The Nigerian Bilingual Context A Re Evaluation Of Child Language Acquisition Models

This paper looks into the topic of language attrition and shift among bilingual Nigerian children between the ages of 3 and 6 and the effect of early exposure to the English language in educational institutions in Nigeria on the preservation of native languages including Igbo, Yoruba and Hausa. Using the sociocultural theory presented by Vygotsky as the theory of child language acquisition, the study examines how the existing theories of child language acquisition are applicable to the realities of multilingual Nigeria and how the concept of bilingualism can be cognitively and culturally interpreted. The participants were two children in Enugu and Lagos, who were monitored in terms of longitudinal observations, audio recordings, and vocabulary tests over a period of six months. The results indicate moderate to high L1 attrition (40-70% lexical loss) as a result of urban schooling and weak L1 scaffolding of children with children showing code-switching patterns to favour English. The bilingual advantages were demonstrated on the cognitive flexibility tasks (75-88 percent accuracy), but unequal language exposure prevented complete retention of L1. Social mediation as seen by Vygotsky is very consistent (70-80%), but the cognitivism of Piaget and nativism of Chomsky are poorly fitting (20-40%), because they ignore cultural prestige and multilingualism processes. The research concludes that policies of additive bilingual education that involve the use of indigenous languages in the school curriculum are necessary to maintain lingual heritage without jeopardising cognitive growth in the multilingual Nigeria.