Bilingualism and Second-Language Acquisition
Up to this point we have discussed how a child is acquires a single language, but in many parts of the world bilingualism is the norm. The presence of bilingualism raises many questions about development. Do bilingual children get languages confused? Is their language development delayed due to the task of learning two languages? Or, to look at the issue from the other side, are there some advantages to being a bilingual?
We will begin by discussing the circumstances under which children acquire more than one language, then examine acquisition of two languages simultaneously and sequentially. And sequentially. Finally , we will turn to the cognitive consequences of bilingualism