How Bilingual and Multilingual is in Favour?

Bilingual 

Recently I took a 5weeks course about understanding and helping Bilingual and Multilingual Learners (BMLs).

Ever since Ive always have an interest in learning more about how to teach and help English Language Learners at school. I have few courses (maybe about 5) that I took about teaching English.

But my recent study is called Teaching and Understanding BMLs. which is really interesting. and Ive learn how important it is to encourage parent and learners to speak in their Mother Tongue (MT) while learning English Language, as it will help them a lot to progress more and faster in learning new language. And hits me ,when Ive learnt how important MT is, realising that my own children does not know how to speak my MT or my husband MT and now they fall on as English is their MT which is I'm not very proud of now.. Well it is still not too late! They are both 5 years old now and it is not too late , I'm starting to speak Tagalog with them and my husband Tamil, at the same time they are learning Bahasa Melayu at school.

 Mother tongue is the language which a child starts hearing after being born and thus, it also helps in providing a definite shape to our emotions and thoughts. Learning in your mother tongue also is crucial in enhancing other skills such as critical thinking, skills to learn a second language and literacy skills.

And here is an addition article from our friend Jeffrey Nelson  about:
The Benefits of Bilingual Education: Why Bilingual Kids Are Smarter


The cognitive benefits of bilingual education are many. It gives bilingual children a great number of benefits. Many of these same benefits are not noted in their monolingual counterparts, therefore further reinforcing the decision to educate children in two languages. The benefits of bilingual education are apparent in several areas.

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The first of these areas I would like to discuss is the ability for the bilingual child to outperform his monolingual peers in certain mental abilities such as distilling information; filtering out unimportant information and focusing on the important information. This leads to a bilingual child being better able to prioritize and manage multiple tasks according to research done at Penn State in February of 2011 and reported in Science Daily magazine. Prioritization, and being able to work on multiple projects at the same time, is a lifelong skill necessary for success in many different areas of life. This is one of the best benefits of bilingual education.

As one can imagine, this could be very helpful in today's world. We have so much information and so many distractions, that it may be helpful to have an advanced mechanism to be able to filter all of this information. This also aids the bilingual child when learning, as they are able to focus on the important or pertinent information and ignore the less important information. The conclusion of the above referenced study done at Penn State is very simple: being bilingual is good for you. By extension, the benefits of bilingual education are worth pursuing.

Another interesting study was done by the Swedish Armed Forces Interpreter Academy as reported in Science Daily magazine. They weren't specifically looking at the benefits of bilingual education, but we can make certain inferences from their study. At the academy, young recruits learn languages at a very fast pace. They are chosen for their aptitude and taught languages, such as Arabic, Russian, or Chinese, over a span of about 13 months; from no knowledge to advanced fluency. The pace is intense, and as such was a perfect incubator to examine the brain, and what happens to it under extreme language learning. This would hopefully serve as a snapshot of what the bilingual brain undergoes in their everyday lives.

The study found that language learning actually makes the brain grow. The language learner's brains developed in size in key areas: the hippocampus, which is responsible for learning new material and spatial navigation, as well as three other areas in the cerebral cortex.This growth lends itself to the bilingual, again, becoming a superior language learner later in life. With improved concentration, a larger and stronger hippocampus, and an increased ability to distill information, the bilingual has the opportunity to maximize further learning opportunities; even ones unrelated to language.

Another of the benefits of bilingual education is that it exposes babies and young children to flexible thinking through the medium of two languages. Bilingual children learn that things and events in the world can be called two different things. They can then flexibly switch between the "labels" which gives the brain a great workout. This constant exercising of the brain is what helps the bilingual make gains in things like concentration and focus, according to a University of Washington study done in August of 2009.

Covered above are a few of the benefits of being bilingual as it relates to children and their ability to concentrate and learn. Hopefully this article has done some good in helping debunk some of the myths that bilingual children are somehow lesser than monolingual children in terms of scholastic performance. While the bilingual child's environment is a huge factor, and must be properly calibrated, the fact that a child is bilingual is certainly not a precursor to a child having a hard time in educational environments; it's actually the opposite.

Bilingual education, in a formal setting, helps support bilingual education at home. Both parts of the equation are necessary for the child to truly realize their bilingual potential. The benefits of bilingual education are greatest when exposure is realized across all channels; social and academic....
  Jeffrey Nelson is an author and father of a bilingual child. He is fluent in Spanish and English and runs the site LivingBilingual.

Another article that may be of interest can be found here: [http://livingbilingual.com/2013/06/12/what-is-bilingual-education/]

Article Source: [http://EzineArticles.com/?The-Benefits-of-Bilingual-Education:-Why-Bilingual-Kids-Are-Smarter&id=7788524] The Benefits of Bilingual Education: Why Bilingual Kids Are Smarter



And Reading is one of the key base on learning any language.