Bilingual 双语

I still remember Ms Chan had discussed about the issue on bilingual versus ESL. I personally support the bilingual education because I had received this kind of education in my early education. The following part of this post contains some of my personal thought.

First, mother tongue is the only language for a child to communicate with the world. I observed this through my little nephew. He is just one year old but is already capable to listen to instruction. How he understood the language? The answer is simple. He imitates the action of his parent and guesses what his parent want the language (as get it right, they will be so pleased and keep praising him). Slowly, this language will be planted deep in his heart.

I wonder, what language a bilingual (or even multilingual) person will use when he/she in danger. At first, I thought he/she will speechless because I thought he/she will face a conflict to choose the right language which other will understand. But, who bother about other when in extreme condition? Yes, he/she will choose the mother tongue which is deeply cultivated inside their mind.

After 6 years ESL teaching, I still have problems with my English. This primarily because I need to convert every thing in my mind (which is mostly in Chinese) to English before I can speak it out. This is why I am very slow when writing English essay and some time I am just unable to complete the essay on time. However, I can write 5-page long essay (which is around 2000 words) during the exam condition, even Chinese words are more complex and it take longer time to write one single word. (That is why I found blog is easier to write in Chinese rather in English)

I notice that every time I count number, I will use Chinese involuntarily. Maybe Chinese use a shorter syllabus to pronoun a number and I can say a word a few time faster than I speak in English. However, as what I say, it comes naturally form our mind as it already there.

In short, mother tongue is the first language to communicate with other mankind, but one language is never enough to converse with this diversified world.