UNIVERSIDAD DE GUAYAQUIL

INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTICS
Second Language Acquisition in Children

Children develop the ability to understand and speak second languages in stages. Explore the five
stages of second language acquisition for young learners.

Sequential Second Language Learners

When figuring out how to motor around, babies don't just one day stand up and walk. Instead, their
journey to toddling and walking happens in stages. In the same manner, children in the midst of second
language acquisition also travel through stages. In today's lesson, we'll take a look at these very stages.

We will focus on sequential second language learners. These are children who are fluent in one
language then introduced to another. These are boys and girls who speak Spanish or Chinese then find
themselves sitting in a classroom in a place like Pennsylvania. Not understanding a word of English,
their journey to becoming fluent in a new tongue begins. According to those who study language
acquisition, these young students will go through several stages in their climb to acquire a new
language. Of course, these stages vary greatly from child to child so our overview of them will be simply
that, an overview.

Pre-Production

The first stage in a child’s second language acquisition is the stage of pre-production. Also called
the silent receptive stage, the amount of time spent in it tends to vary from child to child. During this
phase, young learners have minimal comprehension of the new language. Due to this, they will draw or
point rather than try to verbalize in the new tongue.

Experts in linguistics report this stage includes familiarity with about 500 words but applying these
words independently is still not in the child's toolbox. In other words, they are able to parrot the
language more than speak it. For this reason, it's not uncommon to see a child in the pre-production
stage do things shake his head yes or no rather than say yes or no.

Early Production and Speech Emergence

The next stage in the second language learning climb is early production. Lasting about six months, this
stage sees the child beginning to learn and speak in short phrases. During this stage, they have a
vocabulary of about 1,000 words and very little understanding of grammatical rules. For this reason,
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they tend to stick with short, familiar phrases like 'Where is the bathroom' or 'Thank you very much.'
Despite these limitations, they are beginning to make the language their own.

With this, we come to the next stage, speech emergence. Lasting from about one to three years,
comprehension of the new language takes off during this phase. As evidence of this, our young learners
will begin to independently form simple sentences. Rather than simply regurgitating memorized
phrases, they will begin to manipulate them. Rather than saying the rehearsed, 'Thank you very much,'
they might say, 'Thanks for doing that' or 'Thanks for your help.' Yes, their grammar will still be quite a
disaster, but they will be able to sound out words phonetically with an inventory of about 3,000 words.

Intermediate and Advanced Fluency

Our next phase is intermediate fluency. Finding themselves in this stage about three to five years after
being introduced to the new language, learners have about 6,000 words or more under their belts.
Adding to this, they have an excellent comprehension of their new language. Their grammar even looks
good! During this stage, it's reported that some students even begin to think in the new language.

The last stage of a child's second language acquisition journey is advanced fluency. As the name
implies, learners in this stage have a near-native grasp of the language. In other words, other than their
accents, they may just sound like they were born speaking the language. This stage can take up to ten
years to reach. However, once attained, our young learners can easily navigate their new language. Yes,
they still need support, but just like the rest of us, their language development and vocabulary should
continue to grow as they do.