LANGUAGE MIXING BY A TWO YEARS OLD BILINGUAL CHILD

This study aims to observe whether the language mixing by 2 years old bilingual child initially forms one linguistic system or two separate linguistic systems from the child’s onset of development. The instruments used were observations on the child’s mixed utterances and interview sessions with the parent and significant caregivers. The subject was a 2 years old bilingual child. A case study research method was applied. The result of the findings shows that a 2 years old bilingual child actually forms two separate systems from the onset on the developments, significantly in the aspects of phonology, grammar, lexical and pragmatics. This research implies that in the process of simultaneous bilingual acquisition, the bilingual child’s ability of using the two languages is considered as an advantage for their development if the necessary input is provided by parents, community and school.