Good thing so many of us are learning Chinese!
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from http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/31/science/31conversation.html?_r=2&src=me&ref=general
he Bilingual Advantage
By CLAUDIA DREIFUS
Published: May 30, 2011
A cognitive neuroscientist, Ellen Bialystok has spent almost 40 years learning about how bilingualism sharpens the mind. Her good news: Among other benefits, the regular use of two languages appears to delay the onset of Alzheimer’s disease symptoms. Dr. Bialystok, 62, a distinguished research professor of psychology at York University in Toronto, was awarded a $100,000 Killam Prize last year for her contributions to social science. We spoke for two hours in a Washington hotel room in February and again, more recently, by telephone. An edited version of the two conversations follows.
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Chris Young for The New York Times
MENTAL WORKOUT Ellen Bialystok with a neuroimaging electrode cap.
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Q. How did you begin studying bilingualism?
A. You know, I didn’t start trying to find out whether bilingualism was bad or good. I did my doctorate in psychology: on how children acquire language. When I finished graduate school, in 1976, there was a job shortage in Canada for Ph.D.’s. The only position I found was with a research project studying second language acquisition in school children. It wasn’t my area. But it was close enough.
As a psychologist, I brought neuroscience questions to the study, like “How does the acquisition of a second language change thought?” It was these types of questions that naturally led to the bilingualism research. The way research works is, it takes you down a road. You then follow that road.
Q. So what exactly did you find on this unexpected road?
A. As we did our research, you could see there was a big difference in the way monolingual and bilingual children processed language. We found that if you gave 5- and 6-year-olds language problems to solve, monolingual and bilingual children knew, pretty much, the same amount of language.
But on one question, there was a difference. We asked all the children if a certain illogical sentence was grammatically correct: “Apples grow on noses.” The monolingual children couldn’t answer. They’d say, “That’s silly” and they’d stall. But the bilingual children would say, in their own words, “It’s silly, but it’s grammatically correct.” The bilinguals, we found, manifested a cognitive system with the ability to attend to important information and ignore the less important.
Q. How does this work — do you understand it?
A. Yes. There’s a system in your brain, the executive control system. It’s a general manager. Its job is to keep you focused on what is relevant, while ignoring distractions. It’s what makes it possible for you to hold two different things in your mind at one time and switch between them.
If you have two languages and you use them regularly, the way the brain’s networks work is that every time you speak, both languages pop up and the executive control system has to sort through everything and attend to what’s relevant in the moment. Therefore the bilinguals use that system more, and it’s that regular use that makes that system more efficient.
Q. One of your most startling recent findings is that bilingualism helps forestall the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease. How did you come to learn this?
A. We did two kinds of studies. In the first, published in 2004, we found that normally aging bilinguals had better cognitive functioning than normally aging monolinguals. Bilingual older adults performed better than monolingual older adults on executive control tasks. That was very impressive because it didn’t have to be that way. It could have turned out that everybody just lost function equally as they got older.
That evidence made us look at people who didn’t have normal cognitive function. In our next studies , we looked at the medical records of 400 Alzheimer’s patients. On average, the bilinguals showed Alzheimer’s symptoms five or six years later than those who spoke only one language. This didn’t mean that the bilinguals didn’t have Alzheimer’s. It meant that as the disease took root in their brains, they were able to continue functioning at a higher level. They could cope with the disease for longer.
Q. So high school French is useful for something other than ordering a special meal in a restaurant?
A. Sorry, no. You have to use both languages all the time. You won’t get the bilingual benefit from occasional use.
Q. One would think bilingualism might help with multitasking — does it?
A. Yes, multitasking is one of the things the executive control system handles. We wondered, “Are bilinguals better at multitasking?” So we put monolinguals and bilinguals into a driving simulator. Through headphones, we gave them extra tasks to do — as if they were driving and talking on cellphones. We then measured how much worse their driving got. Now, everybody’s driving got worse. But the bilinguals, their driving didn’t drop as much. Because adding on another task while trying to concentrate on a driving problem, that’s what bilingualism gives you — though I wouldn’t advise doing this.
Q. Has the development of new neuroimaging technologies changed your work?
A. Tremendously. It used to be that we could only see what parts of the brain lit up when our subjects performed different tasks. Now, with the new technologies, we can see how all the brain structures work in accord with each other.
In terms of monolinguals and bilinguals, the big thing that we have found is that the connections are different. So we have monolinguals solving a problem, and they use X systems, but when bilinguals solve the same problem, they use others. One of the things we’ve seen is that on certain kinds of even nonverbal tests, bilingual people are faster. Why? Well, when we look in their brains through neuroimaging, it appears like they’re using a different kind of a network that might include language centers to solve a completely nonverbal problem. Their whole brain appears to rewire because of bilingualism.
Q. Bilingualism used to be considered a negative thing — at least in the United States. Is it still?
A. Until about the 1960s, the conventional wisdom was that bilingualism was a disadvantage. Some of this was xenophobia. Thanks to science, we now know that the opposite is true.
Q. Many immigrants choose not to teach their children their native language. Is this a good thing?
A. I’m asked about this all the time. People e-mail me and say, “I’m getting married to someone from another culture, what should we do with the children?” I always say, “You’re sitting on a potential gift.”
There are two major reasons people should pass their heritage language onto children. First, it connects children to their ancestors. The second is my research: Bilingualism is good for you. It makes brains stronger. It is brain exercise.
Q. Are you bilingual?
A. Well, I have fully bilingual grandchildren because my daughter married a Frenchman. When my daughter announced her engagement to her French boyfriend, we were a little surprised. It’s always astonishing when your child announces she’s getting married. She said, “But Mom, it’ll be fine, our children will be bilingual!”
A version of this interview appeared in print on May 31, 2011, on page D2 of the New York edition with the headline: A Conversation With | Ellen Bialystok.
Showing posts with label bi-lingual students. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bi-lingual students. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Growing Diversity Fuels Chinese School
The bi-lingual CAIS school in San Francisco uses many of the tools and teaching methods that are used at the Chinese Language School of Connecticut.
For more info on ways to engage your children in learning Chinese please visit: www.ChineseLanguageSchool.org
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704461304576216613309652724.html?mod=wsj_share_facebook
By YUKARI IWATANI KANE
San Francisco's Chinese American International School has long had a reputation for strong academics, but it has grown more popular as a rising number of non-Chinese parents bank on Chinese-language skills for their children's future.
Lianne Milton for The Wall Street Journal
First-grader Martha Chessen gets help from instructor Xiu Geng in a math-in-Mandarin class at the Chinese American International School, where a growing number of students come from non-Chinese backgrounds.
When Christine Chessen decided to send her oldest child to CAIS eight years ago, her blond-haired daughter stood out among the sea of mostly Asian or half-Asian children. Her stock-trader husband opposed the idea, and friends thought she was crazy.
She went ahead and enrolled her daughter, because she wanted to expose her to a completely different culture. The move made sense to Ms. Chessen when she learned that there are more native speakers of Chinese in the world than those whose mother tongue is English or Spanish.
These days, her daughter isn't so unusual at CAIS, a private school that instructs in both Mandarin and English from pre-kindergarten through eighth grade.
"With the rise of Asia, people are finally jumping on the bandwagon," said Ms. Chessen, a stay-at-home mom who now has all three of her children—a first-, fourth- and sixth-grader—enrolled in the school. Her children, she said, are growing up singing Chinese songs, playing Chinese instruments and learning Chinese calligraphy, which she said she now considers all "part of our culture."
A recent survey by the school found that CAIS's non-Asian population has grown 42% over the past decade and currently makes up 27% of its 472 students. The remainder are children with partial or full Asian backgrounds, though most come from non-Chinese-speaking families.
Even though the school has increased its overall student population by 35% since 2000, it continues to be difficult to get into. More than 100 families vied for the 25 to 30 pre-K spots available next year. In the lower grades, instruction is half in Chinese, half in English; in middle school, which starts with grade six, 35% is in Chinese. The day school, in Hayes Valley, costs about $22,000 a year.
CAIS's growth is part of a nationwide trend as China's rise in the global economy prompts parents to seek Chinese-language instruction for their children—including President Barack Obama, whose daughter Sasha is learning Mandarin.
The San Francisco Unified Public School District said Chinese, including the Mandarin and Cantonese dialects, was the most requested language program by parents of kindergartners after Spanish for the next academic year. There are several public Chinese schools in San Francisco, and a new Chinese-language charter school is set to open in the Oakland area in the fall.
While there are no overall figures on how many students take Chinese-language classes nationwide, the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages said it saw a threefold increase in the number of public-school students taking such classes to 60,000 in the 2007-08 academic year from three years earlier.
Programs like CAIS's carry little risk, said Marty Abbott, director of education at ACTFL, because even those students who spend their entire day in another language eventually catch up to and might even surpass their peers in English-language skills.
"The beauty of immersion programs, whether they're partial or full, is that students spend a considerable amount of time hearing the language and develop it and use it," Ms. Abbott said.
At CAIS one recent afternoon, a Chinese-speaking teacher led a kindergarten class in a game. The children sat in a circle around a collection of sea animal toys and tried to guess which were each other's favorites by asking questions in Mandarin.
On other floors, a fourth-grade class took an English spelling test while a group of seventh-graders practiced playing the Chinese yue qin guitar and the zither-like guzheng in a music class.
Tzara Geraghty, a tall, 13-year-old eighth-grader, plays the yangzin, a Chinese dulcimer, in a Chinese music ensemble, loves to eat tangyuan (dumplings made of rice flour with red bean, sesame and peanut butter fillings) and is looking forward to a coming school trip to Beijing.
Tzara, who has been at CAIS since pre-kindergarten, said she didn't realize she was Caucasian until she grew much taller than her classmates in fourth grade. "I never felt like I was different," said Tzara, who also plays volleyball, basketball and soccer.
For parents and teachers, it's a slightly different matter. Jeff Bissell, the head of the school, said the greater number of non-Asian families has prompted CAIS to adopt the more collaborative American educational approach along with the traditional top-down Chinese style.
Even then, there are challenges, because teachers are dealing with parents and students who are unfamiliar with Chinese teaching methods, such as the rote memorization required to learn the written script.
"Ten years ago, I could demonstrate how to write a character and make sure students got it, but now we have to break down the steps more," said Kevin Chang, the lower school's director.
Last year, the Parent Association took an extra step, holding a Mandarin 101 class for parents for the first time. The goal was not to teach Chinese but to familiarize parents with how the language works so they could understand what their children were learning.
Ms. Chessen said she values the school's lessons. "What my kids have learned about the Chinese culture they apply to the rest of the world," she said. "It makes us feel like we're part of a bigger community."
Write to Yukari Iwatani Kane at yukari.iwatani@wsj.com
For more info on ways to engage your children in learning Chinese please visit: www.ChineseLanguageSchool.org
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704461304576216613309652724.html?mod=wsj_share_facebook
By YUKARI IWATANI KANE
San Francisco's Chinese American International School has long had a reputation for strong academics, but it has grown more popular as a rising number of non-Chinese parents bank on Chinese-language skills for their children's future.
Lianne Milton for The Wall Street Journal
First-grader Martha Chessen gets help from instructor Xiu Geng in a math-in-Mandarin class at the Chinese American International School, where a growing number of students come from non-Chinese backgrounds.
When Christine Chessen decided to send her oldest child to CAIS eight years ago, her blond-haired daughter stood out among the sea of mostly Asian or half-Asian children. Her stock-trader husband opposed the idea, and friends thought she was crazy.
She went ahead and enrolled her daughter, because she wanted to expose her to a completely different culture. The move made sense to Ms. Chessen when she learned that there are more native speakers of Chinese in the world than those whose mother tongue is English or Spanish.
These days, her daughter isn't so unusual at CAIS, a private school that instructs in both Mandarin and English from pre-kindergarten through eighth grade.
"With the rise of Asia, people are finally jumping on the bandwagon," said Ms. Chessen, a stay-at-home mom who now has all three of her children—a first-, fourth- and sixth-grader—enrolled in the school. Her children, she said, are growing up singing Chinese songs, playing Chinese instruments and learning Chinese calligraphy, which she said she now considers all "part of our culture."
A recent survey by the school found that CAIS's non-Asian population has grown 42% over the past decade and currently makes up 27% of its 472 students. The remainder are children with partial or full Asian backgrounds, though most come from non-Chinese-speaking families.
Even though the school has increased its overall student population by 35% since 2000, it continues to be difficult to get into. More than 100 families vied for the 25 to 30 pre-K spots available next year. In the lower grades, instruction is half in Chinese, half in English; in middle school, which starts with grade six, 35% is in Chinese. The day school, in Hayes Valley, costs about $22,000 a year.
CAIS's growth is part of a nationwide trend as China's rise in the global economy prompts parents to seek Chinese-language instruction for their children—including President Barack Obama, whose daughter Sasha is learning Mandarin.
The San Francisco Unified Public School District said Chinese, including the Mandarin and Cantonese dialects, was the most requested language program by parents of kindergartners after Spanish for the next academic year. There are several public Chinese schools in San Francisco, and a new Chinese-language charter school is set to open in the Oakland area in the fall.
While there are no overall figures on how many students take Chinese-language classes nationwide, the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages said it saw a threefold increase in the number of public-school students taking such classes to 60,000 in the 2007-08 academic year from three years earlier.
Programs like CAIS's carry little risk, said Marty Abbott, director of education at ACTFL, because even those students who spend their entire day in another language eventually catch up to and might even surpass their peers in English-language skills.
"The beauty of immersion programs, whether they're partial or full, is that students spend a considerable amount of time hearing the language and develop it and use it," Ms. Abbott said.
At CAIS one recent afternoon, a Chinese-speaking teacher led a kindergarten class in a game. The children sat in a circle around a collection of sea animal toys and tried to guess which were each other's favorites by asking questions in Mandarin.
On other floors, a fourth-grade class took an English spelling test while a group of seventh-graders practiced playing the Chinese yue qin guitar and the zither-like guzheng in a music class.
Tzara Geraghty, a tall, 13-year-old eighth-grader, plays the yangzin, a Chinese dulcimer, in a Chinese music ensemble, loves to eat tangyuan (dumplings made of rice flour with red bean, sesame and peanut butter fillings) and is looking forward to a coming school trip to Beijing.
Tzara, who has been at CAIS since pre-kindergarten, said she didn't realize she was Caucasian until she grew much taller than her classmates in fourth grade. "I never felt like I was different," said Tzara, who also plays volleyball, basketball and soccer.
For parents and teachers, it's a slightly different matter. Jeff Bissell, the head of the school, said the greater number of non-Asian families has prompted CAIS to adopt the more collaborative American educational approach along with the traditional top-down Chinese style.
Even then, there are challenges, because teachers are dealing with parents and students who are unfamiliar with Chinese teaching methods, such as the rote memorization required to learn the written script.
"Ten years ago, I could demonstrate how to write a character and make sure students got it, but now we have to break down the steps more," said Kevin Chang, the lower school's director.
Last year, the Parent Association took an extra step, holding a Mandarin 101 class for parents for the first time. The goal was not to teach Chinese but to familiarize parents with how the language works so they could understand what their children were learning.
Ms. Chessen said she values the school's lessons. "What my kids have learned about the Chinese culture they apply to the rest of the world," she said. "It makes us feel like we're part of a bigger community."
Write to Yukari Iwatani Kane at yukari.iwatani@wsj.com
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