Acquisition of articles in L3 English by bilingual Danish-Russian children
What is it about?
Native speakers of languages such as English masterfully and effortlessly use such tiny and frequent words as articles the and a. But those of us who speak a native language without articles know how difficult it is to use articles in a foreign language correctly, the way native speakers do. For example, a speaker of Russian learning English will often use the instead of a and a where the should be used or can erroneously omit them. This pattern is confirmed by extensive research. In our study, we wanted to find out whether it is as difficult for bilingual Danish-Russian children to use articles in English, their third language, because they speak Russian, a language without articles, or whether they overcome these difficulties because they also know Danish, a language with articles. Our findings show that the use of English articles is unproblematic for bilingual Danish-Russian children because they are able to activate the knowledge of articles they have in Danish.
Why is it important?
Recent theoretical models have been concerned with the processes involved in learning a third language by speakers who already know two different languages. These theories assume that prior language knowledge facilitates the acquisition of a third language because learners are able to activate certain properties or structures that are similar between one of the languages they already know and the new language. This facilitation can be seen very clearly when for example speakers of Danish and Russian learning English are compared to speakers of Russian learning English. This is indeed what we see in our study: The Danish-Russian children find English articles easy to learn, but not the Russian children who make many errors with articles. These findings suggest that the knowledge of Danish provides a facilitating effect for learning a third language. Our findings also highlight the importance of (sufficient) linguistic experience or input in language learning. Children learning English in Denmark are likely to hear and use English outside the classroom more than their peers in Russia which may have also helped our Danish-Russian bilinguals learn how to use articles in English. Thus, the amount and quality of exposure to English outside the classroom is an important factor in foreign language learning. Overall, this study contributes to our understanding of multilingualism and its benefits for language learning.