Posted by whj on September 30, 19102 at 05:44:28:
The issue of whether children should begin learning a foreign language as soon as they start school is a complex and controversial one. Different people hold different views due to their respective angles. On the one hand, many people advocate that children should study foreign language early as they are apt to language study; on the other hand, others may insist that the learning of foreign language at earlier stage is not good to the development of children. Actually, we do not have to look very far to seek this matter. I would like to reason and provide evidence favoring the former and refuting the latter.
In the first place, an important reason presented in this issue to develop my position is that childhood is the best time to learn foreign language. According to scientific research, children's capability to master a new language is much more than adult people. Take me as an example, my parents told me that I could learn a dialect within a month. However, I have to spent more than a year on learning another dialect at my twenties. Therefore, it is obvious that children should start to learn foreign language as soon s they start school.
In addition, there is another reason for me to agree the former statement. The reason is not far to seek, It is quite easier to children to master an accurate pronunciation than to adults. In China, I often meet with foreign people who can speak Chinese. It is quite common that the level of pronunciation is different. After investigation, I found that most of them who have an accurate pronunciation learned Chinese at their early stage. Therefore, we have no doubt that people who wants to have perfect pronunciation of a foreign language, they should start learning when they were still child.
Admittedly, we can not deny that starting to learn foreign language when children enter school will bring some extra burden. However, this alone do not constitute a sufficient evidence against the advantage to let children start learning a foreign language at an early time.
Consequently, I advocate that children should start to learn foreign language as early as possible because it will help children to master the new language earlier and easier. Due to the above-mentioned reason, which may sometime intertwine to form an organic whole and thus become more persuasive, I can safely arrive at my conclusion.