Re:The Neural Advantage of Speaking 2 Languages
by catzaa on Thursday January 21, 2010 @07:10PM
(#1068763)
South Africa's national language is bad English :)
While I do think that everyone should learn English in SA, research has shown that mother tongue education (especially at primary and secondary levels) are extremely important.
There are a lot of parents doing their children a disservice by sending them to English schools.
It's easy for most people who's mother tongue is not English to learn it, as it's everywhere - government, media, advertisements, entertainment, you name it. So it's a necesity, not a status symbol.
It's also interesting to note that English kids generally struggle to pick up a second language, even if they live in a community that speaks another language, just because English is so pervasive, and there's no need for them to pick up a second language. This despite the fact that you have three languages at school, at least up to grade 9.