Second Language Acquisition in Bilingual Children
As we know that children have a brilliant brain which they got when they was in an embryo phase, where their body cells are growth continuously. Locke characterized a newborn child's mind as a blank sheet of paper, a clean slate, a tabula rasa. It is mean that they have to learn anything around them. The input of the knowledge into their brain is depending on some factors such as ages, environment, and culture. As we know that ages held a crucial role towards the process of learning. Commonly, as long as we grow old, our ability to memorize the knowledge that we just get is decreasing. That is why there is statement state that adult having more difficulties to learn something new than children did. The process of acquiring language on newborn baby and children in early ages is different. I don’t mean that baby is easier to acquire a language even their ages is younger than the children in early ages. Of course they have different abilities to acquire language. Newborn babies are through the first stage where they just hear the sound around them. They can produce the sound that heard around them in different form. I mean that they can’t speak the sounds around them precisely like they heard before. They just tend to produce easier sound which contains of vowels such as /a/, /i/, /u/, /e/, /o/. If you ever had or seen a baby crying, it also belongs to sound that they produce to communicate with the people around them, they also try to communicate with people around them. For example, when they crying in loud enough even you have had to carry them, or even you have checked their diapers they still won’t to stop, it means that they are hungry, so you will give breast-feeding on them. Even when they not crying but babbling with produce the vowel /a/, when they looked into interesting thing or they afraid of something it will be different. Babbling is belongs to the second stage.
The second stage is starting when the babies are producing the sound that has a meaning. This stage also occurs when baby through the golden year. Children in early ages have so many lucks of developing something. It is because their brain is entering the phase that called as golden year. Golden year here means that the children’s brain is working maximally in the several years at their early ages. They can absorb and learn much knowledge from everything, everywhere, everyone. The golden years also determine the successful of the children in the future towards the knowledge that they have had in the golden years. The golden years also determine the success of their ability to learn a language or maybe some languages. Children also start to learn a language in this phase. So, it is common if many parents pay more attention to their children nutrition in this phase. Many parents believe that fulfilling their children nutrition will make the growth of their brain and nerves in good condition. Children in the early ages are starting to through the second stage where they will learn, produce, and understand the word that they have learned. It is true that in the golden years, the cells in the brain and the nerves are in the best condition.
For example is babbling. When baby try to babbling, they tend to communicate to the people around them. The example is when they want to get breast-feeding from their mother, they will produces sound such as m, ah, ee, etc. This first step in the second stage is very crucial towards their positions to acquire a language. This stage is concern to the forming of the word that produces by baby. From a consonant or a syllabic word then a bi-syllabic word then mono-syllabic word. The alteration of syllabic into bi-syllabic word also needs a process. It can be by reduplication and imitation. The reduplication, the baby just needs to take the first or the last syllable that they want to speak and make it into bi-syllabic word. Baby also tends to make that new word consist of consonant and vowel that can be produced by them easily. The example is the word ‘makan’ that means ‘eating’ will become ‘mamam’; baby take the first syllable of ‘makan’ and repeat it into the second syllable then adding the consonant /m/ in the last word. The second example is when they want to say ‘panas’ that means ‘hot’, it will become ‘nanas’; baby take the last syllable in the word ‘panas’. The other process is called as imitation. Baby try to sound the word that heard by them as same as the real word itself. The process of imitation can be by changing consonant or vowel, adding consonant or vowel and even deleting consonant or vowel. The example of imitation that changing the consonant is ‘sepeda’ that means ‘bicycle’ into ‘sapida’. They tend to change the consonant /e/ in the first syllable ‘se-‘ into vowel /a/, they also change the vowel /e/ in the second syllable ‘-pe-‘ into vowel /i/.The imitation that used adding is the word ‘minum’ means ‘drinking’ that become ‘mimik’; by reduplication the first syllable and adding consonant /k/ in the last word. The imitation that used deleting is for the word ‘pulang’ that means ‘go home’; they tend to produce it as ‘puyan’; deleting the consonant /g/ in the last word.
The third stage is when baby or children in the early ages learn how to make or construct a sentence. In this stage, children are tending to learn how to use the right grammar of a language. For example in Indonesia the pattern that S-P-O-K; S for subject, P for predicate, O for object, and K for adjunction; children are tend to construct the word in the sentence in the random way. They just put it the pattern as they want but we still know what they mean. For example when they will said ‘Mama, adik mau minum susu’ that means ‘Mommy, I want to drink a glass of milk’ they tend to say it as ‘Mama, susu minum adik’ or ‘Mama, minum adik susu’. They construct it randomly.
English, a language that have been used by the people around the world nowadays is becoming the most usable language. English used by the people who uses it as first language, second language, and also the people who have not live in the country which uses English. Indonesia is the one of a country which does not uses English as the official language or even the second language. Nowadays, in Indonesia you will easily find English sense (everything that using English) in any kind of things, anywhere, anytime. The easiest example is when you walk through the pedestrian and you looking at the poster of product, easily you find that there is English words or phrase or sentence in that poster. English also set up in the Indonesian’ Education Curriculum. Eventhough in kindergarten, Indonesian children will teach English by their teacher; it also happens when Indonesian children enter the university. Indonesia children also can learn English by entering an English Learning Center that widely spread in Indonesia. As we know that Indonesia have a lot of languages and set up one official language, Bahasa Indonesia, and now they still have to learn a foreign language. That is mean, Indonesian children is multilingual speaker. How can Indonesian children learn some different language at the same time? How they pronounce the foreign word and understand its meaning? When the right time to learn the different language for children?
I have a little sister who studies at the kindergarten now. She is able to mention and understand the name of fruits, animals, numbers, and colors in English. Actually, in her daily life, she uses to speak in Javanese and Bahasa Indonesia. She also includes the one of students who smarts enough in English in her school. Many of her friends couldn’t mention and understand the English. I still remember how she tries to speak in her early ages. She starts with produces some sounds which consist of one consonant with different rhyme, for example she will pronounce consonant ‘a’ in a different rhyme to differentiate the meaning of its sounds. She also speak one word which consist of some consonants but it still in one-syllabic words; she can do that by omitting the other syllables in that word, and usually children just sound the last syllable or the first syllable such as ‘mam’ for ‘makan’ that’s mean eating, ‘nda’ for ‘bunda’ that’s mean mother. Then she develops more complex sounds, she produces some sounds which consist of two consonants; it can be by reduplication the bi-syllabic or polysyllabic words, such as ‘bubu’ for ‘tidur’ that means sleep.
How she can learn different languages at the same time? for the information, her native language is Javanese and Bahasa Indonesia as the second language; first that should she done is the understanding of the words that she pronounce in those two languages then she will easily learn English as the foreign language. When she was at the early childhood, I don’t sure it was at two or three years old; she try to speak by imitating the words that spoke by people around her. The process of imitating is just produce the words that same as with the real words. It means that she just try to speak the words without knowing the meaning. I still remember how she try to call me like the other call me ‘mbak Kiki’, she just pronounce it as ‘mbak Titi’; she change the /k/ with /t/. she also change the consonant of some other words, such as egg ‘telur’ becomes ‘telul’; bycicle ‘sepeda’ becomes ‘sapida’. It belongs to stages of language development by children. I still remember when the first time she knows English. She gets English when she entered playgroup class. In the playgroup she learns English by sing the song. The example of the song is:
“Watermelon, watermelon,
Papaya, papaya
Banana, banana,
Tomato, tomato..”
Her mother who usually assist her in the playgroup class told me that when the students sing the song, the teacher are showing the picture of the words that sung by the students. In her home, she always repeat that song and show me that watermelon is for ‘semangka’, papaya is for ‘pepaya’, banana is for ‘pisang’, and tomato is for ‘tomat’ in Bahasa Indonesia. in the playgroup she also taught the English of color by her teachers. The method that ussualy used by their teacher is showing the card that have different color. This method also used by her mother to teach her in home. I remember that when she learned the color in English, she also still learn the color in Javanese and Bahasa Indonesia.
How can she learn a different language at the same time? I think we already know the answer. We know that human can differentiate to use different language in different event, so do the children. Even they young enough, but they know when they should use this language, when they use that language. Dhira as my sample also do that. She won’t speak in English if people around her do not ask her. She usually speaks in Javanese, and Bahasa Indonesia in several event such as when they speak with the new person, speak to her teacher. She already knew it. How can it be? As we know that environment also held the important thing for the growth process of the children, fortunately, she was born in the good environment where she can learn how to act in a good attitude and manner. Her mother and people around her usually tell her to behave in right and good manner. Her mother tells her how the right time to use this kind of language or that kind of language. This is also occurring in the process of learning English. She will be told by her mother or people around her the right word of the things that she mentions. As we know that the second learner will affected by their native language; this phenomenon also happened in Dhira. Until now, she can’t speak or pronounce the English word same as the native speakers.
The right time to taught children a new language is when they in the golden years where their nerves and cells are work maximally. They already learn how to use a language since they are newborn babies. They still develop their ability to learn language till they grow up. Not only the golden year but also environment holds a crucial role for the process acquiring language in children. As we know that second learner, children will not speak and produce the same words as the native speakers.