Bilingual Buds NYC » Approach

Why Immersion?

admin — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 19:56:06 +0000

Immersion has been shown to be the most effective way to learn a foreign language, even for children. As a result, we provide a high quality immersion environment with sufficient hours to enable a child without language support at home to develop the foundation to becoming bilingual. Even a child without prior exposure to the language will become comfortable in an immersion environment through our use of gestures, context clues and visual support. The result is that students feel safe and comfortable challenging themselves using the language. Language is used as a medium for learning subject content such as math and science or PE and fine arts. Through this process students are also able to think abstractly, creatively and focus selectively – all a result of the process of learning two languages simultaneously.

Why Start Early?

admin — Tue, 26 May 2009 19:16:45 +0000

•   To take advantage of the critical language learning window which experts believe is from birth to 10 years of age.
•   To be able to speak without an accent. In the first five years of life, children are able to distinguish fine differences in sounds outside that of their native language.
•   So that children are more naturally interested in the vocabulary building blocks normally taught at that age (colors, family members etc).

Key Benefits to Being Bilingual

admin — Tue, 26 May 2009 18:14:43 +0000

•   Enhanced cognitive skills
•   Better understanding of language structure
•   Broader cultural context
•   Enhanced self esteem

Articles for more information

admin — Tue, 26 May 2009 17:16:07 +0000

Read articles written by researchers on various aspects of cognition and bilingualism.

Bilingualism is Great for the Brain, by Judy Foreman, lecturer at Harvard University – Studies suggest that from an early age, bilingual people are better able to deal with abstraction, ignore misleading information, filter out distractions and switch back and forth between tasks which may be helpful in school. (see full article)

Cognitive Advantages of Balanced Bilingualism – This article reviews the myths and debate about raising children to be bilingual, the cognitive advantages of learning a second language and the interrelationship which facilitates the learning of the two languages together. (see full article)

Why, How and When Should My Child Hear a Second Language? by Kathleen Marcos, the Center for Applied Linguistics in Washington, D.C. (see full article)

Bilingual Kids Not Slowed by Second Tongue in Science (see full article)

Foreign Languages Fade in Class–Except Chinese. This article appeared in the Education section of The New York Times on January 20, 2010. Thousands of public schools stopped teaching foreign languages in the last decade. However a contrary trend has educators abuzz: a rush by schools to offer Chinese. (see full article)