To Win at The Starting Point

The expectations of parents affect their young children’s starting point in receiving bilingual education. The large demand for bilingual preschools resulting from parents’ expectations gives rise to a social phenomenon, that is, English-learning fever among children.

Therefore, the understanding of parental belief toward childhood English learning can provide the basis or reference for the proper planning and guidance for preschool education.

Parents want their children to win at the starting point, especially from the beginning of preschool; therefore, parents send their children to learn English in a swarming fashion.

This action seems to show a lack of deliberate considerations from different angles; that is, at this preschool stage the ability in the mother tongue is not fully developed, and learning English so early may have negative impacts on the child’s physical and mental development, self-identity and cultural identity.

So my study tries to explore the following issues (the aims/research questions of the study)

1. What ratio of the parents think that for childhood English learning, it is “the sooner the better”?

2. What is the main factor that influences the parents to believe that it is “the sooner the better” for their children to learn English?

3. Is the expert’s opinion, that influences the parents to believe that it is “the sooner the better” for childhood English learning, credible?

4. Is this expert’s opinion in line with the principle of language development for young children?

Originally published at http://poeticmindfulness.wordpress.com on August 24, 2020.