Is it better to learn English as early as possible?

The article shares English teacher Moon Nguyen's perspective on the relationship between when to start learning a foreign language and the learner's results.

The origin of the idea of ​​"learning English as early as possible"

I have heard the message “learn English as early as possible” for a long time. The first time was in 2010, a colleague at Grand Rapids Public Schools (Michigan, USA) said “if you learn English after the age of 11, you will never be a native speaker”. Later, many people also absorbed this idea.

The idea of ​​"learning English as early as possible" is based on a theory called Critical Period Hypothesis (CPH), which was born in the mid-20th century. The name associated with this theory is Lenneberg, who believes that learning the mother tongue after a certain age (taking puberty as the benchmark, around 11 years old in the past and around 9 years old in the US today), will be very difficult. They believe that when a child's brain is not fully developed, it is easier to absorb language.

Later, linguists did further research and found that this theory was not only true for the mother tongue, but also for learning a second or third language. From then on, people believed that learning a language later would be more difficult, giving rise to the notion of "the younger, the better". English was introduced into the curriculum earlier in many countries, including Vietnam. Parents began to worry that if their children did not go to school early, they would never be good at English.

I have spent a lot of time researching and analyzing relevant documents over the past 10 years to explain the problem in the most objective way.

How is CPH research conducted?

When someone tells me “research shows that…”, I immediately ask “how was that research done?”. The results of the research are not necessarily the truth, because the research itself has certain limitations. Moreover, the same research on the same issue, the results in one region may be different from that in another. There are many conflicting views on CPH research in the world today.

1. Research supporting CPH

The studies were mainly conducted in countries where English is the native language (inner circle - people who learn English in countries where English is the official language, widely used in and out of school, such as the US, UK, Australia, New Zealand, Canada...). They compared people who started learning English after the age of 11 (puberty) with native speakers, and found them to be inferior, especially in speaking skills.

2. Research (tentatively) refuting CPH

Many other studies show that late learners also achieve native level, including "accent". However, they were conducted in ESL countries - English is a second language, there has not been any research in EFL countries - English is a foreign language such as Vietnam, China, Japan, Korea...

Besides, some studies show that if you are exposed to and learn English for about 2,000 hours, there seems to be no age gap between early learners and late learners.

Inadequacies of the research

Why is there no research showing that learners in EFL countries like Vietnam can achieve native English proficiency? The difference between EFL and ESL is the environmental factor. In the US (ESL), you go to English classes, everyone speaks English on the street. In Vietnam (EFL), you study English 3-4 hours a week, and speak Vietnamese at home. If you work hard, you have a few more hours to watch TV in English, and interacting in English outside of class is difficult to happen regularly. Thus, the environmental factorinput(input such as English listening and reading sources) andinteraction(interacting in English with teachers, peers, and the English-speaking community) clearly plays an important role.

Studies supporting CPH have not taken into account the input and interaction that learners have. For example, two immigrants are late (after puberty), one is 13 years old, the other is 20 years old. With the same time in the US, the 13-year-old goes to school all day, sits in class all day listening to friends and teachers speak English, and then has to work in groups, of course his English will be different from the 20-year-old, works in a factory, sits at a computer all day, does not need to listen or talk much with anyone. Studies on CPH have not classified these two types of “late starters”. If they did, maybe they would find that the group of late learners are in an environment with a lot of interaction with English, no less than native speakers?

Furthermore, studies supporting CPH do not compare early learners with late learners, but rather late learners with native speakers. This is unfair. The studies were conducted using “grammatical judgment tests” (reading a series of sentences and judging whether they were good or not) and “speech production” (reading a passage for native speakers to judge whether the pronunciation was native-like). Other areas such as writing, reading, and listening were not touched.

Suggestions for Vietnamese parents

As I pointed out above, interaction and input are very important, especially in EFL countries like Vietnam. The most important thing is not learning early or late, because research has not shown that learning late is worse than learning early.

The important thing is input (if you want your child to speak like a native, let them listen to native sources, speak and write), and interaction (talk to others in English).As I said above, some studies show that after more than 2,000 hours of learning and exposure to English, early learning has no advantage over late learning. 2,000 hours of learning, if you only study in class 4 hours a week, it will take about 10 years. If you want to shorten it to 5 years or less, the number of hours of exposure to English outside of school hours must be doubled. If you only send your child to extra English classes, without ensuring enough input and interaction, the effectiveness will not be high.

Sending children to school early, parents feel secure when hearing their children babble a few simple sentences, read a few words. But this is suitable for families with conditions, because if sending children to school from the age of 4, the cost of education is not small. In my opinion, early education helps children become more confident and comfortable, but is not really related to efficiency.

Is it okay if your child learns English a little late? Based on the above analysis, my answer is that it is okay, as long as your child is properly trained, can listen, speak, read and write well, and has enough contact hours, and is learning in an “immersion” environment in English, the better.

One issue that many parents worry about is whether their children need to speak English like a native speaker. Everyone wants that, but studies that use native speakers as a measure have become outdated. Many people cannot speak like a native speaker, but still use English fluently for work and study.