Comments on: The mind of a three year old http://italychronicles.com/the-mind-of-a-three-year-old/ Life in the Living Museum Sat, 11 Feb 2012 15:30:06 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Alexhttp://italychronicles.com/the-mind-of-a-three-year-old/#comment-646 Alex Mon, 30 Oct 2006 23:25:25 +0000 http://italychronicles.com/?p=384#comment-646 a.c.t. - we do not come to the UK that often - which will slow my son down a bit, I know. Your point about knowing the meaning of lyrics is a good one. If he thinks English is cool, the he won't have a problem progressing, that's for sure. There's nothing like a little motivation to get people learning. Thanks for giving me that point of view :-) a.c.t. – we do not come to the UK that often – which will slow my son down a bit, I know. Your point about knowing the meaning of lyrics is a good one. If he thinks English is cool, the he won’t have a problem progressing, that’s for sure. There’s nothing like a little motivation to get people learning. Thanks for giving me that point of view :-)

]]> By: a.c.t.http://italychronicles.com/the-mind-of-a-three-year-old/#comment-644 a.c.t. Mon, 30 Oct 2006 11:44:36 +0000 http://italychronicles.com/?p=384#comment-644 By the way, I forgot to say, if he understands you when you speak to him in English, at least he's learning it even if he doesn't reply in English. Wait until he's a bit older and starts getting into music, he'll thank you for teaching him English - he'll be the cool kid at school who everyone envies for knowing what all the lyrics mean. By the way, I forgot to say, if he understands you when you speak to him in English, at least he’s learning it even if he doesn’t reply in English. Wait until he’s a bit older and starts getting into music, he’ll thank you for teaching him English – he’ll be the cool kid at school who everyone envies for knowing what all the lyrics mean.

]]> By: a.c.t.http://italychronicles.com/the-mind-of-a-three-year-old/#comment-641 a.c.t. Mon, 30 Oct 2006 11:42:20 +0000 http://italychronicles.com/?p=384#comment-641 How often to you come back to the UK?I was brought up in the UK and my Italian Mother spoke to me in English at home. I did however learn to speak Italian fluently just through yearly visits to my family in Italy and then later on I had Italian lessons to learn how to write. How often to you come back to the UK?

I was brought up in the UK and my Italian Mother spoke to me in English at home. I did however learn to speak Italian fluently just through yearly visits to my family in Italy and then later on I had Italian lessons to learn how to write.

]]> By: Alexhttp://italychronicles.com/the-mind-of-a-three-year-old/#comment-645 Alex Mon, 30 Oct 2006 10:48:00 +0000 http://italychronicles.com/?p=384#comment-645 Hi Jan,Yes, we should try to compromise - but it is not easy when your child starts balling and everyone ends up feeling irritable, I can tell you. As for mixing up the two languages, upon reflection, I think this is possibly quite natural - I do it sometimes. The areas of the brain which control language appear to be divided into separate sections - one for language 1 and one for language 2 etc - a bit like the partitions on a hard disk, only, as on one hard disk, both languages are located in the same brain and at times information from the two seems to overlap or become mixed up, so you get a language 1 sentence spoken with the structure of language 2 and vice versa. I find the mental processes involved in the acquisition of languages quite fascinating, but I just don't know enough about how exactly we learn languages to understand just how the brain does what it does, if you follow me. Knowledge of the functioning of the brain is growing every day, but as yet we don't seem to know much about its inner-workings. One day we will and, possibly, we will be able to plug ourselves into some device and have language knowledge implanted in our brains. Sci-fi, I know, but then a lot of what was sci-fi in the past is real now. It will happen, but not while I'm still around;-) - Maybe you will be lucky!Alex Hi Jan,

Yes, we should try to compromise – but it is not easy when your child starts balling and everyone ends up feeling irritable, I can tell you. As for mixing up the two languages, upon reflection, I think this is possibly quite natural – I do it sometimes. The areas of the brain which control language appear to be divided into separate sections – one for language 1 and one for language 2 etc – a bit like the partitions on a hard disk, only, as on one hard disk, both languages are located in the same brain and at times information from the two seems to overlap or become mixed up, so you get a language 1 sentence spoken with the structure of language 2 and vice versa.
I find the mental processes involved in the acquisition of languages quite fascinating, but I just don’t know enough about how exactly we learn languages to understand just how the brain does what it does, if you follow me. Knowledge of the functioning of the brain is growing every day, but as yet we don’t seem to know much about its inner-workings. One day we will and, possibly, we will be able to plug ourselves into some device and have language knowledge implanted in our brains. Sci-fi, I know, but then a lot of what was sci-fi in the past is real now. It will happen, but not while I’m still around;-) – Maybe you will be lucky!

Alex

]]> By: My son Blog Digest - The mind of a three year oldhttp://italychronicles.com/the-mind-of-a-three-year-old/#comment-642 My son Blog Digest - The mind of a three year old Sat, 28 Oct 2006 09:52:36 +0000 http://italychronicles.com/?p=384#comment-642 [...] ">The mind of a three year old I'm a little depressed today. Weather is bad. I just hanging around net and found this: My little one asked me, in Italian, why I don't speak to him in Italian.  I replied that it was because I am English and that it is important and useful for him to know another language.  He seemed to accept this, but his progress with English is not promising, not to me, at least.  I guess that is down to his living here and being surrounded by all things Italian.  He is now insisting on seeing all films in Italian, not in English, which is a problem because it means that his exposure to English will be limited to the words he hears from little old me.  Not that I don't speak to him, ... I'll keep searching for more interesting materialsLink to original article [...] [...] “>The mind of a three year old I’m a little depressed today. Weather is bad. I just hanging around net and found this: My little one asked me, in Italian, why I don’t speak to him in Italian.  I replied that it was because I am English and that it is important and useful for him to know another language.  He seemed to accept this, but his progress with English is not promising, not to me, at least.  I guess that is down to his living here and being surrounded by all things Italian.  He is now insisting on seeing all films in Italian, not in English, which is a problem because it means that his exposure to English will be limited to the words he hears from little old me.  Not that I don’t speak to him, … I’ll keep searching for more interesting materialsLink to original article [...]

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