Children are not born with a imprint of how a language should work. If learnt young enough languages for children become just different ways of communicating meaning of a sort that reflects the culture the language originates from. Children do need to learn through an appropriate pedagogy. Western children need a Western pedagogy mixed with a top quality knowledge of Chinese. Contact us for an advice sheet on 'West meet East' pedagogy for children learning Chinese.
Children have an enhanced ability to learn a langauge whilst young. They have the time and willingness to learn, they imitate well, they are adaptable.
The more you expose a child to different languages the better, unless they have some destabilising factors in their broader life. Children need to hear a word in as many contexts as possible to associate the correct meaning to the word. This is the case for Chinese as it is for any language. Translation should be avoided not least because their may not be a direct translation so translating misses out on cultural nuances.
Co-learning culture and language is very important. Contact us for an advice sheet on co-learning language and culture. Languages are a function of culture and vice-versa. The more distinct a culture is from another culture the more distinct the respsective languages are likely to be. This why it is important not to say there is no need to learn Chinese as there are many English speaking Chinese. Understand the language and you understand the culture so can do business with the emerging power that is China.
For the very young dual immersion schools exist but are not plentiful. Children might be confused in the first few weeks but quickly adapt and learn. Try not to transfer any of your own adult concerns onto the children as they adapt.
For the young there can be pre-school clubs but children need more than an hour plus teaching a week. Practice online can be helpful to reduce the overall cost and to expose the child to sufficient Chinese. See our new practice playground Mandarama. Mandarama is a good value way of helping your child make progress and stay enthused about Chinese.
Schools increasingly are adopting to teach Mandarin Chinese before children reach Secondary and High School. Before the so called window of opportunity closes between 11 and 13, children are not worried by a language being different as they have the cognitive flexibility to accommodate this variety.
Young enough and you need not point out the differences between Chinese and English just as you do not teach grammar to a baby. It can be advantageous for general literacy to learn about these differences at a later stage. The child learns that languages are tools that work in different ways to transmit meaning. Mandarama is built upon this concept along with incremental vocab, contextualised phrases, and interactive cultural content.
Learn Chinese as an older child, over 13 years of age, and children struggle to become fluent, to cope with Chinese characters and to speak without an accent if they begin to learn Chinese.
If you would like to know more about learning languages as a child, especially Mandarin Chinese contact us with your questions.
Resources
Multilingual Children’s Association
http://www.multilingualchildren.org/