"Bilingual Development and the Education of Bilingual Children during Early Childhood"
Summary:
In Bilingual Development and the Education of Bilingual Children during Early Childhood Eugene Garcia discusses the issues concerning bilingualism in young children. Garcia defines early childhood bilingualism as children who are able to comprehend and speak two languages. These children must be exposed to the two languages in the form of social interaction during childhood. This differs from native speakers of one language, who acquire a second language after they have mastered their native language. Garcia distinguishes how the view of early bilingual children has changed throughout time. In the mid 1960's it was believed that bilingual acquisition in early childhood was detrimental to intelligence as measured by a standardized test of intelligence. A decade later scholars argued that children who truly achieve the definition of early childhood bilingualism are cognitively more advanced than monolingual children and children who do not embody the definition of early childhood bilingualism. There is however, a negative influence on children who do not fully master both languages, thus the importance of having a thorough definition of early childhood bilingualism to distinguish the difference.
The sources summary of itself in the abstract and introduction closely match my sense of the actual work done throughout the source. Garcia expands upon the topic of functional language, which I did not perceive when reading the introduction and abstract.
Source in relation to my research question:
This article introduced me to a comprehensive definition of early childhood bilingualism that was needed in order to expand upon my research question. Just as in Kapa and Colombo’s article, Garcia discusses the specific cognitive advantages that bilingual children have over monolingual children such as “mental flexibility, superior concept formation and a generally diversified set of mental abilities.” (Garcia 103). Garcia also discusses how the perspective on bilingualism has changed over time. Through much of the 20th century scholars believed second language acquisition to be a cognitive hindrance rather than an asset. In response to the success of a Canadian-French-immersion bilingual program for English-speaking children and the failure of English-immersion programs for Spanish-speaking children in the United States Garcia makes a valid point that “successful subjects came from either majority, middle, or high socioeconomic strata, in which a premium was put on education and learning a second language was openly rewarded,” and that, “learning a second language under such conditions is quite different from a situation in which doing so is dictated by economic depression as well as by social and psychological repression of a minority language culture.” (Garcia 105) This is a valid point that not only counters the results of the programs, but of other scholars’ views on multilingualism.
Wendy falls under Garcia’s definition of early childhood bilingualism. She states, “Growing up, I was always exposed to Spanish. It was a household priority.” (Rodriguez 1) However, as a child Wendy had a tendency of mixing both English and Spanish, “For instance, I was very thirsty and was joking about how ‘dihitria’ I was. The funny part is that this is definitely not the way of saying or spelling dehydrated. This is a clear example of making English words play off as Spanish which is not uncommon amongst bilingual speakers.” This could have been a simple mistake or an indication that there are negative consequences of inadequate bilingual training.
Garcia, Eugene. "Bilingual Development and the Education of Bilingual Children during Early Childhood."American Journal of Education 95.1 (1986): 96-121. JSTOR. Web. 23 Oct 2013. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/1209229>.