...CSM 104 Research Essay Why you should learn Spanish before you learn French? Speaking a new language helps you to get to know another people and culture, as language and culture go hand in hand. Because language simultaneously is defined by the world around us, learning another language opens one's mind to new ideas and new ways of looking at the world. While most of us can't hope to learn the languages of more than one or two cultures other than that of our own, those that we can learn help us to learn how other people learn and think. In North American, most people choose French and Spanish as their second or third language. Many people believe that Spanish is actually more useful than French, and obviously the foreign language most spoken and studied--by far--in the North America is Spanish. Compare with French, Spanish can offer a wealth of literature of Latin language, both modern and traditional. For example, when you are reading a Latin American websites, you may find that you could gain a sense of how other people think and fee if you know Spanish. As a matter of fact, both of the languages belong to the Latin group of languages. Hence, they show some similarities too. On the one hand, French is spoken by the country of France in the continent of Europe. On the other hand, Spanish is spoken in the country of Spain in the continent of Europe. However, French and Spanish are two languages that show enormous differences between them when it comes to the pronunciation...
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...Why is English the international language? The fact that English is now the main international language is indisputable. In all aspects of international life – trade, science, diplomacy, education and travel – the common language is English and has been for decades. There are two main reasons why English is the current lingua franca; political history and economics. First, one of the main reasons why English is the international language in the world today is the fact that Britain was the global superpower in the nineteenth century and America is the global superpower in the twentieth and twenty-first. For example, these two English-speaking countries were the most important countries in terms of the military and trade. By conquering and colonising so much of the world, their customs, culture and way of life became common in those parts of the world. This is why so many ex-British colonies now have English as the national language, with many of their people speaking English as a first language. Second, a further reason for the spread and of English is economics. By being the global political and military superpower, these two countries also became the leading trading nations and many countries and territories needed to learn English in order to trade with them. The USA is currently a major trading partner with almost every other country on the planet due to the size of the consumer economy. This explains why in many countries, English is...
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...winner? This training course is called English for Winners, and before you delve into it, we should find out together if it is for you. Do you want to be a winner? Most English learners are unhappy with their English ability. If you ask the average English learner to assess their skills, you're very likely to get one of these answers: "I studied English at school for more than 5 years, but my English is not so good." "I speak a little English, but I think it's just 'school English'." "I understand it a little, but I can't speak it fluently." "My grammar is very bad. I've often tried to learn the grammar rules, but they're too complicated for me." "I had good school grades in English but I still can't speak it very well." These are typical complaints, and they make it clear that very few learners are really happy with the quality of their English. Most of them realize that their efforts are not yielding the results they expect. But instead of changing their strategy and trying to find the right learning methods and techniques, they simply give up. They think that they "just don't have a talent for learning languages". The winners, however, are those English learners who have taken control of their own programs. They know that acquiring English is an ongoing process. It is something that happens every day, day in and day out. They also understand that when it comes to learning English any progress is success. ©EnglishForWinners, Page 1 of 34 Dear Listener, since you have obtained...
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...learning foreign languages? Does the spread of English prevent its NSs from learning foreign languages? Table of Contents Page number introduction: 3 Argument With: 4 Argument Against: 5 Responding To The Counter-Argument 6 Conclusion: 7 List Of References: 9 INTRODUCTION: At a time when the number of users of English language increases in all parts of the world to nearly two billion people, while only a number of talking about it as their mother tongue on the about five this total number or less, while more jobs and uses English language by speakers of their native language or foreign language alike, regardless of the nationality of the Spokesman (or writer), started a number of results in emerging clearly. Some of these results to the need not only to knowledge of the facts and in English on pace of changes. Some of them relate to, inter alia, the standards and criteria for English-language education, and the goals and criteria evaluation of success in learning and education. Some people say that because of the worldwide spread of the English language, the native speakers of English do not need to learn any other languages because they can use English everywhere. For this reason, some people say that the native speakers of English lose any other languages they might have learned because they do not practice it. We now will show if the the spread of English prevent its native speakers from learning foreign languages. ARGUMENT WITH: ...
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...Everything you need to know about TEACHING YOUR BABY TO READ by Madeleine Fitzpatrick MA, Cantab brillkids www.brillkids.com ™ © 2010 BrillKids Inc. All rights reserved. Visit www.BrillBaby.com to learn more! CONTENTS FOREWORD..................................................................................... i Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION................................................... 1 I don’t believe it!.................................................................. 1 Why teach babies to read?.................................................. 1 Shouldn’t I teach the alphabet first?..................................... 2 What if my baby doesn’t enjoy reading?............................... 2 What are the learning methods for babies?.......................... 2 Chapter 2: WHY TEACH READING EARLY?........................... 3 Babies are linguistic geniuses.............................................. 4 Isn’t learning to read supposed to be difficult?..................... 5 From speaking to reading … a giant leap?........................... 6 Reading’s place in history.................................................... 7 The promise of early reading................................................ 8 Early reading can prevent dyslexia....................................... 9 Chapter 3: WHOLE LANGUAGE VS PHONICS...................... 12 Why teach whole language?................................................ 13 Why teach phonics?.................................
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...How effective is learning a foreign language in high school? Not very. According to “America’s Lacking Language Skills,” an article by Amelia Friedman for The Atlantic, “less than 1 percent of American adults today are proficient in a foreign language that they studied in a U.S. classroom.” What’s one way to remedy this? Beginning foreign language instruction earlier. For the average American student, foreign language instruction doesn’t begin until high school. Only a small percentage of people remember everything that they learned in a high school foreign language class. Everything they learned just didn’t stick and they gradually forgot everything. Students should begin foreign language instruction in kindergarten because it is easier for young children to learn, has many benefits as the students get...
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...tying shoes. Children learn these skills called developmental milestones, during predictable time periods. There are five main areas of development: Cognitive, Socio-emotional, Language, Fine motor skill, and Gross motor skill development. All of these areas correlates to each other. However, the differences of cognitive and language development on a child’s growth is the main focus of this paper. What is Cognitive Development? “Cognitive development is the construction of thought processes, including remembering, problem solving, and decision-making, from childhood through adolescence to...
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...Introducing the essay: The variety of language, whether it can be seen or heard, diverse or standard, all play a critical role in a child’s life. Language makes the world go around, evidently by communicating with each other, hence why it is central to everything. Every member of society, including an infant, primary student, teenager, or adult all use their own language that is apparent to them. Through Auslan, Braille, oral language and written language, every member of society communicates through their own language, as well as variation, Discourse, gender, and/or social class. Thesis statement: Language is central to everything; whether you are an infant, a teenager, or an adult, language is used in many different ways, including variations...
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...Press 1 for English…. Press 2 for Spanish… Why English Should Be Declared the Official Language of the Unites States of America Declaring English as the official language of the United States is a very controversial issue. We have one flag, one government, however no official language. Making English the official language would unite all Americans, no matter the race, creed, culture, heritage or ancestry. In 1907, US President Theodore Roosevelt wrote, “We have room for but one language in this country, and that is the English language, for we intend to see that the crucible turns our people out as Americans, of American nationally and not dwellers in a polyglot boarding house” (English-only movement/Wikipedia). There were as many as twenty different languages that could be heard around the time of our founding fathers. Today, there are presently three hundred twenty nine languages in the United States (US Census 2010). Immigrants of many nationalities have built our nation. Just look our nations motto, E pluribus Unum, (Latin meaning – out of many, one) which was adapted by the committee of Congress on July 4, 1776 to design “a seal for the United States of America”, which is carried by the American eagle. The nation has but one flag which we “pledge our allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all” (MacAuthur). However, 236 years later the...
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...English Should be the Only Language Immigration, legal or not, has been a problem for the United States for a long time. In the U.S., promoters of bilingualism have supported the use of other languages for public services, including government documents, hospitals services, voting ballots, and bilingual education. In their essays “A Nation Divided by One Language” and “Viva Bilingualism”, James Crawford and James Fallows claim that it is not necessary to declare English the official language of the U.S. On the other hand, in their essays “English Should Be the Only Language” and “Why the U.S. Needs an Official Language”, S. I. Hayakawa and Mauro E. Mujica argue that English should be made the official language. They contend that multilingualism puts a large financial burden on the country. One specific service in which the cost outweighs the benefits is bilingual education. It is teaching non-English speaking students all school subjects in their native language. However, it lowers the standards for public schools and tends to create a segregated environment for the students. They also point out that the U.S. is a leading nation and English is the most used language in the world. Not forcing immigrants to learn English will actually impede upon their assimilation into America. Without correcting this problem, America will suffer from disunity and divergence. Multilingual government is very expensive. More than 120 multiple languages are spoken throughout the states. To support...
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...and Bilingualism” EN221 – 1M - Language in Culture Submitted by: Virgino, Clarisse Yvette P. Submitted to: Dr. Deborah Javier I. Introduction What is a Bilingual? A Bilingual person is someone who can speak or write in more than one language. A person who can speak/write in more than two languages is considered to be a multilingual. Bilingualism and multilingualism isn’t unusual. In fact, it’s the norm for most of the world’s societies. It is possible for a person to know more than one or two languages, most especially when the country is not in the western part of the globe, usually, people can speak two languages—that is, their L1 and L2, which, in this context, L2 is usually the English language. People become bilingual when they learn two languages at the same time, or, they learn the second language sometime after they acquired their L1. But then, it is more possible for a person to learn a second language sometime after he has acquired his L1. The problem is, the older you get, the harder it is to learn to speak a new language as well as a native speaker. Many linguists believe that there is a so-called “critical period” wherein the child can easily acquire any language that he or she is regularly exposed to. Under this belief, the structure of the brain changes at puberty, then after that, it becomes harder to learn a new language. In some countries, nearly everyone...
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...Bilingualism One in seven or 31.8 million people speak a language other than English in their home, according to the United States Census. (United States Census, 2009). People use this term in different ways. For some, bilingualism means an equal ability to communicate in two languages. For others, bilingualism means the ability to communicate in two languages but with the possibility of greater skills in one language. There is a lot of criteria that goes along with bilingualism. For this research paper, the criteria I focused on were: The history of bilingualism laws in the United States, pros/cons of bilingual education in America’s school system, who benefits the most from bilingual education programs; youths in elementary or the youths in high school, bilingualism in the labor market, and bilingualism in the media. In the society that we live in today, Bilingualism has become just as it is important to learn as to learn the language from the country of a person’s ethnical background. Bilingualism has come a far way in the last 20 years to where it is today. Whether we notice it or not bilingualism plays a part in every person’s day to day life. Bilingualism is highly researchable subject is given a lot of political, as well as ethical attention. Twenty years ago in the school system bilingual education programs were almost never heard of much in elementary schools for English speaking students to have to learn another language. Most often the kids who didn’t t know English...
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...Act to see our roots in bilingual education. We will examine both the advantages and disadvantages of bilingualism and it’s effect on the brain. Also, we will attempt to shed some needed light on just why this is such a hot political topic. Why do Americans still seem unwilling to accept bilingual education as a necessity for their children? Bilingual Education: Friend or Foe? Bilingual education is a polarizing topic in America. Torn between preserving American culture and what makes us American, and providing immigrant children with the same access to education that all Americans deserve, bilingual education is now a political topic in America. There have been many attempts to make positive changes in our education system concerning bilingual education. Even for those who agree that bilingual education is important, arriving at the answer to the best approach is on a meandering path. With decades of studies, opinions and speculation as to the right way to best educate English language learners, it is not unlikely that many Americans wonder if bilingual education is friend or foe? Answers to these questions can best be answered by looking deeper into the history of the Bilingual Education Act, statistics concerning bilingual education, and looking into why the American public could be mislead about what bilingual education really is. Answering the question, “Bilingual Education: Friend or Foe?”, should start by making clear what bilingual education...
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...Memory, Theories on Language Student ID: 21923613 July 12, 2015 Essay Assignment Exam number: 250391 Language learning from what I’ve read starts when you are about a year old. Learning theory approach to language development suggest that “Language acquisition follows the principles of reinforcement and conditioning.” They give one example in our textbook on page 232 about a mother praising her baby for saying “mama” which means the baby is more likely to continue saying it. Once the baby gets older the learning theory approach to acquisition no longer applies, because it has an issue with grammar. A child that might say “Why he walks away?” could be understood by the listeners around so it makes the theory harder to explain. So we might as well jump to our next topic in language acquisition, which is an innate process by nativist Noam Chomsky. Chomsky believed that people shared something called universal grammar. He also suggested the language acquisition device, it’s a neural system of the brain to help the understanding of language. There is also clear evidence from scientist who have helped this innate process they have researched. They have discovered that there are specific places in the brain that contribute to learning languages, and there are certain areas in the mouth and throat that help with new speech. There is also some research on how some languages need a different tone in speech such as pitch to make a words mean different things such as Chinese. In...
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...Although scientists have not discovered all the secrets of first language acquisition, the fact that children are born with the gift for acquiring language is practically undisputed now. However, what happens if the child is deprived of a normal audio environment from the beginning? In order to acquire listening comprehension ability, children need to hear sounds in order to imitate them correctly and then to link the sounds to the object they represent. However, deaf children can still develop a fantastic sense of language through sign language. To store and process language, people rely on the neurological system responsible for processing by the brain. It is a highly sophisticated mechanism that is only possessed by humans. Although...
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