Singing, playing, laughing. All things we as adults take for granted – especially when it comes to learning a foreign language! When prepping for an upcoming trip abroad, or, even harder, when studying up on cultural customs of a nation we need to visit for work, learning a foreign language can be a daunting task for us older folks.
Not so for our little ones however.
Instead of memorization, foreign language learning is an organic process that incorporates kids’ real lives — their toys, the animals they love, the letters and numbers that shape the world around them. Children are seemingly able to absorb a second language naturally without all the arduous study an adult might have to undertake.
A recent study published in the journal Cognition, which surveyed 669,498 native and non-native English speakers, found that this so-called “critical period” of language learning may last all the way up to the age of 17, but that for kids to really become fluent in a second language, they need to get started sometime before the age of ten or 12.
![Tutor interacting with child during online preschool foreign language lesson.](https://www.pandatree.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Lauren-Mateo-Ana-Screen-Grab-3-300x185.jpg)
It’s not clear exactly why kids are such able learners when they’re young, but we do know that their neural plasticity, unselfconsciousness, and natural inclination to learn through play make a huge difference. Here are some of the ways that children’s language learning differs from adults—and how we might take a few cues from them!