When a child learns two languages from birth, it is called:

Concept

Bilingual development can be classified by when the two languages begin, by the social setting of learning, or by the effect of one language on the other.

In an age-of-acquisition classification, simultaneous acquisition begins with exposure to both languages from birth or the earliest period, whereas sequential acquisition begins the second language after the first has started developing.

Application

The stem states that both languages are learned from birth. That timing places the child in the simultaneous-acquisition category.

Contrast

• Elite bilingualism concerns social privilege or access to prestigious language learning, not the order in which two languages begin.

• Simultaneous bilingualism concerns exposure to both languages from birth or very early childhood.

• Sequential bilingualism concerns learning the second language after the first language has begun to develop.

• Subtractive bilingualism concerns one language gaining ground while the other is weakened or displaced.

Cross-check

The deciding clue is ‘from birth’. It describes the onset of both languages at the same early stage, not a later sequence or a change in language status.

Result

The child is experiencing simultaneous bilingualism.