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I read an interesting article recently about language ability. There is a theory that language ability declines with age - though there is no clear agreement as to at what age this decline begins. This has led to a movement in the language teaching world to start children learning their first foreign language as young as possible. Some people believe that by late adolescence the ability to learn a new language is already rapidly declining.

The article I read, however, seemed to be rubbishing this idea. It seems that, rather than age, the key factor in language ability is ‘consciousness’. Research has revealed that people with exceptional language ability are also the possessors of ‘abnormal’ consciousness. By ‘abnormal’ is meant not ’strange’ or ‘wierd’, but simply ‘not normal’. The article suggested that people with a ‘normal’ consciousness are overly-preoccupied with life on a mundane level and their imaginative ability is thus limited. Whereas those whose minds can rise above the level of everyday mundanity are better equipped to master foreign languages.

We all know that interesting people can make anything seem fun - buying toilet paper in the supermarket, for example, can be fun if your imagination can rise above the obvious mundanity of the task at hand. The same logic applies to people trying to learn languages.

I was pleased with this idea as it chimes with my own belief that the exercise of imagination is the key to success in learning languages. Of course, memory skills and the ability to integrate grammatical rules are in themselves also essential. But these skills are dependent on and inseparable from imaginative power.

Take, for example, a young Japanese man studying English as part of his degree course. Every week he studies points of grammar and accumulates new vocabulary. It is his imagination that will create the possibility of remembering this information and of using it in the future. Boring as sitting at his desk and studying is, he imagines himself using the English at some time and in different situations in the future. If you like, he indulges himself in a fantasy future - a world in which his English ability will be indispensable. In this way, he raises himself above the world of mundanity and, through the exercise of his imagination, creates future possibilities for communication.

I absolutely believe in this approach to language learning. It requires a positive frame of mind with regard to one’s future - a feeling that surely anyone can summon up when they think about areas of their present existence that they are dissatisfied with - and the ability to visualize desirable situations which will require communication in the language. In this way, learning a new language can be a way of changing your future, changing your life. We can also recognize that there is no particular advantage to starting children off learning English in their infancy, and that even adults can experience the pleasure of learning a foreign language. Just free your imagination!

( The article on which this post is loosely-based can be read at Daily Yomiuri Online article )