Peep this. So I’m in Vancouver. And I’m hungry for something awesome to put into my mouth. So I go into this Persian bakery, because that’s a good place to find awesome things to put into my mouth. So I’m walking in and guess what I see?
- A Persian bakery, with
- Very good-looking Persian people in it
- Including a gorgeous young woman (typical college age?) manning the till…well, the entire store, really
- Persian music playing, and
- A guy at a table reading a newspaper — in Farsi!
…And you still wonder how people can have accents (including the young person)?
Let’s review. The people at this bakery were doing full spectrum Persian immersion — no cross-language multiplexing. They were:
- Hearing Persian,
- Reading Persian,
- Speaking Persian, and
- EATING Persian
Now imagine this happening every day for 20 years…
Where’s your critical period god now, skeptics?! Huh?!
My point here is: children aren’t magical. They’re just bad at immersion; they’re bad at controlling their environment. Children don’t even get to choose what to eat and when to sleep. Adults are amazing. Adults can re-create one country inside another. Reminds me of the American parties with American food and American people playing American games that I go to in Japan. Adults rule. Literally.
So next time you want to know how to do immersion, do it like a Persian 😉 . Also, visit your local Persian bakery, coz…dayom.
I don’t necessarily think stubbornly hanging onto every little part of your culture, and forcing it onto your children is a good thing… but if you teach your kids to speak both the local language, and the “mother tongue” then that’s fine. Good actually. Studies show that kids growing up with a complete understanding of 2 or more languages perform better in school, and have a greater capacity for learning in general.
Pretty awesome! I’m still working on doing a couple hours a day of immersion with my sensei. That’s all i got here in stupid america 🙁 Bless Kiyumi-sensei!!
KHATZU! I’m not sure if you know or read about this, but one of the founders of Antimoon did something called the “Norsk experiment” for learning norwegian. You should check it out. You’d be suprised. He went about it L2 first from the start. Check it out. I’d like to hear your thoughts on it
He already listed it on the left side of the site, in the box where it says [EXTERNAL SITES]
Waaaah! You were in Vancouver!