Competence and Performance

QUESTION ONE
A CHILD BORN TO YORUBA LANGUAGE COUPLE IN ENGLAND, WHAT IS THE CHILD’S MOTHER TONGUE (MT)?
ANSWER:
Firstly, the concept of language learning and acquisition will aid our resolution of the conclusion. Language acquisition tends to be the first and immediate language of the people. The first language (L1) is the language a child acquires first in his/her attempt to communicate with his surroundings.
Psychologists in conjunction with the neuro-linguists who study the language in the brain believed that when a child is born, its mind is blank and empty but whatever the immediate people process or say to the child is what the child will re-echo. Therefore, I strongly believed that English Language will be the child’s mother tongue (L1) since the child’s immediate environment is characterised with English speakers and the child will then learn and acquire the foreign language as his/her MT, whereas his/her parents’ language remains native language.
However, since parents’ physiological and biological orientation does not permit the child to automatically acquire mother tongue (MT) rather he/she will still learn the immediate language as L1 before communicating.
Moreover, with the aid of language acquisition device (LAD) as researched, can easily assist and enhance the child to still have high tendency in acquiring the parents’ language as soon as he/she returns to his/her parents’ land.




QUESTION TWO
A CHILD BORN IN A YORUBA SPEAKING ENVIRONMENT AND AFTER FIVE (5) YEARS THE CHILD WAS TAKEN TO ACCRA, TWENTY (20) YEARS LATER THE CHILD RETURNS TO YORUBA LAND, WHAT WILL BE THE CHILD’S LINGUISTIC SITUATION?
ANSWER:
First and foremost, the child’s MT is Yoruba Language, even if after learning part of the MT and he/she leaves for other land no matter the donkey years, there is certainty and high tendency to still be able to speak the L1 when he/she returns to the father’s land, though it may take time depending on the child’s language acquisition...