“Children’s brains are like sponges! It’s easy for them to learn”

“My older brain is full of information, so it’s harder for me to learn and remember things”

We use kids as an excuse for why we feel that we can’t learn as an adult.

It is true that children learn a language more quickly and with greater precision than adults. The problem is, people accept this and say, “well I’m not a child anymore so I won’t be able to learn a language very well”.

This is the biggest mistake a learner can make.

It is also true that you can only learn certain aspects of a language when the brain is still developing. For most people, perfect pronunciation, intonation, and other aspects related to the ‘music’ of the language need to be learnt while the brain is still growing.

True.

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People just accept the sponge analogy as truth and think that they can’t learn. The sponge analogy is just that: an analogy. It’s a comparison, but it’s not an accurate comparison.

And it’s not true.

The second excuse is absolute rubbish.

You can never fill the brain with information. You can never max out your brain’s hard drive. The brain’s learning capacity is almost limitless.

In fact, the opposite is true. The more you learn, the easier it is to learn new things and the healthier the brain is.

Removing these misconceptions is one of the biggest favours you can do yourself.

But children do learn differently, and we should learn from them. Not use them as an excuse for not learning.

But nobody stops to ask why children learn so well.

When you take a moment to analyse children’s brains and look at how they learn, you see some very interesting things. Then, you can steal their tricks and use them to help you learn.

Great!

So what is it that children do that helps them in learning languages?

It’s not that they’re more intelligent than adults. After all, their brains are smaller.

The tricks they use to learn languages so well are, in fact, very very simple.

Adults overcomplicate things.

Really, it’s the way kids behave and the way that they think that has the biggest impact on their ability to learn.

A big part of the way I teach is to try to get my students to think about language the way children do.

I’ve divided this post into two parts. This first part deals with behaviour. The second looks at the way children think when learning a language.

So. Behaviour…

Kids do four very important things that give them the upper hand in language learning.

They observe, listen, copy, and repeat.

They are also very persistent (if you have kids, you know what I’m talking about here).

Let’s break down those four things.

First of all, kids observe.

They observe everything, and they want to learn from everything.

Actually, that’s not correct.

It’s not that they want to learn. They are just curious. Very curious. And curiosity leads directly to learning.

There’s a difference.

They know that they don’t know, but they are curious, and want to know. So they go and find out.

As a result, they learn.

How does this work with language?

Well, they observe and remember situations, and then they listen to what language is used in those situations. Then they copy and repeat the same words when they find themselves in a similar situation.

Observe, listen, copy, and repeat.

Babies learn individual words this way.

“Daddy says ‘bath’ every time he puts me in this lovely water”.

They learn that the place where lovely water is is the bath. The situation and context tells them this.

As they grow, they start to learn groups of words and phrases.

You can see how they do this when they make a mistake with it.

Children learn the meaning of “we need to change the batteries” when something stops doing what it is supposed to do. A toy car stops moving and Mummy says, “we need to change the batteries”.

A while back, the toilet in my house wouldn’t flush, and my son offered me some great advice: “Daddy, we need to change the batteries”.

Hmm…not exactly.

The logic is there, but the context isn’t totally clear.

Children do not learn grammar rules.

They learn and remember situations and context.

They see patterns in situations, and the language that is used in those situations.

But we don’t teach language learners to be observant. We teach them grammar rules.

What are grammar rules and why do we teach them?

A grammar rule is basically an extremely compressed version of context and situation.

It’s a quick way of explaining the meaning of a tense, for example, without needing to show the learner multiple contexts over time that demonstrate the meaning.

It’s a quick way to understand the concept of a tense without observing it ‘in action’.

And that’s great. It makes understanding it quick and easy.

The problem is that it doesn’t help us use grammar. If you’re in a conversation and you need to use a particular tense, you don’t (you can’t) go through all the grammar rules in your head, then decide which tense is correct for the sentence that you want to say.

It takes too long.

Grammar rules are fantastic to understand the meaning of grammar.

But they are useless when you need to use grammar.

It’s easier to remember and apply situation and context than it is to remember and apply grammar rules.

And this is exactly why kids do this.

Because it’s easier.

And it works.

When you associate grammar with situations and context, and not rules, the correct verb tense simply ‘sounds right’.

After all, this is how you do it in your own language. The chances are you can’t explain the rules related to grammar in your language, but you can use them perfectly. The correct form just ‘sounds right’.

It sounds right because your brain can remember situations in which you heard the correct form. But it can’t remember any situations in which you heard the incorrect form. So the correct one just sounds right.

It’s true that it takes longer to understand the meaning using the way that children learn. But when kids finally learn the meaning, they learn it forever, and they are able to actually use it.

The adult way makes it quick to understand grammar, but difficult to use.

Which one would you prefer?

You try explaining a grammar rule to a child, and they will look at you like you’re completely crazy.

And they have a point.

Absolutely everything you need in a language you can get from observing and listening.

The natural way of learning language and grammar is much better, and gives far better long term results.

This is how humans learn languages. It’s the only way the brain knows how to learn a language. So we should learn languages in a way that is natural and easy for us.

Observe, listen, copy, and repeat.

See you next week for part 2

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