Learning two languages

Coming across the reading on learning two different languages, I knew that it would be the next topic I would want to blog about. 

In the reading, I learned that it is easier to learn multiple languages as a child. After puberty, it becomes harder for a person to learn a second language and be a skilled bilingualist (Berger, 2016). This is due to the different activation sites for each language that they learn (Berger, 2016). In the younger bilingual children, it was found that they site both languages, but are able to keep them separated (Berger, 2016). 

Relating to my own experience, I was born in Philadelphia, PA and moved to Korea when I was in 4th grade to 9th grade. Because I was able to learn both Korean and English at a young age, I was able to be bilingual successfully as an adult. However, after coming back to the U.S. at 15 year old and going to college, I found myself sometimes getting mixed up with Korean and English. Sometimes I have to think about the words that I want to use, depending on which language that I am speaking. Other times, I find myself talking in Korean without realizing it to my friends! 

While reading chapter 9, I found myself wondering if adults between the ages of 18 years old or in their twenties, can become successful bilinguals if they have learned the language as a child. I questioned this because of my Korean-American friends and the amazing ability of them becoming fluent in Korean, just by living in Korea for summer vacation. Of course they knew how to speak a little of Korean, but it was at a low elementary level. The mind is truly amazing when it comes to learning languages. I suppose that as long as a person has spoken the language earlier in their life, they just need to practice it for a few months in order to refresh their memories in that language!

Animism in Preoperational Thought

Animism is the belief that natural objects and phenomena are alive (Berger, 2016).  Animism is the belief that natural objects and phenomena are alive. When reading about animism, it made me question whether this was the basis of imagination and imaginary friends of young children. This topic was something that I found very relatable, because of how I believed in animism when I was young. I found it interesting how animism is actually a normal part of pre-operational thought. As a child, I collected a lot of stuffed animals. I remember believing that they were alive and had feelings. Because of this, I was very protective of them and tried to make sure they were "happy" and well cared for. I remember an incident where my younger brother and I had gotten into a fight.He became so angry with me that he simply chucked my stuffed rabbit out of our second floor bedroom window. I was shocked and became upset because I was worried that my rabbit was "hurt".
It is amazing to me how as children, our minds can be very fragile and innocent towards life. Also, it is interesting when I think back to how many times my rabbit had gotten "hurt", and never "died". I think that this was because as a child, I was very positive and did not understand the concept of death.

Bilingual

I found reading about two languages to be interesting in the textbook. I myself, am not bilingual. I have a friend from Germany who can speak very fluent English on top of German, her native language. I wish I could speak two languages, so when I would go in for a job interview I would have something that some other teachers wouldn’t have. I feel our world and surrounding areas around us will turn into a bilingual area someday, and we will have to adapt to a new language. This reminds me of my great grandparents who spoke mostly Pennsylvania-Dutch. They could speak English, but communicated towards one another in Dutch. My grandparents remember it and could say phrases today, but my parents on the other hand cannot say too many things anymore. I was too young to remember how to say anything today. As the textbook said, young bilingual children site both languages in the same area of the brain, yet they manage to keep them separate (Berger 2011). I find this so fascination. Children are constantly learning new things every day, and they can really teach the adults somethings sometimes.

Reading about language loss was something I know my friend can relate to. When she was here for a year from Germany, she was forgetting a lot of German and could not communicate well when she would talk to her parents. Even though she was 22 at the time, English felt like her native language to her. When her and I communicate when she is home, she will forget many words in English and I will have to remind her which words she is looking for. When she just comes for a brief trip, she can flip back and forth from English to German quite easily. It’s interesting to see how easily someone can communicate in a different language. Even though she is currently in college, she is still taking English classes. She does have a thick accent when she speaks in German, but she is very easily understood. My family even enjoys teaching her the Philadelphia “slang” so she can fit in a little better with the area J

Belief and Reality

While reading chapter nine this week the second topic I found interesting and important is the topic of a child's belief versus their reality. I personally find it fascinating that young children believe their beliefs to be reality. For example a lot of young children believe in Santa Clause and believe that he bring presents to children all around the world in one night. Most children also have the belief that this is everyone's belief as well, but in reality only children believe this idea. I also find it interesting that according to Berger, after the age of three children start to realize their reality is not everyone's reality. My question is why do children hold onto this belief for so long? Is it because they want to believe that it's true or because they just don't understand that it can't possibly be a logical occurrence. I remember when I found out that the Easter Bunny was not real, I realized Santa was not real at the same time, but up until that point, at round eight, I had no clue or even and idea that the Easter Bunny was just a made up story. Which leads me then to wonder why do we tell our children these stories only for them to get upset later in life when they realize it's not true, but just a deception? Is it because we are trying to comfort them? Or is there some other reason that we tell our children these stories?

Reference
Berger, K. S. (2011). The Developing Person Through the Life Span. New York: Worth Publishers.

Childrens's Theory

For chapter 9, the section that i found most interesting was the children's theory. This section is about how children knowledge develops and that children do not only learn words and ideas, they learn theories. We learned that a child purpose is whatever they observe and so the first theory to describe this is theory-theory. Theory-theory is the idea that children attempts to explain whatever they hear and see. Children seeks for reason and cause, they do this by asking questions and look for a purpose in everything. Some questions that they ask are, "Why does it rain?", "Why is your hair black?", or "Why is my brother bad?", these are some questions that gathered in the text on page 244. Children around the age 3 are more likely to  to ask these question and also, imitate others as they are still learning. The other theory that researchers looked at is theory of minds. Theory of mind is the human mental process, it is a person's theory of what people might be thinking and this process beings in children that are about 4 years old.

Preschool

After this week's reading, and starting my daughter in preschool this month,  I have been thinking more about the benefits preschool. I remember a friend telling me, "preschool is just a glorified way to get your kid out of the house during the day." I disagree since my daughter, Blake, started.

I am noticing she is more comfortable already in social settings with other children. I also swear that her ability to put together longer sentences has happened in the past couple of weeks. Is it possible that she had a burst of language skills all of the sudden and is just experiencing growth in general? Sure! But, I'm thinking that school has something to do with it. Like Berger (2011) states, children of this age group are "language sponges."

Not only is Blake expanding her vocabulary, but she is having socialization that she did not have before when she was simply home with me or other family members. She is learning how to interact and what is socially acceptable and what is not. This is important for children who will enter kindergarten. Preschool also gives kids the feeling of school, for shorter lengths of time. Many kindergartens now have gone to full day programs, and if a child has no sort of structure of this manner prior to kindergarten, I would imagine it would be more of an adjustment.

All in all, I think preschool is valuable and I think I already see evidence of it being beneficial to my daughter's development.

Preschool

With our discussion post for this week, I started to really think about the American education system. I’ve never really put a lot of thought into our education system other than my own teaching lessons or those teaching around me and the teachers I have observed. While education is so important, I’ve also never thought about different countries around us. Looking up facts about preschool in Germany I was surprised at how their education system works. I did take German through high school so I was aware that the system was different but I didn’t realize how different it was compared to the American system. I also found the textbook to be interesting as it talked about different early education programs. Head Start is one I have been familiar with my whole life as my church held a lot of head start programs for children and families in our area. The textbook described Head Start in a very simple way: Head Start has served millions of young children who were thought to need a “head start” on their formal education and former Head Start Students were more likely to graduate from high school and have jobs than those who never had preschool education (Berger 2011). As more children are speaking languages other than English, the United States is trying to keep up as a whole with the rest of the world. Head Start programs enroll children whose families may not be able to afford preschool, or children who are showing disabilities by the age of 3. I was fortunate enough to go to a preschool for two years before Kindergarten and I am very thankful my mom sent me to preschool to learn and socialize with other children. Preschool is a good way to get a child used to school especially if they are going from no schooling to full day kindergarten in a blink of an eye.

Preschool vs. No Preschool

When I used to work with younger kids (age 3-5) at the local YMCA, I noticed how many of the parents could not afford preschool. They were in the program at the YMCA because there was financial aid for those programs for their children. However, the day-care was not up to the standards that a well run preschool was. 

As I watched these kids grow, I noticed how the kids who did go to preschool had more- I do not want to say self-control, but self-control. What I mean is that the kids in preschool knew the discourse of a school-type program. They knew to raise their hands, sit quietly (or at least quieter), and not push and shove the other kids. Of course, there are other factors such as socioeconomic statuses as well, but I thought it was interesting at the least. 

My hypothesis is that the kids that were currently enrolled in preschool were more familiar with the expectations of school, so they were not jolted into a new set of rules and regulations like some children that had not gone to preschool were. 

Child Care & Education

After I did my research on Australia's school system and how the government funds and handles their education system it really got my thinking about them how the US handles their students, children and education. I feel as though the US can step it up a bit and really focus on what they are doing as a government when it comes to making sure kids get the proper education. People like me who had the opportunity to go too school growing up all my life and having the privilege to learn, but not all kids get that chance. Of course because you have the states shutting closing their doors on certain schools, which puts kids on the street to learn what to be a criminal? "No child gets left behind", right? Then you look at the funding stand point of Australia and their government makes it their priority to make sure all kids get an education, the US you live in some run down town they say they can't afford the funding for but at the same time parents fight for their kids to get an education. Then you look at higher education and that's a whole other scenario. Most of us just don't get enough funding, but we can't get a good job with a high school diploma? Tell me now how does any of that make sense? When you're getting assistance through the state you live in they pretty much pay for your higher education and then puts students like me out working two jobs to put myself through school. I get it professors and teachers have to make a living for themselves to, but an extra $159 million which will then most likely increase out tuition when it already costs an arm and leg just to make up for the pay out. In the end the US just needs to reevaluate their state systems educations across the board and really understand that never kid, child and student has the same thought process, same situation of living, and same skills. "No child left behind", right?

Child-Centered Programs

After looking further into Sweden for my discussion post, and having experience with Swedish friends, it seems to me that the education provided for young children is more what Berger (2011) describes as a child-centered. In these types of programs, children are allowed to develop and learn new skills at their own pace. Creativity is encouraged and valued and reading and writing are not pushed early on.

I did have an experience with Montessori education since we sent my daughter there for a 2 year old program. This only lasted about a month for my daughter, because I think she was just not ready for any formal type of learning that early. She has since moved on to preschool and is having a completely different experience, one year later.

Interestingly enough, our Swedish friends (who were here on business for 6 months), ended up sending both of their children to the New School of Lancaster, as well. They explained to us that this was much like the education their children received in Sweden and therefore, it was an easy transition when they would be in the U.S. They had done quite a bit of research on where to send their two children prior to coming over to the U.S. I must say, their children were very well adjusted and quite bright.

I tend to agree with the philosophy shown in the video on Sweden's education in many ways. I see the benefit of having children outside everyday, despite the weather. This was one thing that I truly appreciated about the Montessori school that we sent our daughter to. I also agree that creativity should be inspired. Every child is different and it is refreshing to see that taken into account with learning. My mother, being a kindergarten teacher all her life, had no problem retiring from teaching a few years back. The educational system in the U.S. had changed so much in her career, and she did not like where it was headed. In her eyes, teaching became all about testing. It was too much pressure on the children and the teachers. I agree with her to some degree as I want my children to enjoy going to school. I also hope that my kids end up with teachers that value them as individuals and appreciate their creativity. They will have plenty of time to act like "adults" and live in a much more structured world....I hope they have time to be kids!

Language Loss

Language loss tends to happen a lot with children or minority languages across the world. Parents of these bilingual children fear that the children will loose their native language to the language they are learning in school.Children will sometimes be hesitant to talk in their native language when they come home from school. The parents then use their child as a spokesperson to communicate with monolingual people. Both of these techniques described in our book are called roll reversals. I think that it is wise for children to be bilingual though since it opens opportunities to them as they grow older such as communicating with others, broadening their knowledge and understanding of language culture, and possibly better job opportunities. From an outside look at it, it helps the world become more intertwined. I understand that some may fear that there will be a total language shift in these children as it does happen often. However I believe their are ways to keep both languages strong in children, such as teaching kids different languages at a very young age. It is a known fact that children learn language the best while they are young and it becomes difficult as they get older. Another way to keep both or numerous languages alive is to have adults cooperate in learning the language that their children are learning in school too, while not abandoning or speaking less of their native language. All in all I believe that we should have more bilingual children and should not let the fear of language loss prevent parents from inviting other languages in. 

Barriers to Problem Solving

While reading chapter nine this week, I found the section on Obstacles to Logical Operations intriguing and important. I think it is important and interesting to learn how children try to logically solve problems. I found static reasoning one of the biggest interest to me personally. I baby sit my little cousin Kaleb, and I see a lot of these characteristics in him. He solves problems in the same manor as stated by Berger in The Developing Person Through the Life Span. Kaleb often thinks that once his favorite program Calliou is over and I change the channel to watch something else, he always thinks that I can just turn Calliou back on. No matter how I try to explain it to him, he just can not grasp the concept that Calliou is over and is only on a certain times of the day. Another barrier that I see in my cousin is irreversibility. Kaleb will get upset over little things like the crust being cut off his bread, but the crust must be cut off the bread before the sandwich is made. If you make the sandwich and then cut off the crust he will refuse to eat it because he believes that damage is done and it can then not be undone. I find it very interesting to not only learn about the barriers that children go through when learning problem solving and logic, but also to be able to see these things first hand.

Reference:
Berger, K. S. (2011). The Developing Person Through the Life Span. New York: Worth Publishers.

Proximal and Distal Parenting

As I read this chapter, I continue to learn more about the the development of babies. You learn to understand that babies are so fragile and they need to be taken care of very carefully. Parents and caregivers actions can have big impact on the babies as they grow and in order to keep your baby in good health there is another ethnotheory that is embedeed in a particular culture to shape a parents baby, this ethnotheory is known as the Proximal and the Distal parenting. Proximal parenting is when a parent is physically close to a baby, often holding and touching the baby. Distal parenting involves pants keeping their distance from the child, providing toys, feeding by putting finger food within the babies reach ,and just talking face to face rather than having an intimate conversation with the baby. Ethnotheory underlines the values and practices of a cultural but is not apparent to the people in the culture (Berger 189).

Social Referencing

While continuing my reading on chapter 7, the concept of social referencing came across as interesting to me. Social referencing is the seeking of emotions or information from others (Berger, 2016). When children are at the toddler age, they look for clues in facial expressions (Berger, 2016). By paying attention to people's emotions and intentions, toddlers can then try to understand what people do (Berger, 2016). The part in the reading on social referencing that was interesting, was the information that talked about how toddlers are actually selective in their referencing! Apparently, children observe which strangers are reliable or not (Berger, 2016). I suppose that this means that besides a child's parents, close relatives, friends, and others who visit frequently, are all people that a toddler would reference to. Another piece of information that I found fascinating, was how social referencing could be applied. One example that the reading pointed out was mealtime. Through a process of showing a toddler expressions, where it shows them that an adult really likes a certain kind of food, it persuades the toddler to eat certain foods. This process explains and shows how children in some cultures, can develop a taste for foods that are rejected by other children in the other cultures. Growing up in a Korean household, I ate a lot of foods that I suppose American children would find "smelly" such as kimchi. I also love fish either raw or cooked. However, I have encountered some friends on campus who have told me that they do not like fish because of its "fishy smell". These conversations with my friends about fish, made me think that maybe they don't like fish because of their biological taste bud reference. After reading the topic of social referencing, I now think that people have preferences of certain foods, depending on what kinds of food they ate and were introduced to as a child.

Mother and Fathers

When it comes to mothers and fathers when their new born is finally here in their arms, the mother is likely to be the main caregiver. As if they child is breastfeeding or that the mom has more time off to spend with their child. Mothers are given a longer period of time for maternity leave than fathers. Most people would say that child care is "domain of women". In my opinion some fathers do not get enough credit when it comes to child care, especially the ones who end up raising their kids on their own. Of course those mothers and fathers complement one another when it comes to caring for their children. According to (Lamb, 2010) mothers are better caregivers and fathers are better playmates. To and extent i would have to agree. Growing up my parents where never married so i always lived with my mother as she was the primary care giver in my life and i would see my dad the every other weekend until i was able to drive and could see him whenever. But, my mom was the one who was serious and was worried about making sure i was taken care and had what i needed. As my dad was the care-free fun guy who you can go to for advice and just have fun and not have to worry. Don't get me wrong though when it was time for him to be a parent and punish or do what a parent needed he was there doing it along side my mom. So when people compare mothers and fathers its not fair to one or the other. As they both bring certain styles to the table that work for raising their kids. Sons need their fathers and daughters need their mothers for the most part that's usually how it goes.

Sychrony and immitation

When I read the section about sychrony in parent and infants I thought it was neat that even though infants imitate adults, that adults imitate the infants first usually. This is a way of connecting and boding between the parent and infant. Imitating each other is not just a form of communication or learning, but a way to feel loved and warmth from each other also. I often hear moms talking to their infants and the infant will then at the same time communicate back. You can tell that there is deep boding going on and that the infant is feeling close to their caregiver. I feel that it is very important to start to communicate like this to infants as soon as possible to feed this sense of nurturing. I also thought it was interesting in this section that adults rarely ever smile at infants until they smile back at them. I thought this would be the opposite way around, which gets me thinking that infants may have an innate sense to make facial expressions. I believe the timing of facial expressions such as smiling may be learned but that babies naturally start to smile when they are happy without learning from an adult first. Another interesting thing is the use of the still face technique how it shows that babies are disturbed by their parents lack of emotion in their facial feautres. This demonstrates that babies can pick up and sense when something is wrong just by reading someones facial expressions.

Toilet Learning

In this weeks reading I found the topic of potty training interesting. I think it is interesting how different theorists say there are different times that are best for potty training, such as Freud says that toilet training should not be done until about the age of two, but others say it depends on the child's sleep habits. So when does a parent begin to potty train? How do they know that the child is ready and will be receptive to potty training? I think it is interesting how in the text book the one woman had her child toilet trained by six months of age. My next question would be will this cause personality problems later in life as Freud says? We will never know, but it is very interesting to see the different ideas and techniques that are used to toilet train children. I thought the idea of setting the child on the toilet and having them drink their favorite juice until urination or defecation occurred and then proceeding to praise them was a very interesting idea. I believe that toilet training all depends on the child and the parents, because it is something that takes time and the child will not learn it over night. I think as long as the parents decide when to toilet train and stick with it, they will yield positive results. I also agree with the text book when it states that the younger the child the longer it will take for the child to master this skill.

Reference:
Berger, K. S. (2011). The Developing Person Though the Life Span. New York: Worth Publishers.

German Parenting

Another aspect of the reading that really spoke to me was the line of text that stated many German parents will just leave their children outside of the grocery store to roam around while the parents shopped. This spoke to me, because when I was a sophomore in high school I was partnered with an exchange student from Germany. She spent three weeks at my house in the fall and I her house in the summer. It was an amazing experience, but I noticed how her parents treated her and it was so different than my more... clingy parents.

Laura (the exchange student) was treated more as a roommate than a fifteen year old; she came home when she wanted and did whatever pleased her. Of course, her parents would get upset if she were to act out or break the law or skipped school, but for the most part she was given a pass to life as opposed to the more controlling atmosphere of the United States where curfews are given and more. It was an interesting cultural experience that I was not expecting to see verified in my developmental psychology class.

The more independent German teenager makes sense given the child rearing practices of more distal parenting as opposed to proximal parenting elsewhere. If the child has more hands off parenting, then the teenager will look less to his or her parents for comfort or dependency.