Learning a Language

Schools in Australia teach children a different language, but can we start this even earlier? Kindergarten? Childcare centres?

I certainly have. I have a fondness for Japanese. I’ll be honest, I’m not very good at it, but I’m good enough to teach some to 3 and 4 year olds. I’ll go into detail about how I teach language in another part, but today I would like to talk about why we should do it.

It’s not necessarily about teaching children how to speak fluently. Language learning in the early years is a great way to open up conversations on culture and diversity. It is a clear way of showing children that people are different, but they are still people.

I have also found that children enjoy different languages. It is almost like having codewords. Many will take that information home and then pass their learning onto their families. This encourages further communication and sharing knowledge.

Languages also help to develop problem solving skills. Children have to build strategies to remember the different words.

At this young age, it doesn’t matter if you are not highly skilled in another language. Teaching a few areas will be enough to support these skills and spark a passion for learning.

What are your opinions about languages in the early years? Do you teach a language?