How Does A Baby Learn Language ?

[xHarinder_singh]

A newly born baby does not know a language. The baby just listens to sounds(words) coming from the mouths of the people around him and automatically starts to learn the meanings of words, develops vocabulary, learns grammar and after some time starts to form sentences and one day becomes very fluent in the language.

On the other hand, when an adult has to learn a new language, so much effort has to be put in. People join language courses etc and even then mistakes do occur and its never the same as mother tongue.

Now if we believe that amrit sanchar is actually the birth of a baby and Satguru is our mother father and gurbani is our mother tongue, shudnt we be learning gurbani the same way as the newly born baby learns his mother tongue.

These days people read lots of translations or use the phurrnas of mind to generate their own meanings and then fight with each other over meanings. I feel all this is a waste of time. People who keep rehit and japp naam, they automatically start to understand gurbani and with time, the meanings and understanding gets deeper and deeper.

Bhai Sahib Randir Singh jee never went to any taksal nor did he read books and translations but he possessed ocean-like knowledge of gurbani because he learnt everything from the owner of the bani ie. Satguru jee.

[_singhni_]

amazing post.

[mskcan]

Indeed,

however the argument that babies learn more easily than adults is not necessarily true, accordingly research into literature and phonics is showing that in fact that is not the case. The difference is the keen willingness, and the child being surrounded by a language while adults tend to only create snap shots of their learning capacity/ability.

Thus, adults can learn as easily as children and as such both should be immersed in that which they wish to learn.

WEll done for posting

[xHarinder_singh]

Indeed,

however the argument that babies learn more easily than adults is not necessarily true, accordingly research into literature and phonics is showing that in fact that is not the case. The difference is the keen willingness, and the child being surrounded by a language while adults tend to only create snap shots of their learning capacity/ability.

Thus, adults can learn as easily as children and as such both should be immersed in that which they wish to learn.

WEll done for posting

Dear Veer,

I recently met a psychologist and asked him about this. He said that basically a baby is PROGRAMMED(by God) to learn his/her mother tongue(ie the language/s spoken around him).

Now, gurbani is not any normal set of words, It is the bani of Maha Purakh.

Amrit bachan Satgur ke baani, jo bolai so mukh amrit pavai ||

Gurbani has paras kala and all humans are PROGRAMMED to learn gurbani( the only condition is the human to take sharan of Satguru jee and keep rehit)

Read this:

http://whyfiles.org/058language/baby_talk.html

[apne]

I read this a long time ago. thought should share it.

There was once a bhai from a rural village who was illiterate and could not write, read or even hold a pen. He was around 40 yrs old and had worked all his life in fields. One day he decided that he needed to learn to recite gurbani. He went to 'poanta sahib' and met the head granthi . He requested him to give him discourse in gurmukhi and teach him gurbani. Head granthi gave him a room to stay and told him to coming the following morning.

The next morning, when he went to head granthi to learn gurbani ,bhai was told by Head Granthi to do seva in 'langar'. He did seva all day and retired to his room at night. The following day when he went to see head granthi, who was busy doing viakhya of gurbani, he was told to do seva at parikarma. Bhai cleaned parikarma and retired at his room at night. The next day, he was told by head granthi to do seva where shoes of sangat are kept. Bhai cleaned the shoes of sangat all day.

Everday he went to head granthi, he got the answer that he would be taught gurbani but first he should do some seva. This went on for six months. Eventually the bahi thought that the head granthi was fooling him and using him to do work at gurdwara sahib for free. He went to head granthi, to tell him that he was leaving and to hand over the room keys to him. The head granthi had just started the discourse with other sangat present.

The head granthi told the bhai to take bath and come to hazzori of Guru Granth Sahib. After the bhai arrived, head granthi said that we are going to recite Japji Sahib. I will recite the first line and you will recite the second and so on. Bhai was confused, he requested the head granthi that he did not know any gurbani and how could he recite , not even from a gutks as he was illiterate. He told the head granthi that he had come to learn from him and how will he recite when the head granthi did not teach him anything.

The head granthi said to bhai, "close your eyes and remeber Guru Nanak and start repeating after me". To the astonishment of bhai, he could and did very well recite japji sahib with sangat without reading, which he had never done in his life. He was even able to understand the meaning of gurbani. The head granthi said that 'seva bhavana' is foremost in Sikhi. By doing seva of guruji a Sikh automatically reaches higher avastha and guru sahib bless him. Gurbani comes not by education, money or determination (hath) but by seva and purity.

Guru Gobind singhji said "sachu kahoon, sun leh sabho; jin prem kiyo, tin hi prabh payeo"

Waheguruji ka Khalsa Waheguruji ki Fateh!

[kaur_khalistani_lioness]

awesome reads...

but i'll ask my questions as its not really clear to me here( apne or whoevr can answer thm)

so the person, who came to learn gurbani, recited bani when he didnt know any?

do we know what it means to be illiterate?

and when it comes to learning gurbani...def it is by kirpa..one develops this longing to sit with guru maharaj to listen to his pavitar bachar to improve ones life.

but there is a need to learn gurmukhi nd know how to pronounce akhaars(words) properly in order to know/understand what guru sahib is saying dont we?

guru sahib himself opened school to teach gurmukhi. if we think about it why would guru sahib do that? why would guru sahib even have Manjiya or Bhanguuray (crib like swings) to spread the word/shabd?...and if we were to know what gurbani is saying by ourselves..might take a long time dont u think? if we have the resources then why not use them to live better life and understand gurbani? maybe thats why we need kathakars or vichaar hana(which guru sahib continues to tell to do in HIS bani) ?

(to the original poster)is ur post about santhiya..and how we dont really need it?

here

These days people read lots of translations or use the phurrnas of mind to generate their own meanings and then fight with each other over meanings. I feel all this is a waste of time. People who keep rehit and japp naam, they automatically start to understand gurbani and with time, the meanings and understanding gets deeper and deeper.

i agree with u that fighting over meanings is waste of time... but that doesnt mean one shouldnt read translations does it? its not the translations but the human mind (ego) which makes us fight and makes us think "what i know is correct"..

maybe at times when people like me who fight over translations, forget that our knowledge is very limited nd need to think about what maharaj is instructing us on individual level.

Bhai Sahib Randir Singh jee never went to any taksal nor did he read books and translations but he possessed ocean-like knowledge of gurbani because he learnt everything from the owner of the bani ie. Satguru jee.

about u saying bhai Randir singh ji nevr read any books or translations. how can u be soo sure of that?

and please lets not forget, our generation doesnt know punjabi properly , thus we cant compare ourselves to bhai Randir Singh ji. they(bhai sahib and alike) learned things,if like u are saying not by books,... they learned from the society & the environment...their mother tongue was punjabi... and knew the words, had a very good vocabulary (developed background knowledge) which we dont, thus people like me need vichaar, translations/books and people who can help/teach me twist my tongue properly to say the words correctly.

just my 1 cent

bhul chuk muaf karni and please forgive me if i didnt understand what u were saying

akal sahai!

wjkk wjkf

[xHarinder_singh]

<< and please lets not forget, our generation doesnt know punjabi properly>>

If u read the bani of Sri Dasam Granth, there is very less use of punjabi, its more sanskrit, I am from Punjab and punjabi is my mother tongue but most words in Sri Dasam Granth are totally new to me. Even in Sri Guru Granth Sahib Jee, a large number of words are from sanskrit, hindi and brij bhasha.

Taking santhiya and reading translations is a good thing, I am not saying we shud not do it. All I wanted to say is that Gurbani is Dhur De baani and as we keep on reading bani with shardha, as we keep on japping Naam, Satguru jee keeps on telling us more and more about His Gurbani.

Jo praani gobind dhiyavai, parriyaa ANNPARRIYAA param gatt pavai ||

A baby is PROGRAMMED to learn his mother tongue. He doesnt require any translations or santhiyaa. A baby just listens to sounds around him, has the special ability to separate these sounds into words, slowlly develops vocabulary and grammar.

Same way, we all are PROGRAMMED to learn Gurbani.

[xHarinder_singh]

Baby learns language in SLEEP

source : http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn1887...heir-sleep.html

Students should be jealous - not only do babies get to doze their days away, but they have also mastered the art of learning in their sleep.

By the time babies are a year old they can recognise a lot of sounds and even simple words. Marie Cheour at the University of Turku in Finland suspected they might progress this fast because they learn language while they sleep as well as when they are awake.

To test the theory, Cheour and her colleagues studied 45 newborn babies in the first few days of their lives. They exposed all the infants to an hour of Finnish vowel sounds - one that sounds like "oo", another like "ee", and a third boundary vowel peculiar to Finnish and similar languages that sounds like something in between. EEG recordings of the infants brains before and after the session showed that the newborns could not distinguish between the sounds.

Fifteen of the babies then went back with their mothers, while the rest were split into two sleep-study groups. One group was exposed throughout their night-time sleeping hours to the same three vowels, while the others listened to other, easier-to-distinguish vowel sounds.

Brainwave

When tested in the morning, and again in the evening, the babies who had heard the tricky boundary vowel all night showed brainwave activity indicating that they could now recognise this new sound. They could identify the sound even when its pitch was changed, while none of the other babies could pick out the boundary vowel at all.

Cheour doesn't know how babies accomplish this night-time learning, but she suspects that the special ability might indicate that unlike adults, babies don't "turn off" their cerebral cortex while they sleep. The skill probably fades in the course of the first year of life, she adds - so forget the idea that you can pick up tricky French vowels as an adult just by slipping a language tape under your pillow.

But while it may not help grown-ups, Cheour is hoping to use the sleeping hours to give remedial help to babies who are genetically at risk of language disorders.