Our neighbors are Moctaw Indians. To preserve their tribal culture and language and to tone down the overwhelming Mormon influence here in Utah, my neighbors like other members of their tribe, don’t teach their kids English until they are sexually mature. A priori, this should have an adverse effect on a child’s development, right? I have no knowledge of psychology or child development, so I would like to hear from those who specialize in this area. Is a child’s development adversely affected if he or she does not learn to communicate in English until they have become full adults? What is likely to happen to the child? How is it likely to affect the child’s chances of getting a good education, perhaps probability of going to graduate school? What is the income effect? My hypothesis is that delayed learning of English will mean that the kid will always remain in the lower quadrant of the income scale all his or her life. Have any studies been done on Hispanic kids many of whom also seem to have a language handicap?

Presuming they are teaching the children to read and write in their tribal language, it shouldn’t affect them at all. It is no different to English speaking children learning a second language when they get to high school. There are some studies that suggest that learning two languages actually can make you more intelligent. Parents have every right to choose what their children’s first language should be.

Being bilingual is considered a great benefit these days, and can cause one to earn much more than monolingual English speakers. There are many, many Hispanic kids for whom being bilingual is a great benefit, and in no way a language handicap. What may appear to be a language handicap to you is more to do with lack of education in either language and interruptions to their education, both through changing schools and going between Spanish and English speaking schools.

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