Is It Too Late to Try?
Wednesday, June 21, 2006 by yish
' The language of the moment is Chinese, and the expert advice is depressingly similar. If you didn't start speaking Mandarin while you were in diapers, it's highly unlikely you'll ever be mistaken for a Beijinger. The U.S. State Department's Foreign Service Institute ranks Mandarin as one of five "exceptionally difficult" languages (the others are Arabic, Cantonese, Japanese and Korean).The average English speaker requires 2,200 class hours to reach proficiency, according to the Foreign Service Institute. That's more than three times the amount of time needed to master French or Spanish. If you could somehow make learning Chinese your 40-hours-a-week job, it would take you nearly 13 months—and forget about technological shortcuts. "Computerized language-learning programs and materials have helped marginally," says John Berninghausen, professor of Chinese at Middlebury College in Vermont. "But there are, at least thus far, no magic bullets." '
' It's not just Chinese that vexes us. Our ability to effortlessly absorb a new language—any new language—begins to decline by age six, according to Robert DeKeyser, a professor of second-language acquisition at the University of Maryland. By the time we are 16, we have lost just about all hope of being able to speak a second language without a telltale accent, DeKeyser says. The reasons why children have a remarkable capacity to absorb new languages that adults generally lack are unclear. Some researchers studying the brain believe the answer may lie in a fundamental process by which grey matter develops. As we age, nerve fibers in our brain become sheathed in a protective coating made of fats and proteins. This coating, called myelin, boosts the speed of signals moving through the brain, but it also limits the potential for new connections. "It's as if you have a lot of tracks where people walked around the countryside and somebody came down and put asphalt on them," says Mike Long, who also teaches second-language acquisition at the University of Maryland. "Those roads are stronger and better, but they also limit possibility." In other words, adults find it difficult to alter the way they communicate because they become wired for their native tongue. '
haha. seriously out of the 5, i noe one and had tried to learn other 3. but thank gdness i tried learning canto at 13, jap from 15. um. nevermind korean.
full text at http://www.time.com/time/asia/covers/501060626/language.html
' It's not just Chinese that vexes us. Our ability to effortlessly absorb a new language—any new language—begins to decline by age six, according to Robert DeKeyser, a professor of second-language acquisition at the University of Maryland. By the time we are 16, we have lost just about all hope of being able to speak a second language without a telltale accent, DeKeyser says. The reasons why children have a remarkable capacity to absorb new languages that adults generally lack are unclear. Some researchers studying the brain believe the answer may lie in a fundamental process by which grey matter develops. As we age, nerve fibers in our brain become sheathed in a protective coating made of fats and proteins. This coating, called myelin, boosts the speed of signals moving through the brain, but it also limits the potential for new connections. "It's as if you have a lot of tracks where people walked around the countryside and somebody came down and put asphalt on them," says Mike Long, who also teaches second-language acquisition at the University of Maryland. "Those roads are stronger and better, but they also limit possibility." In other words, adults find it difficult to alter the way they communicate because they become wired for their native tongue. '
haha. seriously out of the 5, i noe one and had tried to learn other 3. but thank gdness i tried learning canto at 13, jap from 15. um. nevermind korean.
full text at http://www.time.com/time/asia/covers/501060626/language.html