Language Learning Blog - Bilingual Babies: Expose Now, Benefit Later

At birth, we are born with the ability to discriminate and repeat the sounds of any world language.  As we begin to live and function within the language of our society, we slowly lose the need to produce these other sounds and the brain eventually shuts off this ability.  This is why we see many toys (such as Around the World See and Say), cartoons (Dora, Diego, & Ni Hao Kai Lan), and video series (such as Baby Einstein and the On Demand programs cited here) designed to introduce the sounds of other languages to children as early as possible with a goal of keeping this ability alive within the brain.

While American parents may be hesitant to introduce a second language before the child can actually speak English, research shows that benefits of doing so abound, including increased academic abilities over multiple subject areas.  (See Related Post)

Worried? Hesitant?  Read this article in Babies Today

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