From Steve Leveen, following the publication of my piece on bilingual children in the May 1 issue

“Thanks for this story. I’m delighted that Nazario has his family here, as I thought they were still back in his country. “You express an oft-told story of precocious children impressing adults with their linguistic powers. The stories are true, but they can also serve to discourage adults from attempting to learn another language themselves, believing that it’s too late for them. And that’s a pity since it’s based on an incorrect interpretation of what you’ve described. “What these young children are displaying is not the power of children but the power of humans. We all are born with the ability to learn multiple languages and can continue to do this throughout our lives, until the onset of dementia. “What children have over adults are two things. First, they have exceptional hearing, which begins to decline as early as our late teens or twenties. Second, they have time. Adults are busy doing adult things, whereas children are devoting all their waking hours to hearing and repeating languages. If adults spend comparable time in similar language immersion situations, they generally make faster progress than children. “And finally, children talk like children. What often amazes adults is how children can communicate well with one another, and with adults on basic topics, often with refreshing and even clever language use, but they have nowhere near the language abilities of adults who have tens of thousands of hours of language use, so that they include idioms, quotations, literary references, evoking of popular culture, etc. They also talk with other adults about abstract concepts out of reach of children. “So, let’s enjoy these little humans and marvel at their growing language skills, but instead of being discouraged, be reminded of the skills we all have.”