Language Through the Eyes of a Child

As a naïve child, I thought I lived a normal life. My days reflected what I saw other children doing. I played hopscotch with neighborhood kids, climbed carelessly to the top of trees, and tumbled down hills creating grass stains upon my knees. As I reflect upon the days of my youth however, I recognize that one aspect of my childhood was quite different from many children my age. I realize my parents gave me a gift that surpasses all other gifts. My mother and father gave me the gift of experience. As a child, I unconsciously learned two languages simultaneously through experience.

Throughout my first years of childhood, my father spoke to me in English while my mother spoke strictly Japanese to me. They did the same for my older sister. It was not a struggle to pick up both languages because I was exposed equally to both. Speaking a second language came with ease and seemed only natural for me.

As my sister and I became a little older, we would come home from school and my mother would attempt to hold Japanese lessons. Her goal was to teach us advanced vocabulary, complex grammar, and how to write using unfamiliar characters. It was challenging to learn in this type of setting because I felt almost as if I was forced to continue learning Japanese. It became increasingly difficult to learn as we progressed through our weekly lessons.

My mother recognized our struggle to learn in a teaching type atmosphere. She understood that my sister and I needed to be surrounded by the Japanese language in order to effectively learn it. The only manor in which I could become completely fluent was to be in an entirely Japanese environment.

I lived among sushi, chopsticks, and bullet trains during the summer months from when I was seven years old until I was thirteen. Throughout those years I learned the distinctly different Japanese culture, customs, and ultimately the language. My sister and I lived with my grandparents who knew only a handful of English words. It became a game when we encountered a word that we did not know how to say in Japanese. We described the unknown word with symbols such as drawings or other similar objects until the translation for that particular word was discovered.

Watching television shows was yet another way I picked up certain Japanese words. Seeing and hearing unfamiliar words in context led me to comprehend far more Japanese than in any lesson back at home. My grandparents found it humorous that my sister and I sang along to certain commercials. The thought that we were learning new words and sentence structure never crossed our mind. We sang merely because it was our choice and at the same time entertaining. Resembling my learning process as a toddler, I was again learning the language unconsciously.

As I became progressively comfortable with Japanese, English strangely sounded foreign. I rarely heard English spoken when I was out in public. It was almost shocking the few times I heard English because it stood out greatly over the Japanese voices. It is very odd when you feel distant in some sense from your own primary language. This same routine of becoming accustomed to the Japanese language occurred each summer I visited my grandparents.

As I look back upon my childhood, I understand more clearly the importance of learning a language through experience. The methods and conditions in which a language is learned are imperative. Being forced to learn prohibits learning, but subtle efforts of wanting to learn brings you knowledge. Tom Bodett clearly encompasses the exact feelings of my youth as he says, " The difference between school and life? In school, you're taught a lesson and then given a test. In life, you're given a test that teaches you a lesson."