Re: History of French

From: Peter T. Daniels (grammatim_at_worldnet.att.net)
Date: 09/17/04 

Date: Fri, 17 Sep 2004 15:43:30 GMT

Herman Rubin wrote:
>
> In article <414A44CC.B0@worldnet.att.net>,
> Peter T. Daniels <grammatim@worldnet.att.net> wrote:

> >> >If adults could absorb languages like children, there WOULD BE NO
> >> >FOREIGN-LANGUAGE INSTRUCTION, whether in public schools, private
> >> >schools, or tutorial situations.
>
> >> So why do we have children take courses in "English" or
> >> "language arts" every year of their schooling?
>
> >In order to learn the arts or skills of interpreting literature and
> >maybe even doing creative writing. Neither of which is important to
> >society generally.
>
> I suggest in that case it be dropped, and basic mathematics
> and science, which are not taught, replace them.

Ok by me.

Though I managed to have both four years of English and four years of
sciences in high school.

> >> >> > If adults could learn languages like children, there'd be no
> >> >> > need for language-teachers ...
>
> >> Several years of little more? Who is going to spend that
> >> much time on it?
>
> >> >> They _can_ ... but they just don't have the time.
>
> >> >Some people have the time and the will, and cannot do it.
>
> >> Nobody is willing to crawl when running is possible.
>
> >Hunh? ESL is "running," and an infant mastering a language in a few
> >years is "crawling"? The tortoise really does arrive before the hare!
> >(or Achilles.)
>
> Possibly ESL as NOW done is very slow, but this was not
> the case in the massive immigration period. Both of my
> parents were immigrants, and the night schools were set
> up to get the immigrants to be "up to snuff" in a year
> or two. My father found this to be far too slow.

How old were they when they came?

The vast majority of immigrant _adults_, whatever their native language,
learn little or no English; their grandchildren are usually monolingual
and only as adults regret that they didn't learn their grandparents'
language when they could. 

-- 
Peter T. Daniels                       grammatim@att.net

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