A Critical Examination of the Beliefs about Learning a Foreign Language at Primary School

stated that the frequently expressed view that 'young children have a better
memory than older ones find little support in psychological literature' (Stern,
1967: 117). Studies in child development suggest that young, pre-literate
children forget quickly and that their recall is deficient. Studies by Leontiev
(1981) have shown that memory improves with age and 'natural memory',
prevalent in the very young and pre-literate, is gradually replaced by a more
abstract and logical type of memory which develops with cognitive maturity.
Harris states that older children also have a better understanding of how
memory works:

"Older children are also more likely to use elaboration, a memory aid that relies
on visual imagery, and verbal aids (like acronyms) to enhance memory."
(Harris, 1993: 531)

John-Steiner in discussing a Vygotskyan perspective on bilingualism suggests
that 'better memory storage and a more fully developed conceptual system' give
older children and adolescents an advantage over the 'highly imitative younger
children' learning a second language (John-Steiner, 1985: 350). Better memory
storage capacity and the ability to retain more input was also found to be the
reason for the adolescents outperforming the younger children in the study by
Raminez & Politzer (1978: 331).

Literacy skills are said to play a crucial role in the development of more
advanced forms of memory and the importance of being able to read and write
in foreign language development in the classroom has already been discussed.

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