How does it happen that children learn
their mother tongue so well? When we compare them with adults learning a foreign
language, we often find this interesting fact. A little child without knowledge
or experience often succeeds in a complete mastery of the language. A grown-up
person with fully developed mental powers, in most case, may end up with a
faulty and inexact command. What accounts for this difference?
Despite other explanations, the real answer in my opinion lies partly in the
child himself, partly in the behavior of the people around him. In the first
place, the time of learning the mother tongue is the most favorable of all,
namely, the first years of life. A child hears it spoken from morning till night
and, what is more important, always in its genuine form, with the right
pronunciation, right intonation, right use of words and right structure. He
drinks in all the words and expressions, which come to him in a flash,
ever-bubbling spring. There is no resistance:there is perfect
assimilation. Then the child has, as it were, private lessons
all the year round, while an adult language-student has each week a limited
number of hours, which he generally shares with others. The child has another
advantage. he hears the language in all possible situations, always accompanied
by the right kind of gestures and facial expressions. Here there is nothing
unnatural, such as is often found in language lessons in schools, when one talks
about ice and snow in June or scorching heat in January. And what a child hears
is generally what immediately interests him. Again and again, when his attempts
at speech are successful, his desires are understood and fulfilled.
Finally, though a child's "teachers" may not have been trained in
language teaching, their relations with him are always close and personal. They
take great pains to make their lessons easy.
单选题
Compared with adults learning a foreign language, children learn their
native language with ease.
单选题
Plenty of practice in listening during the first years of life partly
ensures children's success of learning their mother tongue.
A. Right
B. Wrong
C. Not mentioned
【正确答案】
A
【答案解析】[解析] 利用答案线索词：the first years of life。于是可以很快在第二段第二句发现相关句。该句说“早年时学习母语是最有益的”。接下来的一句突出说明了儿童期听力练习的形式。故此题说法为“正确”的。
单选题
A child learning his native language has the advantage of having
private lessons all the year round.
A. Right
B. Wrong
C. Not mentioned
【正确答案】
B
【答案解析】[解析] 借助常识判断该句的说法不正确。利用答案线索词：all the year round。于是可以很快在第三段第一句中发现直接相关句。比较原句和问题句的结构，发现不同之处在于“as it were”的结构。实际上，as it were的含义是“仿佛是”。所以原文说“仿佛是”，而问题句说“是”，故此题说法为“错误”的。
单选题
Gestures and facial expressions may assist a child in mastering his
native language.
A. Right
B. Wrong
C. Not mentioned
【正确答案】
A
【答案解析】[解析] 利用答案线索词：Gestures and facial expressions。于是可以很快在第三段第二句中发现直接相关句。该句说“学习母语的儿童的另一个优势是可以接触各种情景的母语，而且母语中还伴随了正确的手势和面部表情”。可见原句的说法与问题句一致，故此题说法为“正确”的。
单选题
So far as language teaching is concerned, the teacher's close personal
relationship with the student is more important than the professional language
teaching training he has received.