Topic Talk | Five reasons why you're never too old to learn a new language

Become a monthly subscriber for just $1.99 per month and receive an additional two to three episodes per week!https://app.redcircle.com/shows/9472af5c-8580-45e1-b0dd-ff211db08a90/exclusive-contentIn this episode of The A to Z English Podcast, Xochitl and Jack talk about why it's still important for adults to learn a new language.Transcript:00:00:00JackHey A-Z listeners, this is Jack here.00:00:03JackAnd if you would like to become a an exclusive subscriber to the show, you can hit the link in the description and that will take you to our Red Circle page, where for $1.99 a month you will get access to an extra two or three episodes each week.00:00:23JackAnd be careful, don't hit that donation button if you want to become an exclusive subscriber because the donation button is just a one time donation. However, the exclusive subscriber button will give you access to the extra two or three episodes.00:00:42JackEach week.00:00:44JackSo make sure you hit that exclusive subscriber button if you want access to the extra episodes.00:00:52JackNow let's get on with the show.00:00:56JackWelcome to the A-Z English podcast. My name is Jack and I'm here with my co-host social. And today we are doing a topic talk and the topic of today's conversation is why you are never too old to learn a language and such a I just went online and did a little bit of research.00:01:18JackAnd I found five pretty interesting reasons why you're never too old to learn a language, and the first one is about near neuroplasticity.00:01:29XochitlOh, interesting.00:01:30JackAnd so yeah, and it's it's it says here while it's true that children often have an easier time picking up languages due to their brains, high level of neuroplasticity, which means ability to adapt and change, adults can still learn new languages.00:01:50JackEffectively, research has shown that the adult brain remains capable of forming new neural connections.00:01:58JackActions and adapting to new linguistic challenges, albeit at a different pace than children, so it's not like we have zero ability to learn a language and and build new neural pathways, but it's not the same as when we're like in the the critical age when you know.00:02:18JackWhatever that might be, five to three years old.00:02:21JackYou know, I don't know. Thirteen years old or whatever, so yeah.00:02:25발표자Right, right.00:02:26XochitlYeah. OK. I think that's very interesting. I've heard before on theories that if you learn two or more languages as a balanced bilingual from childhood that you're also more able to pick up new languages. But even if you hadn't, even if you are monolingual.00:02:44XochitlAnd you never learned more than one language growing up. I think research shows that adults, it's it's beginning to show at an increasing weight that adults still retain quite a bit of neuroplasticity. Right, so I think.00:03:02XochitlYeah, that just gives you every more reason to have faith that you can learn another language and a lot of the world has light up on us because they have learned two or more languages.00:03:15XochitlFrom a young age so.00:03:17JackYeah. And this one kind of dovetails nicely. It connects with the one later, which is cognitive benefits. You know, like the like, holding off dementia and stuff like that is creating new neural pathways in your brain, you know, so neurons are making new connections.00:03:28발표자Yep.00:03:36JackThis is a good thing, like it's a it's a good practice. It's like exercise for your brain, you know, it's like working out your brain. So yeah, definitely a good thing. And I also I wanted to say one more thing about what you said about bilingual children.00:03:44XochitlRight.00:03:56JackCause my daughter is a a balanced bilingual just like you.00:04:00JackBar and I think there's something that children learn early that that we don't, that I didn't learn till I was older and that is that language is arbitrary and what arbitrary means is there's no reason for anything to be called anything like trees.00:04:20JackJust the sound that we decided as English speakers to mean tree.00:04:23발표자This can happen.00:04:27JackBut it means nothing to Spanish speaker, you know.00:04:27XochitlRight.00:04:31XochitlIt might even mean something else, like if a one word might mean something completely different in another language.00:04:37JackExactly, exactly. Those are called false cognates. I believe you know when they they don't line, they sound the same, but they're totally unrelated.00:04:47JackUM, and I think that, uh, you learned, you know, when you were young, you're like ohh table is table and table is also the Spanish word for table is Mesa.00:04:58JackIf I'm not mistaken.00:04:59JackYeah. So you've got you've got 2 words and you're like, oh, OK, so things can have multiple names depending on their.00:05:06XochitlRight.00:05:07JackCultural significance.00:05:09JackAnd you learned that just probably before you even knew you learned it. You you knew that. And my daughter.00:05:14XochitlRight. That was a fact of life, basically. Like, you don't really think that too much.00:05:17JackYeah.00:05:19JackYeah. And in my little tiny English speaking world, where I'm a monolingual person, I probably was like, you know, a teenager when I had that epiphany. And I'm like, ohh you, the world is not all table is not just the universal term for, you know table it was it was always it's always been a table since the beginning of time.00:05:35XochitlRight.00:05:39JackYou know, so you you just don't. You don't get that epiphany that that realization until until.00:05:40XochitlRight.00:05:48JackNumber two, life experience, this one. I'll just read the first sentence. Adults bring a wealth of life experience to the language learning process. So how? What do you think about that? Like, just like life experience.00:06:03XochitlI think life experience can help you in any way, because if you already have practice studying other things like in university or high school, then you probably already know how to study.00:06:16XochitlMe and that helps a lot. Like you gave a tip in an earlier episode about writing things down and how that helps retain information and for example, things like flash cards. You'll have all those tools at your disposal and you'll be way more organized. So I think that will definitely help. And it's also something to look forward to in the sense that it'll open your life experiences.00:06:37XochitlToo.00:06:38XochitlLike you'll have way more experiences and be able to appreciate cultures at a different level. If you speak another language fluently.00:06:47JackI I see it as like this, like beautiful secret skeleton key to an entire entirely new world. Like you. You put it in. You open that door and it's like the Wizard of Oz. Like you walking into another world that you can understand.00:06:57XochitlYeah.00:07:07JackYou know, without that, without the language, you're missing just so much. It's so it's so it's so dull and and dreary and and you you can't really appreciate.00:07:19JackI'm speaking no, you go ahead. You go ahead.00:07:20XochitlIt's like an.00:07:20XochitlApple, sorry, good.00:07:23XochitlI'm just gonna say it's like when you go to the grocery store in the US, there's like a wax cap on the apples. Like there's a thin wax on it, and then you can wash it in hot water and melt it away. And the apple tastes way better. That's like the language. Like, you can see the culture and appreciate it to some extent. But that whole flavorful life of a culture that you can appreciate with language is locked away.00:07:45XochitlUnderneath that wax.00:07:46발표자Yeah.00:07:47JackThat's that's exactly right. There you go. Perfect metaphor. So yeah, life experience, learning a language #3 diverse learning resources. So access to information and knowledge that you might not have had available to you in.00:08:07JackWithout being able to speak that second language, that new language.00:08:11XochitlYeah, yeah, I definitely agree. That's another thing I see a lot with, like migrants or actually I see it a lot with my family.00:08:20XochitlThey my mom speaks good English. My aunts, English is is kind of mediocre and she struggles with. It's like a whole world in the US that's locked away from her as far as the resources and being able to navigate certain things on her own because her English lacks.00:08:39XochitlAnd so.00:08:41XochitlThat's not really her fault. It's very hard to work a full time job and learn a new language when you move to a new country at the same time, I really struggle with that.00:08:48JackSure.00:08:49XochitlIn Korea, you.00:08:50XochitlKnow, but again, it does really hinder you from being able to navigate things independently. The way that you would in your home country.00:09:00JackNow you gave us some really good examples a while back in in older in older episodes about like remedies.00:09:09발표자This.00:09:10JackYour mom has these, like, certain remedies from her region of Mexico where she grew up and like, there would be no without without your momma's. You know, as a, as a gateway to that information and your mom and your and your grandparents.00:09:30JackThat information, that knowledge.00:09:31JackWould be totally locked away from.00:09:33JackYou, you know, and you said like ohh, when you have a stomach ache, your mom would make a certain herbal potion, you know, kind of.00:09:34발표자Right.00:09:43JackThing or whatever.00:09:43XochitlYeah, yeah.00:09:44JackSorry, potion sounds more magical, but it's not feature. Yeah, something like that. Yeah, and I think that that wisdom, there's, like a lot of wisdom that is locked into language.00:09:46XochitlNo, you're fine with the concoction. Uh. A mixture. Yeah, yeah.00:09:58JackAnd and without it you there's just no way you you have access to any of those things so.00:09:58발표자Yeah.00:10:04JackSo yeah, that's that's a beautiful aspect of the of learning another language #4 we touched on already, but the cognitive benefits in adults, there's reducing the risk of developing dementia or delaying the onset of dementia is is is a.00:10:25JackIs a benefit of learning a second law.00:10:28JackWhich so yeah. So I mean, even if you're just looking, it's it's almost like to me, like, you know, if you're like, oh, I gotta hit the gym, I better. I better do, like P90X or something like that. It's like, well, I gotta hit the mental gym. I'm going to learn Spanish. I'm going to learn French.00:10:29XochitlRight.00:10:29XochitlYou work.00:10:46XochitlRight can do some verb conjugation, yeah.00:10:50JackYeah, exactly.00:10:52JackThose are your push-ups, you know, for everything. Yeah. Yeah. Your pull-ups are your, you know, the grammar, your verb tenses or whatever, you know. But yeah, I. So I think for cognitive benefits, definitely it's worth it. And the last one is cultural enrichment. Learning a new language opens the door.00:11:12JackTo experience an.00:11:14JackExperiencing and understanding different cultures more deeply and so.00:11:19JackWould you agree with?00:11:20JackThat I think you've already touched on that before.00:11:21XochitlYeah, we have touched on that and I would agree. And as you said about like for example, the whole herbal medicinal part, if I didn't speak any Spanish, I would be completely locked out of that or, for example, my boyfriend speaks Zapotec, he would like, I wouldn't have been able to talk with my grandparents and learn all their wisdom if I didn't speak Spanish, he wouldn't have been able to talk with his grandparents if he didn't speak Salpa tech.00:11:44XochitlAnd so it's like a whole other world that you would have been completely excluded from in a way. And I do see the effect.00:11:53XochitlOf like Latinos that grew up in the US that don't speak Spanish or don't speak some kind of language that connects them to the culture because really we're we're an indigenous culture as well they have.00:12:06XochitlIt's just there's like a wall there. So that's why I think, yeah, I agree, there's a lot of culture locked into language.00:12:13JackAbsolutely, absolutely. It's where the wisdom is locked in the language. I I think you can try to explain to the, you know, you could try to explain some of these things in English, but they're going to lose. You're going to lose a lot in the translation.00:12:30JackAnd so you know, getting it in from the original source is really important. All right, that's our. Those are our five, yeah.00:12:40XochitlAll right, listener as well. If you enjoyed that, make sure we do comment down below at A-Z newspodcast.com shoot us an e-mail at at [email protected] and join our WeChat and WhatsApp groups in order to join the conversation and we'll see you next time. 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