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Naja Ferjan Ramirez是嬰幼兒語言腦力開發(fā)的研究者，她在演講中解釋了為什么嬰兒完全有同時(shí)學(xué)習(xí)兩門語言的潛能，以及雙語環(huán)境對于建立雙語大腦思維的好處與影響，值得一看！ Naja Ferjan Ramirez
華盛頓大學(xué)語言學(xué)助理教授，雙語腦科學(xué)研究員，研究重點(diǎn)是了解不同背景的幼兒在語言和大腦發(fā)育方面的差異程度和來源 TED演講：如何培養(yǎng)雙語思維？ 來自英語口語屋 00:00 17:02 How many of you can speak two languages? Most of you can; we are in Europe after all.
你們中有多少人會(huì)說兩種語言?大多數(shù)人都可以；我們畢竟是在歐洲。Now let me ask you this: how many of you would say that you are completely fluent in two languages so that you could take a job or dream in either one of them? Not as many. Why is that? 問大家一個(gè)問題：你們當(dāng)中有多少人會(huì)說你完全精通兩門語言，可以通過其中任何一門語言找到工作或?qū)崿F(xiàn)夢想? 不是很多。為什么?I think we can all agree that being fluent in two languages is a good thing. It creates additional job prospects, it allows us to talk to more people. It also has been linked to several cognitive and social advantages and it delays the onset of Alzheimer’s disease.我想我們都同意能流利地掌握兩種語言是一件好事。它創(chuàng)造了更多的就業(yè)機(jī)會(huì)，讓我們可以和更多的人交流。它還與一些認(rèn)知和社會(huì)優(yōu)勢有關(guān)，并能延緩阿爾茨海默病的發(fā)病。So why are we not all fluent bilinguals? Those of us who studied foreign languages in school probably remember how hard it was and how much we struggled. I’m certainly speaking from experience here. 那么，為什么我們不都是流利的雙語者呢?我們這些在學(xué)校里學(xué)過外語的人可能還記得那有多艱難，我們有多掙扎。我講的就是當(dāng)時(shí)的經(jīng)歷。I started learning English when I was about 10 years old in school right here in Ljubljana, and about nine years later, when I went to study in the United States, I thought my English was pretty good. I was able to do my homework just fine. 我10歲的時(shí)候就開始學(xué)習(xí)英語了，那時(shí)我在盧布爾雅那上學(xué)，大約9年后，當(dāng)我去美國學(xué)習(xí)時(shí)，我認(rèn)為我的英語已經(jīng)很好了。我能很好地完成我的家庭作業(yè)。But I also remember eating dinner with my college friends and not being able to follow their conversations. Or going on my first date in America and only understanding about half of what the guy was telling me.但是我記得，當(dāng)和大學(xué)朋友們一起吃晚飯時(shí)，我沒能跟上他們的談話。我在美國的第一次約會(huì)，只聽懂了對方一半的話。Now I’m sure many of you have your own stories about foreign language learning. But there’s one thing that most of these stories have in common: foreign language learning is hard. 我相信你們很多人都有自己的外語學(xué)習(xí)經(jīng)歷。但這些故事有一個(gè)共同點(diǎn):外語學(xué)習(xí)是困難的。It takes a lot of time, a lot of effort and it seems that no matter how hard we try, we rarely achieve native-like fluency. Even in those cases, when we have been using our foreign language for years we still maintain that for an accident.需要花費(fèi)大量的時(shí)間和精力，而且無論我們怎么努力，我們都很少能達(dá)到母語的流利程度。即使在這種情況下，當(dāng)我們已經(jīng)使用外語很多年了，我們?nèi)匀粫?huì)出錯(cuò)。Does it have to be this hard? I don’t think it does. What I’ll tell you today is that the human brain is fully capable of achieving native fluency in two languages at the same time, and that we don’t necessarily have to struggle to get there.真有這么難嗎?我不這么認(rèn)為。今天我要告訴你們的是，人類的大腦完全有能力同時(shí)流利地掌握兩種語言，我們不必為達(dá)到這一目標(biāo)而苦苦掙扎。So what is it that we have to do to create bilingual minds? I think a very promising start is to study the brains of those who are really really good at language learning: babies. 那么，我們需要做些什么來培養(yǎng)雙語思維呢?我認(rèn)為一個(gè)很有希望的開始是研究那些非常擅長語言學(xué)習(xí)的人的大腦:嬰兒。Babies are linguistic geniuses and all over the world babies learn their native languages naturally and spontaneously without anybody actually teaching them how to do this. 嬰兒是語言天才，世界各地的嬰兒能自然、自發(fā)地學(xué)習(xí)他們的母語，沒有人教他們怎么做。But this gets even better. Those babies who have a chance to listen to and interact in two languages learn both and they can become native speakers of both. You and I can’t do that, and computers can’t do that either.更棒的是，有機(jī)會(huì)用兩種語言聽和交流的嬰兒可以同時(shí)學(xué)習(xí)兩種語言，并成為這兩種語言的母語使用者。你我都做不到，電腦也做不到。So why and how are babies so good at language learning? I’m a researcher at the University of Washington’s Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences, I-LABS for short. And I study the brain processing of language in babies between 0 and 3 years of age. I focus specifically on those babies who are learning two languages at the same time: bilingual babies.為什么嬰兒如此擅長語言學(xué)習(xí)呢?我是華盛頓大學(xué)學(xué)習(xí)與腦科學(xué)研究所的研究員，簡稱I- labs。我研究0到3歲嬰兒的大腦語言處理。我特別關(guān)注那些同時(shí)學(xué)習(xí)兩種語言的雙語嬰兒。The approach that we take to study the baby brain is called magnetoencephalography, MEG for short. We call it the ‘hair dryer from Mars’ but it’s important to understand that this machine is actually completely safe, non-invasive and completely silent. So pretty baby friendly. 我們研究嬰兒大腦的方法叫做腦磁圖，簡稱MEG。我們稱它為“來自火星的吹風(fēng)機(jī)”，但重要的是要了解這臺(tái)機(jī)器實(shí)際上是完全安全的，非侵入性的，完全無聲的。對嬰兒十分友好。We use magnetoencephalography to study the baby brains and the MEG machine that we have at our Institute is actually one of the few in the world that’s configured specifically for babies. We also have a team of trained research assistants whose job is to keep the babies happy and entertained when we study their brains.我們用腦磁圖來研究嬰兒的大腦，我們研究所的腦磁圖儀是世界上為數(shù)不多的專門為嬰兒設(shè)計(jì)的機(jī)器之一。我們還有一個(gè)訓(xùn)練有素的研究助理團(tuán)隊(duì)，他們的工作是在我們研究嬰兒的大腦時(shí)，讓他們保持快樂和愉悅。One question that we recently studied with MEG was: What goes on in the brains of those babies who grow up in households where two languages are spoken at the same time by native speakers? If we look at these babies’ brains before the babies even begin to talk. Are they different from those of babies who listened to a single language? Here’s how we tested this — these questions.我們最近使用腦磁圖研究的一個(gè)問題是:在母語人士同時(shí)說兩種語言的家庭中長大的嬰兒，他們的大腦里發(fā)生了什么?如果我們在嬰兒開始說話前觀察他們的大腦，他們和那些只聽一種語言的嬰兒有什么不同嗎? 我們是這樣測試這些問題的。We brought the babies into the lab, half of them were from bilingual families where one parent was a native speaker of Spanish and the other one was a native speaker of English. The other half of the babies were from families were both parents were native English speakers, so English was the only language spoken in the household. 我們把嬰兒帶進(jìn)實(shí)驗(yàn)室，他們中的一半來自雙語家庭，其中一個(gè)父母的母語是西班牙語，另一個(gè)父母的母語是英語。另一半嬰兒的父母都以英語為母語，所以英語是家里唯一使用的語言。Then to prepare the babies for MEG, we used the special digitizing pen and a head. And what this procedure allows us to do is to track the shape of the baby’s head so that we can then continuously monitor the baby’s emotions when the head is in the MEG helmet. We then brought the babies into the MEG room where they sat on a special highchair, the head goes right into the MEG helmet and the parents sit right next to them when we look at their brains.我們使用了特殊的數(shù)碼筆和頭盔，準(zhǔn)備給嬰兒做腦磁圖。帶上頭盔后，這個(gè)程序能讓我們追蹤嬰兒頭部的形狀，這樣我們就可以持續(xù)監(jiān)控嬰兒的情緒。然后我們把嬰兒帶進(jìn)腦磁圖室，他們坐在一張?zhí)刂频母吣_椅上，頭部直接進(jìn)入腦磁圖頭盔，當(dāng)我們觀察他們的大腦時(shí)，他們的父母就坐在他們旁邊。During the MEG studies, the babies typically listened to the sounds of language; in this case, the sounds came from Spanish and English. So let’s take a listen to see what that sounded like. 在腦磁圖的研究中，嬰兒通常會(huì)聽到語言的聲音;在這種情況下，聲音來自西班牙語和英語。讓我們來聽一聽。[Sounds] Some of these sounds are specific to English, some are specific to Spanish and some are common to both languages. All babies in these studies were exactly 11 months old. This is typically right around the time when babies begin to produce their first words but they’re not really speaking yet.[播放聲音] 這些聲音有些是英語特有的，有些是西班牙語特有的，有些是兩種語言共有的。這些研究中的所有嬰兒都正好11個(gè)月大。這通常是在嬰兒說出第一個(gè)單詞，但還沒有真正開口說話的年齡。So what did we find? What we found was that the brains of monolingual babies were specialized to process the sounds of English, their native language, and were not specialized to process the sounds of Spanish, the language to which these babies were not exposed.我們發(fā)現(xiàn)了什么?我們發(fā)現(xiàn)，單語嬰兒的大腦會(huì)處理母語英語的聲音，而不會(huì)處理西班牙語的聲音，這些嬰兒沒有接觸過西班牙語。What about the brains of bilingual babies? Well, as it turns out, the brains of bilingual babies were specialized to process the sounds of both languages: Spanish and English.雙語寶寶的大腦呢? 雙語寶寶的大腦能處理兩種語言的聲音：西班牙語和英語。So what does this mean and why am I so excited about this? What this means is that the baby brain specializes to process whatever language or languages are present in the environment. The brains of those babies who listened to one language specialized to process one language but the brains of those babies who listened to two languages specialized to process two.這意味著什么?為什么我對此如此興奮?這意味著嬰兒的大腦能夠處理環(huán)境中出現(xiàn)的任何語言。聽一種語言的嬰兒的大腦能處理一種語言，而聽兩種語言的嬰兒的大腦能處理兩種語言。There is one more finding in this study that I’d like to tell you about. There’s a part of the brain called the prefrontal cortex. It’s highlighted in green in this schematic that you can see. But it’s right here in the very front of your brain. 在這項(xiàng)研究中還有一個(gè)發(fā)現(xiàn)，我想告訴你們。大腦有一部分叫做前額葉皮層。在這張示意圖中，你可以看到它是用綠色高亮顯示的。它就在你大腦的最前面。And we use this part of the brain to direct our attention, to switch back and forth between doing different tasks and to think flexibly. I think we can all agree that these are extremely important tasks to do in the 21st century.我們用這部分大腦來引導(dǎo)我們的注意力，在不同的任務(wù)之間來回切換，靈活地思考。我想我們都同意，這些都是21世紀(jì)極為重要的任務(wù)。We were curious to see how the two groups of babies compared in terms of their brain activity in these prefrontal areas. Interestingly, what we found was that the bilingual babies had stronger brain activity, stronger brain responses to language sounds, specifically in these prefrontal regions. 我們很好奇，想看看這兩組嬰兒前額葉皮層的大腦活動(dòng)是否不同。有趣的是，我們發(fā)現(xiàn)會(huì)說兩種語言的嬰兒有更強(qiáng)的大腦活動(dòng)，大腦對語言聲音的反應(yīng)更強(qiáng)，尤其是在這些前額葉區(qū)域。Now why would that be? One explanation is that the constant switching, back and forth between two different languages provides exercise for the brain, that it strengthens these brain networks that participate in attention switching. And that this provides a cognitive boost to the bilinguals.為什么會(huì)這樣呢?一種解釋是，在兩種不同語言之間的不斷切換為大腦提供了鍛煉，它加強(qiáng)了參與注意力切換的大腦網(wǎng)絡(luò)。這為雙語者提供了認(rèn)知上的提升。Many other studies have actually shown that bilingual children but also bilingual adults have advantages when it comes to tasks that require cognitive flexibility. But what’s particularly intriguing here is that we see brain differences specifically in these areas that are related to flexible thinking at 11 months of age before these babies are even speaking.其他許多研究也表明，雙語兒童和雙語成年人在處理需要認(rèn)知靈活性的任務(wù)時(shí)都有優(yōu)勢。但這里特別有趣的是，我們發(fā)現(xiàn)這些區(qū)域的大腦差異與11個(gè)月大的嬰兒甚至還不會(huì)說話時(shí)的靈活思維有關(guān)。So our studies have shown that the baby brain is fully capable of specializing in two languages at the same time. And that there are possibly some additional advantages that come along with this for free. 因此，我們的研究表明，嬰兒的大腦完全有能力同時(shí)專注于兩種語言。這可能會(huì)帶來一些額外的好處。So given these findings you may be wondering: why are we not raising all babies to be bilingual? There has to be a disadvantage here that I’m not telling you about. Some people think so.鑒于這些發(fā)現(xiàn)，你可能會(huì)想:為什么我們不能把所有的嬰兒都培養(yǎng)成雙語呢?這里有一個(gè)缺點(diǎn)，我沒告訴你， 有些人這樣認(rèn)為。One common concern is that bilingualism slows language learning down, that it makes it slower. Research doesn’t actually support this. Instead, what studies have shown is that if we consider the patterns in bilingual learning, they’re actually very very similar to what we see in monolingual learning. 人們普遍擔(dān)心的是，雙語會(huì)減慢語言學(xué)習(xí)的速度，讓學(xué)習(xí)變得更慢。研究并不支持這一點(diǎn)。相反，研究表明，如果我們考慮雙語學(xué)習(xí)的模式，它們實(shí)際上非常非常類似于我們在單語學(xué)習(xí)中看到的模式。For example, bilingual babies start producing their first sounds as well as their first words at the same age as monolingual babies. We also know that if we give bilingual children credit for each word that they know across their two languages, their vocabularies are of the same size, if not bigger than those of monolingual babies.例如，雙語寶寶和單語寶寶在相同的年齡開始發(fā)出他們的第一個(gè)聲音和第一個(gè)單詞。我們還知道，如果我們把雙語兒童在兩種語言中認(rèn)識(shí)的每個(gè)單詞都納入記錄，那么他們的詞匯量即使不比單語嬰兒的詞匯量大，也是一樣大的。Another common concern is that bilingualism causes confusion. This concern arises from the fact that bilinguals sometimes combine their two languages in the same sentence or in the same situation. This is called code-switching or code mixing.另一個(gè)普遍的擔(dān)憂是雙語會(huì)引起混淆。雙語者有時(shí)會(huì)把兩種語言結(jié)合在同一個(gè)句子或同一個(gè)情境里。這被稱為代碼轉(zhuǎn)換或代碼混合。So does code-switching or code-mixing indicate confusion? Science suggests that it does not. Most bilinguals code-switch and my family is not an exception. 那么，代碼轉(zhuǎn)換或代碼混合是否意味著混亂呢?科學(xué)表明事實(shí)并非如此。大多數(shù)雙語者都會(huì)轉(zhuǎn)換語碼，我的家人也不例外。In my family we actually speak three languages, and sometimes we hear sentences from our children that combine all three: Slovene, Spanish and English. Does this mean that our children are confused? I don’t think it does.在我家，我們實(shí)際上講三種語言，有時(shí)我們從孩子那里聽到的句子是把這三種語言結(jié)合在一起:斯洛文尼亞語、西班牙語和英語。這是否意味著我們的孩子會(huì)迷惑?我不這么認(rèn)為。So let me give you an example to demonstrate why this is the case. My four-year-old will sometimes say sentences like ‘Mom, is daddy [v tu?]? This means mom, is daddy in the shower? Now why does he say sentences like this? There are a few reasons.讓我舉個(gè)例子。我4歲的兒子有時(shí)會(huì)說出這樣的句子：“媽媽,爸爸[v tu?]嗎?” 意思是：媽媽，爸爸在洗澡嗎?為什么他會(huì)說這樣的句子?有幾個(gè)原因。The first one is that he can. Bilinguals, unlike monolinguals, have another language from which they can easily borrow words and they sometimes do this because they know words from one language sometimes better than they do in the other. So, for example, my son probably knows the word shower better in Slovene than he does in English. So he uses it because it’s easier.第一個(gè)是他可以。雙語者，不像單語者，他們有另一種語言，他們可以很容易地從另一種語言中借用單詞，有時(shí)他們這么做是因?yàn)樗麄儗σ环N語言的單詞的了解有時(shí)比另一種語言的要好。例如，洗澡這個(gè)詞，比起英語，我兒子可能更熟悉斯洛文尼亞語中表達(dá)這個(gè)意思的詞。他用它是因?yàn)樗唵巍?/span>The second reason he uses sentences like this is that he knows I will understand him. He rarely uses Slovene words in his preschool because he knows that his teachers and his friends will have no idea what he’s talking about. 他使用這樣的句子的第二個(gè)原因是他知道我會(huì)理解他。他在學(xué)前班很少使用斯洛文尼亞語，因?yàn)樗浪睦蠋熀团笥褌兏静恢浪谡f什么。Bilingual children typically know very very well when they can and can’t mix their languages and studies have shown that even two-year-olds will adapt their language to match that of their conversational partner.雙語兒童通常非常清楚自己何時(shí)能夠、何時(shí)不能混合使用自己的語言，研究表明，即使是兩歲大的孩子也會(huì)調(diào)整自己的語言，以適應(yīng)他們的對話伙伴。There’s one final point about code-mixing that I’d like to make. Even though it’s called mixing, it’s not just randomly mixing together words from different languages. It follows grammatical rules. 關(guān)于代碼混合還有最后一點(diǎn)我想提一下。即使它被稱為混合，它也不是把不同語言的單詞隨機(jī)混合在一起。它遵循語法規(guī)則。I rarely hear sentences such as, ‘Mom, is daddy [v tu?]? Now those of us who are fluent speakers of Slovene and English will know that I can say, ‘Daddy goes [v tu?]’ but ‘daddy is [v tu?]’ doesn’t work. It has to be [v tu? an]. This is because the verb ‘v’ indicates a state and in Slovene it requires a different case than the verb ‘go’ which indicates motion. This is complicated, right?我很少聽到這樣的句子,如“Mom, is daddy [v tu?]? “ 和我們一樣能熟練使用斯洛文尼亞語和英文的人會(huì)知道，我可以說,“Daddy goes [v tu?] 但‘daddy is [v tu?]’ 是行不通的。它必須是 [v tu? an]。這是因?yàn)閯?dòng)詞“v”表示一種狀態(tài)，而在斯洛文尼亞語中，動(dòng)詞“go”表示動(dòng)作。這很復(fù)雜，對吧?The point is this: code-mixing is not easy. It requires a lot of linguistic knowledge in both languages as well as then being able to figure out how to combine this knowledge in a meaningful way. 重點(diǎn)是:代碼混合并不容易。它需要大量的兩種語言的知識(shí)，以及能夠找出如何以一種有意義的方式組合這些知識(shí)。So rather than indicating confusion, code-mixing is actually a sign of linguistic sophistication. It’s also perfectly normal and expected behavior that we see in bilingual children but also in bilingual adults who are fully fluent in both languages.因此，代碼混合實(shí)際上是語言復(fù)雜性的一個(gè)標(biāo)志，而不是表示混淆。這也是我們在雙語兒童身上看到的完全正常和預(yù)期的行為，也存在于完全精通兩種語言的成年人身上。So bilingualism does not cause confusion, it also does not slow language-learning down. In fact, science suggests that there are many advantages. And the demand on bilingual education is actually increasing in the United States as well as worldwide.因此，雙語不會(huì)造成困惑，也不會(huì)減慢語言學(xué)習(xí)的速度。事實(shí)上，科學(xué)表明這樣做有很多好處。事實(shí)上，美國和世界各地對雙語教育的需求都在增長。People are also beginning to realize that starting from an early age may be the best solution because we know that at birth the human brain is just as capable of learning two languages as it is to learn one.人們也開始意識(shí)到，從小就開始可能是最好的解決辦法，因?yàn)槲覀冎?，人類的大腦在出生時(shí)學(xué)習(xí)兩種語言的能力和學(xué)習(xí)一種語言的能力是一樣的。So what should we do? How can we provide all babies with an opportunity to learn two languages from a very young age? In families like mine, the answer is straightforward because parents are native speakers of languages that are different from what the child hears outside of the home.我們應(yīng)該怎么做呢?我們怎樣才能讓所有的嬰兒在很小的時(shí)候就有機(jī)會(huì)學(xué)習(xí)兩種語言呢?在像我這樣的家庭里，答案很簡單，因?yàn)楦改傅哪刚Z和孩子在外面聽到的語言不同。But what about everybody else? As a child language development specialist, I often hear from parents who are eager to provide their baby with an opportunity to learn another language but they’re not native speakers of that language and they can’t afford to hire a nanny who is a native speaker of that language.但是其他人呢?作為一名兒童語言發(fā)展專家，我經(jīng)常聽到一些父母希望給他們的孩子提供一個(gè)學(xué)習(xí)另一門語言的機(jī)會(huì)，但他們的母語不是那門語言，他們負(fù)擔(dān)不起雇傭一個(gè)母語是那門語言的保姆。Some parents think that their baby may be able to learn foreign language by watching television. Unfortunately this is not the case. Older children may be able to learn some foreign language words from electronic media, but babies learn languages through play, through frequent social interactions with live human beings who are fully competent and comfortable users of that target language.有些家長認(rèn)為他們的孩子可以通過看電視來學(xué)習(xí)外語。不幸的是，事實(shí)并非如此。大一點(diǎn)的孩子可能能從電子媒體中學(xué)習(xí)一些外語單詞，但嬰兒是通過玩耍，與完全能熟練使用目標(biāo)語言的人頻繁的社交互動(dòng)來學(xué)習(xí)語言的。So really the question comes down to this: Can we create environments within public education through which all babies will be able to learn foreign languages from a very early age? If we start very very early, how much and what kind of language exposure is needed to create a truly bilingual mind? 所以真正的問題歸結(jié)為:我們能否在公共教育中創(chuàng)造環(huán)境，讓所有的嬰兒都能在很小的時(shí)候?qū)W習(xí)外語?如果我們很早就開始學(xué)習(xí)，需要多大程度和什么樣的語言接觸才能形成真正的雙語思維?From research we know that babies can learn foreign languages surprisingly quickly but at the same time we also know that the type of language they hear is critical in determining how much they will learn and how quickly they will learn.從研究中我們知道，嬰兒學(xué)習(xí)外語的速度快得驚人，但與此同時(shí)，我們也知道，他們聽到的語言類型對他們學(xué)習(xí)多少和多快起著至關(guān)重要的作用。So can we make this work? We think that we can. From research we know that there are six principles, six ingredients if you will, that grow children’s language. We think that if we take the right science-based approach that combines these six ingredients, we can create educational programs through which all babies will be able to learn foreign languages through play in the context of public early education centers. 我們能做到嗎?我認(rèn)為我們可以。從研究中我們知道，培養(yǎng)兒童語言有六個(gè)原則，六個(gè)要素。我們認(rèn)為，如果我們采取正確的科學(xué)方法，結(jié)合這六要素 ，我們就可以創(chuàng)建教育項(xiàng)目，通過在公共早教中心的環(huán)境中玩耍，所有的嬰兒都能學(xué)習(xí)外語。We recently started to test this idea in one of the European capitals where the government is very excited to promote foreign language learning for all babies from birth. The results of these studies are extremely exciting and extremely promising. So stay tuned.我們最近開始在歐洲的一個(gè)首都測試這個(gè)想法，在那里政府非常興奮地促進(jìn)所有嬰兒從出生開始學(xué)習(xí)外語。這些研究的結(jié)果是非常令人興奮和非常有希望的。所以請繼續(xù)關(guān)注。We think that this approach has the potential to change the game for bilingual education. We’re hoping to scale it up so that it will one day allow all babies to reach their full potential and to start learning two languages from a very young age.我們認(rèn)為這種方法有可能改變雙語教育的游戲規(guī)則。我們希望擴(kuò)大它的規(guī)模，這樣有一天所有的嬰兒都能充分發(fā)揮他們的潛力，從很小的時(shí)候就開始學(xué)習(xí)兩種語言。
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