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Home › Articles › Speech/Language Issues › Foreign Language Power

Foreign Language Power

Can Babies and Toddlers Become Bilingual, or Even Trilingual?

By Kendeyl Johansen

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With the Internet, TV and inexpensive travel options bringing families from different countries together daily, many parents want to teach their child a second language. "Knowing a second language [Spanish] can only benefit my sons in the future. They might get a better job, get paid more, have more doors open to them, plus it will enhance their social opportunities," says Drue Ann Hargis, of California, mom to bilingual 2- and 8-year-old sons.

Learning another language also improves listening skills and helps kids of all ages better understand words in general. "As children develop an inventory of foreign synonyms, they more fully understand English," says Francois Thibaut, founder of the Manhattan-based Language Workshop for Children and pioneer specialist in early childhood education.

Many English words share Latin roots with Spanish, French and other romance language synonyms, and if kids know these foreign words they can analyze the meaning of English words. This leads to higher scores on the verbal portions of college entrance exams such as the SAT and ACT.

English isn't the only language spoken in the United States. The 1990 census figures show 13 percent of the population, 5 years and older, spoke a language other than English. More than half of the non-English speaking population spoke Spanish. Other languages with over one million speakers each are French, German, Italian and Chinese.

College may seem far away if you have a toddler or preschooler, but babies as young as 6 months old can start learning a foreign language, and 2- to 3-year-olds are capable of learning and speaking several languages. Last year Marlene Castricato of New York City proudly watched her 3-year-old son, Louis, chatting in French at a family reunion in Canada, moving confidently from table to table of French relatives. Louis also speaks fluent Italian.

"My husband's family was born and raised in Italy and my husband was born in Montreal, Canada, so we wanted Louis to speak those languages," says Castricato. "My son's exposure to French and Italian was as natural as a lullaby."

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