Myths And Misconceptions About Second Language Learning

Contemporary teachers are facing a challenge in teaching English as a second language at school, and thus there comes a need for them to familiarize themselves with how SLA functions for children. Eric Digests.org. offers an overview on Barry McLaughlin’s article “Myths and Misconceptions about Second Language Learning: What Every Teacher Needs to Unlearn,” which deals with five commonly held myths and misconceptions about children and second language learning while giving practical instructions for classroom teachers. While I agree with most of the myths presented, there is one point that is slightly contradictory to what I have learned in our textbook. Also, though the digest presents the original arguments fairly enough, the way the author

The first myth hypothesizes that children learn second languages quicker and easier than adult and adolescent learners, which gives birth to the second myth that the younger one is involved in L2 learning, the better learner he or she will become. However, research has proved that except for pronunciation, older learners have an advantage over child learners in other linguistic performances. Also, learners who starts L2 learning late are proved to perform as well as or even better than early learners. Teachers should not ignore the potential inhabitations and difficulties children could face during the process of L2 learning. The third myth explores the relation between home language and second language, contending that children from non-English-speaking backgrounds learn English best when putting in an all-English environment. Nonetheless, studies indicate that an increase exposure to English does not speed up the acquisition, and the support of home language is beneficial to other academic performances. Teachers have false belief that oral proficiency implies proficiency in the more complex academic language. Overly underestimating the complexities of

The first two misconceptions stem from the “critical period hypothesis,” which, from the aspect of second language acquisition, concludes that older learners may have a noticeable accent in the spoken language. During the discussion of the first misconception, the author denies the myth that second language learning is easier for children than for adults, contending that older learners are more developed and experienced in learning features of a second language and that “pronunciation” is the only exception in which younger learners might better older learners. Moving on to the second myth, the author then provides some studies which overthrew the myth that the earlier children begin to learn a second language, the better. However, he acknowledges that early exposure to L2 learning can make “a long sequence of instruction leading to potential communicative proficiency possible” to “foreign” language learners, stressing that there is a difference between second language learning (ESL instruction) and foreign language learning. How can early exposure to L2 learning affect only phonological development for ESL learners but not the rest of the linguistic features? Patkowski once conducted an experiment on the relationship between age and linguistic features, excluding phonological development, hypothesizing that even if accent were ignored, only those who had