprised me a bit when i heard a lot of people from english speaking countries say they learned before school (and often from countries that start school very early) - when i started school, we were all 6-7 year olds and no one knew to read. now, at agnes' daycare, there are sometimes kids that can read before school, but not that many - like, her best friend could read a bit before she started school, but i don't think enough to actually read a book ...
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Post by rikita on Jan 6, 2019 0:44:51 GMT
It would be just as fascinating to understand how tiny children can learn a new language so fast. Some day somebody will finally have the inspiration to make a documentary about this. (Even learning to talk the first time is an incredible mystery.) do they, though? of course it is fascinating how fast and how much kids learn, but specifically about second language learning? (and really, for first language learning, it does take them a few years to become fluent) ... during my high school exchange i'd say i reached a pretty good level of spanish (able to communicate about teenage topics, abstract ideas, etc., with crazy grammar though, i only studied that later on at university) within half a year, starting at almost zero. looking at the kids at the daycare i used to work at, that had moved to germany from other countries, it did take them several months to communicate well at a kids level. of course, they didn't have full immersion though, they spoke their language at home ... and kids who have a once-per-week class at school don't always learn more than an adult who has a once-per-week class, though of course that might have to do with the fact that the adult actually has chosen to learn the language and thus is more motivated - also the adult might be more able to understand grammatical issues though ... i think the area where kids are most able to out-do adults is pronunciation, and they have an advantage of time ...
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Post by rikita on Jan 6, 2019 0:47:57 GMT
"Baby talk" is also supposed to be a terrible thing to do. In France, parents are now advised to talk to babies totally normally, even when they are supposedly too young to understand. "It looks like your diaper is full again. I'm going to take care of it, don't worry..." it is? i always learned that baby talk is great for language learning in kids, and that actually it is instinctive. i agree that talking to your child a lot, telling them what you are doing, is important, and also a matter of respect (like, you are not just moving them about like a thing, there is a purpose to what you are doing) - but exaggerated pronunciation, using diminutives, repetition and word-play is supposed to help them learn, according to what i read ...
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Post by rikita on Jan 6, 2019 0:49:46 GMT
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Post by bjd on Jan 6, 2019 7:07:40 GMT
I personally have a problem with academics or scientists doing studies on baby talk or child care. Of course simpler language is easier for babies and small children to understand, but it doesn't mean you have to use two-syllable repetitive words instead of normal words when you talk to them. They always seem to state the obvious.
But nobody has complicated jargon-filled conversations with babies. Like Mick mentioned above, you talk a lot to small children about everything and they pick up words and ideas. I remember my neighbour across the hall in our apartment in Besançon when my kids were small. She always commented on how much I talked to my kids. It seemed natural to me and they are indeed all good at expressing themselves, and all fully bilingual with facilities for learning other languages.
About bilingualism, my Canadian grandchildren were all bilingual from very young (well, they are still young!): our son spoke only French to them, our daughter-in-law only Spanish. When they talk to either parent, they switch to the language needed. Things got a bit more complicated when they moved to Scotland. The eldest was nearly 5 and started nursery, her sister was 3 and also went some hours to nursery school. They picked up English so quickly it was fascinating to watch. It was a game for them, they would use it playing at home, whereas before they played either in French or Spanish, mostly in French. Their little brother picked up English from the playground and a bit of day care hours.
Now that they are back in Quebec, they will perhaps lose some of it. The eldest, who turned 7 on Friday, has an English lesson at school but is bored. So now our son reads English books to the kids withough translating them into French and they don't complain. And in no time, they picked up the Quebec accent again!
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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 6, 2019 11:09:13 GMT
My brother didn't speak English when he started school yet he spoke it as well as any of the other children after one month.
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Jan 6, 2019 11:33:14 GMT
My youngest communicated in grunts until he was around 2...still does occasionally and he's 37 now.
I didn't start school of any kind until I was 5 1/2. My youngest was only 3 and I thought that he wasnt ready. However I realise now that I was quite a clingy mother so it was probably good for us both! Our eldest was more than ready at 4 (we lived in a different area when they started nursery school... Leicestershire's education authority started them at 3 and Hertfordshire's at 4)
When youngest started 'proper' school (at 5) I went back to school myself. At 30. 😁
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Post by questa on Jan 6, 2019 11:56:58 GMT
I had dealings with a boy aged 2 who had about five words. Then a Scottish family moved in next door with a 2 yr old boy. They played together a few hours each day in each other's homes and in 3 months the little aussie was chatting away happily. Trouble was his family couldn't understand his Highland accent. After a term in playgroup with other chn he spoke with less accent. Now he is an adult but I can still hear the highland touch in his speech.
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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 6, 2019 12:26:55 GMT
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Post by rikita on Jan 7, 2019 0:38:09 GMT
I personally have a problem with academics or scientists doing studies on baby talk or child care. Of course simpler language is easier for babies and small children to understand, but it doesn't mean you have to use two-syllable repetitive words instead of normal words when you talk to them. They always seem to state the obvious. But nobody has complicated jargon-filled conversations with babies. Like Mick mentioned above, you talk a lot to small children about everything and they pick up words and ideas. I remember my neighbour across the hall in our apartment in Besançon when my kids were small. She always commented on how much I talked to my kids. It seemed natural to me and they are indeed all good at expressing themselves, and all fully bilingual with facilities for learning other languages. About bilingualism, my Canadian grandchildren were all bilingual from very young (well, they are still young!): our son spoke only French to them, our daughter-in-law only Spanish. When they talk to either parent, they switch to the language needed. Things got a bit more complicated when they moved to Scotland. The eldest was nearly 5 and started nursery, her sister was 3 and also went some hours to nursery school. They picked up English so quickly it was fascinating to watch. It was a game for them, they would use it playing at home, whereas before they played either in French or Spanish, mostly in French. Their little brother picked up English from the playground and a bit of day care hours. Now that they are back in Quebec, they will perhaps lose some of it. The eldest, who turned 7 on Friday, has an English lesson at school but is bored. So now our son reads English books to the kids withough translating them into French and they don't complain. And in no time, they picked up the Quebec accent again! hm, why do you have a problem with the studies, though? i think they are quite interesting - and i don't think they are necessarily stating the obvious - when you say your neighbour was surprised at how much you talked to your kids, i suppose it wasn't obvious to her - and even with things that seem obvious, i think it is interesting to learn about the way they work exactly or why they are like that ... and as i understand it, they don't mean you have to make up a specific language to speak to children, you do it pretty much instinctively without even realizing it ... yeah i suppose some kids learn languages pretty fast, but then some adults learn them faster than others, too ... but as i said, i have met kids who seemed to take quite a while to learn another language ...
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Post by kerouac2 on Jan 7, 2019 5:04:38 GMT
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Post by bjd on Jan 7, 2019 7:03:36 GMT
Rikita, I have a bias against researchers who study the obvious and come up with results that suit them. While still in Canada, I worked for a year at the psychology department at the university. One of the main researchers in child psychology spent her time studying (or having assistants study) children in day care. Her final paper was all about how children do much better in day care than at home with their mothers. Interestingly, she was divorced, re-married and with a small kid in day care. When she very occasionally brought the child to work (because of a problem with day care), she didn't seem to know even how to interact with the child.
Of course, I am generalizing from that one case. But it does seem that sometimes they study what is blindingly obvious and the results appear on places like BBC news as something new.
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Post by rikita on Jan 7, 2019 19:50:10 GMT
hm, the study with the japanese mothers speaking less clearly is mentioned in the article i linked ... i would suppose the articles about studies in newspapers are usually only part of it, though ... and sure, there is the risk of someone finding a result because they want to find it - but then that's why there are reviews and more studies and so on, i suppose ... i still think researching these issues is interesting (and don't quite get why it is obvious, if it was obvious they would get exactly the result you agree with, wouldn't they? the only research i ever did, for my thesis, was kind of obvious, too, i suppose, and something htat had been researched before, but then it was just my magister thesis, you aren't supposed to do something really new, like with a phd thesis) i also read there are some cultures where it is common to talk very little to small children, btw ...
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Post by lagatta on Jan 7, 2019 23:11:15 GMT
On the subject of early childhood education, the reach of Québec's early childhood education / daycare system: www.citylab.com/equity/2018/12/affordable-daycare-subsidized-child-care-working-mom-quebec/579193/ However, this is more in terms of the effect on young women remaining full-time in the job market. The system did also emphasise early childhood education. In some respects that has been a great success, but there were not enough spots in public CPEs, meaning some spaces were farmed out to inferior private daycares, and alas there was more than a whiff of corruption in terms of the party then in power. I'm not inferring that private daycares are inherently inferior - there are excellent ones, usually costly. I'm referring strictly to the situation at the time.
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Post by tod2 on Aug 26, 2020 15:56:43 GMT
It's the World Pandemic 2020 and schools are closed or have given parents the option of either sending the little terrorists to school, or keeping them supervised at home and making sure there is someone available to help with the lessons coming over on the computer. So, here is a perfect example. My eldest Grandchild at his dad's place together with his supervisor……..
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Post by mickthecactus on Aug 26, 2020 16:03:05 GMT
A dog that plays video games!
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Post by tod2 on Aug 26, 2020 16:15:09 GMT
Yeah! Don't you just love it?!
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Post by bixaorellana on Aug 26, 2020 16:28:32 GMT
Adorable picture, Tod!
I'll bet less than two years ago, when this thread started, none of us anticipated there being mass school closings in 2020.
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Post by kerouac2 on Aug 26, 2020 16:40:36 GMT
Back to school as normal in France starting September 1st. I suppose that some of the schools will have to close again after a few days...
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Post by htmb on Aug 26, 2020 17:56:47 GMT
That picture says it all, tod!
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Post by lugg on Aug 27, 2020 20:59:10 GMT
Great photo Tod. The dog has it sorted School is back here in Herefordshire on Tuesday , my daughter who is a primary school teacher has been working throughout the lockdown but only about 50 per cent of children in school since March in her school ( high proportion of vulnerable mixed in with children of key workers) . Life goes on ...
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