A four year old Russian girl has stunned tv audiences with her ability to converse confidently in …. Different languages. Bella Devyatkin appeared on a national talent programme Udivitelniye Lyudi – “Incredible People” and was questioned on several topics by adult speakers of English, French, German, Spanish, Chinese and Arabic. Her fluent responses have earned her many fans, impressed by her seemingly amazing ability to speak seven languages. Despite critics arguing that she could possibly have been trained to answer in parrot fashion, her mother, an English teacher insists that this is not the case. As a keen linguist herself, Bella’s mother says she has tried to instil the importance of learning other languages as a key to understanding other cultures and opening up a world of possibilities for the future.
The girl’s mother told the press that employing a series of nannies of different nationalities had helped spark an interest in learning languages and helped her daughter reach this impressive level of fluency. Experts have long agreed that a child of this age is far better equipped to mimic new sounds and thus has a huge advantage over teenage language learners. Similarly, it is also accepted that exposure to foreign languages at an early age improves cognitive ability, improving the brain’s ability to function in all areas, not just on a linguistic level.