The Jingles Road to Your Target Language Is Laid Before You!

Dear Fellow Earthlings,

I do not believe that a government should control its citizens, but, rather, should protect them -- and allow as much individual freedom as is feasible to every member of its populace.

Within this context I am quite in agreement with the contents of an article I read only yesterday in "The Japan News", whose headline is "Tehran bans English in primary schools".

Sociolinguistic dynamics being what they are, I am fully aware of the "gap" that invariably develops between the children of people wealthy enough to send their children to private schools and those of parents whose means do not allow for that. Fragmentation of society should never be encouraged.

I shall not go through the article word-by-word here, since you my readers have the option of seeking it out for yourselves. What I wish to emphasize in today's blog is that elementary school age children need to learn the language and culture of the nation they are growing up in before immersing themselves in the study of one or more foreign language(s).

Invariably, the pressure to be "upwardly mobile" and "modern" will come into conflict with being "traditional" and "old school". The resulting lack of harmony will create rifts, cracks in the society at large. These rifts can result in unrest and even violence among members of the society at large. Hence, my contention that it is best to postpone training of foreign language until students reach the age of 13 or thereabouts.

In the case of native speakers of Farsi (the national language of Iran), the fact that their language is

Indo-European means that even before Iranian teenagers attempt to start learning English, their speech motor skills are already within one year's "phonological distance" from those of native speakers of English. Therefore, with even a modicum of Jingles training sometime between the time Iranian youth turn 13 and -- seven years later -- turn 20, these learners of English can attain nativelike English phonological competency. Furthermore, this can be accomplished without depriving the students of the opportunity to become well acquainted with the beauty, depth, and intrinsic value of their native language and its deep connection to their nation's history and culture.

For the record, if Iranians wish to use the same means to learn NON-Indo-European languages (such as Chinese, Japanese, or Seneca), they would need slightly longer periods of target language phonological training (in the form of "ding-ling" (for Chinese), "charin-charin" (for Japanese), or "gaEno' (for Seneca) in order to reach their goals!

Steve Walker

Earthsaver and Jingles Creator

© 2013 Steve Walker, The Jingles-The Japan Foundation for English Pronunciation, Summit Enterprises.