Quote:
Originally Posted by Apteryx
IceCreamKid hits it on the head - was this actually Chinese/Japanese, that is to say, was the relative able to communicate with Chinese/Japanese speakers in their own language? Linguistic research has shown that young children who watch TV in a foreign language don't acquire the language, as opposed to, for instance, children who have a babysitter or au pair who interact with them in a foreign language. Interaction and/or conscious volition are key: you don't learn a language well enough to communicate unless you either interact in it or else are consciously trying to acquire it (when you watch a film with subtitles, for instance.)
Magic or spiritual influences are a different matter, which (unlike the linguistics issue) I'm not competent to comment on.
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I would love to read any of that research you wrote of. I know many elementary students that have learned french and spanich from sesame street and other childrens shows, they come to the crisis center and are able to converse fully with my french and spanish speaking co workers. we also have two spanish speaking 7th graders that have never taken any spanish classes and do not have any spanish speaking relatives, they learned the language on sesame street. they are helping the crisis center get their class up to speed in spanish, for a couple of children going through the adoption process with a family in the area so that these mexican children will be able to fit in with their peers better.
I also deal with many children of many nationalities and languages. Right now Im very interested in anything about children and languages and how they learn it and would love to also read the other side of this language issue.