While the percentage of secondary schools teaching foreign language remains stable, the number of pre-schools and elementary schools with foreign language programs is on the rise. The growing interest in learning foreign languages at an early age is not surprising. Many studies have shown that there are educational and social advantages of being bilingual and multilingual. Educate America Act. Language experts say that timing is very important in children s ability to acquire foreign language skills.
Children have the natural ability to develop new language skills more naturally than do adults.
This natural capacity diminishes by age 6 and disappears by puberty. Recent brain research studies show that the brain develops the most in the first three years of a person s life. Exposing your children to another language actually stimulates their brain cells. Studies have shown that multilingual children have stronger problem solving and analytical skills than monolingual children. Multilingual children are more creative than monolingual children because they have learned that there are different ways in expressing oneself, describing an event or labeling an item.