The Older Child and Second Language Acquisition

Before traveling to China, many new parents struggle to learn a few words of Chinese. Some want to speak with the Chinese people they will meet and some want to communicate with their new child. But the bottom line is that Chinese is not an easy language to learn and it can prove quite frustrating. Now, let's imagine a young child from China, entering the United States with a new family and no English. Imagine the frustration of trying to communicate with her new parents, siblings, friends, etc. using hand signals, sounds and facial gestures to be understood. She can't understand simple signs or words on paper, since even the letters may be new to her.

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THE ROLE OF TEMPERAMENT

For older children, the journey through adoption and growth can be tough. How quickly each learns to speak and read English will depend upon many things including temperament, the home situation, how much Chinese she knows and her determination. Other factors include developmental delays and any learning disabilities.

"The older a child gets, the role of temperament plays a more important role in learning language," says Suzanne Flynn, Professor of Linguistics and Second Language Acquisition at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "It depends upon what the child's tolerance for ambiguity and frustration is." Although Flynn's research originally focused on adult language acquisition, most recently she has turned her research to second language acquisition in children whose first language is Chinese, Japanese or Spanish.

Finding out your child's tolerance and frustration level is the first important step to helping them learn to speak and read English. Parents must be careful not to push the child too much or extend the formal learning past the child's tolerance level. Any parent who has reached that level and pushed beyond it will tell you that it can be compared to beating one's head against a well-constructed block wall.

LEARNING AT THEIR OWN SPEED

Jayne Shnowske is the mother of five foreign-adopted children, including Steven, 7, and Kaidy, 6. Both children were adopted from China at about 6 years old. Jayne said she agrees that learning a child's temperament before delving into new language is essential.

"Don't worry so much about it in the beginning," she says. "Too many people make plans early on before meeting the kids and they really don't take the time to get to know them and feel out where they are and what their needs are, emotionally and academically. Chronologically they may be one age, but emotionally they may be younger."

Soon after arriving home with Steven, the Shnowskes realized that he was having trouble learning the basics. They later learned that Steven has an audio-processing problem, which explained his frustration and learning difficulties. Simply, when he hears a word or sound, he doesn't process it correctly in his brain, Jayne says. "When you watch him, you can see he is digesting it slowly."

Steven was enrolled in a computer-based language learning system called Fast Forward, offered by Pediatric Speech and Language Specialists in Phoenix. The system is designed for children with difficulties understanding, following directions, remembering and struggling with general auditory skills.

For Kaidy, the process has been easier. "Kaidy's comprehension is very good," she says. "She's doing very well with three-letter words. She has a better level of comprehension and she understands what's going on in the story where Steven may not."

Jayne said she believes that some of these differences can be attributed to living in an orphanage as a child. "I think a lot of this happens and you probably see this with kids in orphanages: They're attention span is so short," she says. "They are over stimulated by so much that they don't know how to focus on one thing. They miss parts of a story because they're looking at something else."

Martha Reading and her husband adopted their daughter, Emma, at 7 years old. She is now 9.5 years old. Their second daughter, also from China, was adopted at almost 6 years old. Annie is now 6.5 years old. The family lives in New Jersey.

Martha's girls came from very different backgrounds, and therefore their progress has been quite different, she says. "Emma was fully fluent in English by the fifth month on. We had her evaluated by the ESL teacher at their new school and she told my husband that Emma was so far beyond the material she had that we didn't have to worry about it with her. She's now in the third grade.

"With Annie, we don't know yet," she continued. "She came to us further behind than Emma, and much less mature. She comes from a good orphanage, but she didn't even know how to hold a pencil or draw a straight line."

While deciding whether to mainstream their girls into school or not (place them directly into a full-day, English-speaking class), the Readings did what many adoptive parents find helpful, they spoke with another family who had adopted older children. After many conversations with this family, the Readings took their advice and mainstreamed their kids into elementary school.

TOTAL IMMERSION OR NOT?

For most children, ESL (English as a Second Language) programs are available through public and some private schools. Taking advantage of those opportunities is important, as well as finding out how much help your child needs.

"Some children can be immersed in English with ESL support and that's fine," Prof. Flynn states. "Others may be frustrated by their inability to communicate and make themselves known. Those children would be better off with more support in Chinese while learning English."

But while some parents may choose to hire Chinese-speaking tutors to help their children, others rely on the school system and ESL programs. What approach to use depends upon the child and the resources available, but Prof. Flynn does make one point clear-learning Chinese and English during the same tutoring session is not desirable.

"I don't think that going back and forth in Chinese and English is a good idea," she says. "I think one language at a time is better. Switching back and forth in the same session makes it more difficult for the child to learn English. You're not providing enough of a constant input of the language for them to pick up the critical properties of the language."

Prof. Flynn adds that Chinese should not be excluded from the child's education, just separated from the English learning session. Some children may need more support in Chinese while others may not.

LET'S GET STARTED

So, how do we start? Prof. Flynn has found that three things must happen when learning a new language: establish structural parameters, learn the lexicons of the language and learn the idiosyncratic properties. In plain language: learn the building blocks of the language (subject, object, verb, etc.), learn the vocabulary and thirdly, learn the strange and unique properties of the language.

One important way to teach the above steps is simply to read, read, read. Parents of newborns and toddlers are aware of the importance of reading to their children, but parents of older children may not be aware that reading is just as important. "Give them as rich an oral and reading environment as possible," Prof. Flynn says. "And TV is not included in that."

Martha said she agrees with Prof. Flynn's advice about reading to children and also believes in teaching by example. "We read to them every day," she says. "I'm also an avid reader and they see me read all the time."

According to Prof. Flynn, Chinese children learning English as their second language have a distinct advantage over those starting with Japanese. The reason? It's all in the word order. "When possible, it seems that in the fundamental properties where you get the first and second language alike, people can move along the developmental curve a lot faster," she says. English word order is subject, verb, object and Japanese is subject, object, verb. In Chinese it's mixed with a word order like English, making it easier to learn English.

Parents can also use syntactic paraphrasing, which refers to paraphrasing what a child says in order to give them the vocabulary and structure of the language without outright correction. For example, when a child throws a ball and says, "I did it," the parent may say, "Yes, you threw the ball. Can you throw it again? Throw the ball to me." It sounds simple, but the child is learning the structure of the language through conversation. Many parents forget to use this simple exercise.

By correcting constantly, rather than letting the child get a good feel for the language first, that child's confidence may be broken, Prof. Flynn adds. Encouraging the child to talk as much as possible is the key, without too much correction of grammar or pronunciation in the beginning. "The acquisition has its own course and it's better to let them learn than to frustrate them by correcting too much."

But corrections are a part of learning, and Jayne says she and her husband believe in using continuous correction. "We talk very slowly, and it's important for people to realize that Steven has a cleft lip problem and that affects his speech," she says. "We make him talk slowly and if not, we make him repeat it. If you think they will eventually catch on without correcting them, they will just keep speaking that way such as saying sentences the wrong way. We correct it and make him say it correctly, over and over and over."

But although some kids may lose confidence, Steven doesn't seem to mind. "He doesn't get frustrated with that," Jayne says. "Whatever works for him, he will do it."

WORKING WITH TEACHERS

Unfortunately, parents must help their children not only to learn a new language, but also to have the self-confidence to believe that they are intelligent and will learn with practice. "I would make one thing clear-that language and intelligence are not correlated," Prof. Flynn says. "It helps to be an advocate for the child in school. Educators come to ideas about your child because of their reading ability." Therefore, parents need to keep educators aware of the special situation of their children.

For Martha, that situation became apparent with Emma's 2nd grade teacher. Although her teacher believed Emma needed additional help, Martha disagreed. "I didn't feel she did, but that the teacher's expectations were too high in thinking that she should be reading at or above the other students. I saw some slippage from the pressure on Emma's part and I told the teacher to lay off."

Advocating for continuous ESL instruction can also be a burden, but one that most parents find important. ESL instruction is a positive benefit for children, and the frequency with which a child will be offered the instruction depends upon the school district and availability of teachers. Some children may receive an hour or more per day, while others may receive as little as 15 minutes per week. Parents need to make teachers and schools aware of its importance and fight for as much as possible.

Another dilemma most parents of older adopted kids will face is deciding on the grade to enter. For some, starting right into the child's chronological grade is the right choice. For others, starting out slow is the answer. Martha chose to start both her children in lower grades than their ages would require, as did Jayne. "At 9 and a half years old, Emma is in with kids who are one and a half years younger than she is. She fits in with her friends' maturity level and that works well." Emma started Kindergarten at 7.

LEARNING QUICKLY

And don't be alarmed if a child may understand what you say, but not be able to respond. A child's comprehension of a new language will outspeed her production of language in the beginning. That's expected. For most new parents, the speed with which children understand English is often amazing. Many parents report that their children learn to understand simple English instructions within the first few weeks.

But reading a new language is another story. Comprehension of words and phrases, spoken and read, can be difficult for a child to grasp at first.

"I wish I had understood better about the time lag between verbal and reading comprehension," Martha says. "We were so ignorant about it and so impressed with how quickly Emma spoke English and made herself understood that it was astonishing to us."

Parents may be disappointed by their child's inability to comprehend simple sentences after watching a meteoric rise in language ability. "We were fooled by her spoken capabilities," Martha adds. "So this year I struggled with her as she read the instructions on her homework and didn't understand it. I thought maybe she was a lazy student, but that wasn't the issue."

CHINESE SCHOOL OR NOT?

A stumbling block in the education of many Chinese adopted children is the level of education they received while in China. Experts agree that having the basic reading and writing tools in one language facilitates easier learning of a second language. Having a child evaluated in her first language will give educators an idea of how much Chinese she had learned and where to go from there.

And speaking of Chinese, should your child continue the language? Most new parents find this issue a tough one. For some, learning English is enough for their children--Chinese will come later. For others, the idea of letting their child lose their first language seems wrong. Learning a second language at a young age is important and easier in the long run, but if that language is lost, the child may have a greater capacity to learn again at a later age.

Should an older child continue her Chinese language education? It requires more work with the child and more homework, something parents may be struggling with already. Some children are also reluctant to continue speaking Chinese. And if parents do not speak Chinese or have Chinese-speaking friends and associates, with whom will their children practice Chinese? All these issues need to be addressed.

And of course, temperament plays a big part in this equation, too. If a child refuses to attend Chinese language school, or is having too much difficulty learning English, some parents may believe that one issue at a time is enough.

But continuing the first language is not a burden on their learning ability, Prof. Flynn says. "The human brain is unique in being able to learn multiple languages and keep them. It knows that this is English and this is Chinese," she says. "If you have a child who is bilingual, you are at an advantage to do abstractions than are children who are monolingual. This way sometimes they are even better at math and engineering."

BOTTOM LINE

The bottom line for most parents is that children are different and learn at different speeds. Assuming that a child is at a certain level of reading or language capability based upon their age is a mistake. Some children may be both emotionally and academically way behind their peers, while others may catch up with amazing speed. Therefore, getting to know your child and working closely with her is the best way to help her English acquisition.

Take time to observe how your child learns. Is she more comfortable sitting at a table and reading, or is she more apt to play games and learn in a more relaxed atmosphere? Is her attention span short or long? How long do you have before she drowns you out? Is she eager to learn or is she struggling with other things? Many more issues may be involved before the learning style of a child is revealed. Some children may actually "bluff" their way through many school exercises in order to fit in and not disappoint their teachers or parents.

Consult with professionals if you feel your child may have a learning disability or may be struggling too much. Although not all children who struggle to learn English have a learning disability, there are those that may have a problem that without detection may hinder their language acquisition. Unless you are a trained professional, it is very hard to pinpoint areas of difficulty that may benefit from extra help.

With the immense changes these children endure over such a short period of time, the rapid speed at which most of them learn a new language is staggering. Ultimately, it is each parent who must decide what is best for each child.

Valerie A.M. Demetros and her husband, Jim, are the proud parents of two Chinese adopted children: Amy, 9, and Julie Anna, 4. They also share their home with a cantankerous old poodle, and a big, goofy golden retriever (but aren't they all?)

Resources

Internet:

AOK (Adopting Older Kids) Internet discussion group. To subscribe, go to www.eGroups.com/group/aok-china/

FCC (Families with Children from China) www.catalog.com/fwcfc/

PAC (Post-adopt Chinese group, for parents who have already adopted from China) e-mail listserve, see FCC website for information to subscribe.

APC (Adoptive Parents of Chinese Children, for those who are waiting to adopt, and have already adopted) e-mail listserve, see FCC website for information to subscribe.

Rainbow Kids (an Internet adoption magazine with monthly articles on adoption, adopting older children and a waiting list of older children) www.rainbowkids.com

Books and magazines

"Are Those Kids Yours?": American Families with Children Adopted from Other Countries, by Cherie Register

Toddler Adoption: The Weaver's Craft, by Mary Hopkins-Best

Adopting Older Children, by Alfred Kadushin

Adopting the Older Child, by Claudia L. Jewett

Being Adopted: The Lifelong Search for Self, by David Brodzinsky

The Chosen Child magazine, $21/year, to order online and sample article, www.adopting.org/AdoptionToday.

Roots and Wings magazine, $21.95/year, to order online- www.adopt-usa.com/rootsandwings. Or by mail- Roots and Wings, PO Box 577, Hackettstown, NJ 07840.

Credits: Valerie A. M. Demetros