1. Session 1 Global languages: English and other future top languages
Dr Ursula Lanvers Open University
Dr Kristina Hultgren Open University

2. English as a global language?
Think about a time when you’ve met a non-English speaking person in the UK or abroad: what language did you speak?

3. English as a global language?

4. Class Discussion The number of English speakers in the world is
A: Greater than the number of Chinese speakers
B: Smaller than the number of Chinese speakers

5. Quiz Question 1 How many languages are there in the world?
A Nearly 7,000
B About 1,000
C About 900
D Nearly 1 million

6. English as a global language?
Speakers of English as a percentage of world population native=first language

7. Quiz Question 2 How many official languages does South Africa have?
B 2
C 11

8. Quiz Question 3 Which country in the world has the most languages?
A Switzerland
B Papua New Guinea
C Luxemburg

9. Linguistic Diversity

10. Major Languages Today Language Mother tongue speakers Chinese
848 million
Hindi/Urdu
500 million
Arabic
485 million
Spanish
415 million
English
335 million

11. Top Languages of the Future Graddol, D. (2004). The future of language
Top Languages of the Future Graddol, D. (2004). The future of language. Science, 303(5662),

12. Quiz Question 4
What are the three most widely spoken first languages today?

13. Quiz Question 5
How many languages are spoken in Manchester?

14. References

15. Quiz Answers 1. Answer A There are nearly 7000 languages in the world
2. Answer C
South Africa has 11 official languages including English, Afrikaans, Ndebele, Sotho, Northern Sotho, Zulu, Xhosa (a click language)

16. Quiz answers
3. Answer B
Papua New Guinea is the country with most languages (838)
4. If you mentioned three of these five you were right: Chinese, Hindi, Arabic, Spanish, English
5. There are more than 150 languages in Manchester

17. How being bilingual works What being bilingual does to you
Session 2
How being bilingual works
What being bilingual does to you
Bilingual: fluent (or highly competent) in 2 languages
Dr Ursula Lanvers Open University
Dr Kristina Hultgren Open University

18. Get ready! Get into your teams! (Answer sheet? Team name?)
listen to experts on bilingualism
learn about brain functions and bilingualism
Quiz: Results day!

19. Quiz Question 1
Bilinguals store one language in one hemisphere (left /right side) of the brain, the other language in the other hemisphere .
TRUE OR FALSE?

20. Cognitive functions in bilinguals and monolinguals
Prof. Ellen Bialystok
world leader on bilingualism and the brain
scientist at the Rotman Research Institute of the Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care (Canada)
watch her perform a kind of intelligence test & take part!
Minute
Literate=able to read
Executive control=(fast) control over different brain activities
Stimulus= what the test person needs to react to
Congruent=matching

21. Stroop test & letter conflict test
Orange Blue Green Pink Purple Pink
Discuss:
Were the tasks difficult for you?
Why are bilinguals better?
Will bilinguals always have this advantage- even when old?

22. How many languages can one person learn?
Quiz question 2
How many languages can one person learn?
A up to 6 if learned in childhood
B there is no limit
C up to 12 if they are related, like French and Spanish, for example
D up to 18 if learned early in life

23. Bilingualism and dementia
Prof Bialystok tested for differences in onset (start) of dementia between bilinguals and monolinguals
She was so surprised by the results she repeated the tests with lots of different patients
Bialystok, E., Craik, F. I., & Freedman, M. (2007). Bilingualism as a protection against the onset of symptoms of dementia. Neuropsychologia, 45(2),
Why these differences?
Do they have to do with to the differences in bilingual children?
Mean value (and standard deviation)
first problem noticed
first hospital appointment
monolinguals
71.4 (9.4)
75.4 (9.3)
bilinguals
75.5 (8.5)
78.6 (8.4)

24. Quiz question 3
Bilingual children are better than monolinguals at recognizing links between meanings of words, for instance
Plane-bus: both are vehicles.
TRUE OR FALSE?

25. Quiz question 4 Bilingual teenagers are better at learning to drive.
TRUE OR FALSE?

26. So how does the bilingual brain work?
Are bilingual brains bigger?
Do bilingual brains develop faster?
So bilinguals are better at ‘executive function’ of the brain- any advantages?
Prefrontal cortex: part of brain behind forehead
Neuroplasticity: flexibility of the brain, ability to form new networks
Cognitive function: thinking ability

27. Bilingual at birth already?
Bilingual babies can separate the languages as early as 7 months
They use qualities like pitch and duration of sounds to keep two languages separate
Pitch: the degree of ‘highness’ or ‘lowness’ of a tone
Duration: the length of time a sound is produced
Hearing two languages from birth gives children advantages that can last a lifetime
Therefore they can differentiate the languages long before they can speak, when they are just babbling
Kovács, Á. M., & Mehler, J. (2009). Cognitive gains in 7-month-old bilingual infants. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 106(16),
Werker, J. F., & Byers-Heinlein, K. (2008). Bilingualism in infancy: First steps in perception and comprehension. Trends in cognitive sciences, 12(4),

28. Quiz question 5 Children learning 3 languages from birth
A will become fluent in all 3 if given enough input
B will mix up all languages
C will speak all 3 languages but none of them like monolinguals (speaker of one language only)

29. Quiz question 6
Bilinguals are better at maths.
TRUE OR FALSE?

30. Answers to Quiz
Q 1
Bilinguals store one language in one hemisphere (left /right side) of the brain, the other language in the other hemisphere.
False. Bilinguals store language in the same parts of the brain as monolinguals but
the size of some brain parts (pre-frontal cortex) that process language
the density of neural networks in these parts
are greater in bilinguals.
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31. Answers to quiz Q 2 How many languages can a person learn?
B There is no upper limit.
….some speak 20 like this 17 year old New Yorker…..

32. Answers to Quiz
Q 3 Bilingual children are better than monolinguals at recognizing links between meanings of words, for instance
Plane-bus: both are vehicles. True.
Q 4 Bilingual teenagers are better at learning to drive. False.
There is no evidence that bilingualism has much impact on the ability to learn to drive BUT they are likely to be better at filtering out irrelevant information and concentrate on the important information.

33. Answers to Quiz
Q 5 C Children learning 3 languages from birth will become fluent in all 3 if given enough input.
If the input in the 3 languages is relatively balanced, they will become like 3 monolinguals in 1.
Q 6 False.
Although bilinguals have some cognitive advantages, there is no evidence (yet) to suggest that bilinguals are better at maths.