"Asian Americans and pacific Islanders (AAPIs) are the fastest growing racial/ethnic group in the United States." Source: "Families with Asian Roots" by Sam Chan and Evelyn Lee in "Developing Cross-Cultural Competence - A Guide for Working with Children and Their Families", by Eleanor W. Lynch and Marci J. Hanson, page 220
 

"Crosslinguistic studies have shown that young children have preferences for sounds and sound structures, which can be correlated with certain characteristics of the respective target language. For instance, at the babbling stage Japanese children produce more back vowels than English, French, Chinese, or Arabic children..." Source: "Early Phonological Acquisition of German and Spanish: A Reinterpretation of the Continuity Issue Within the Principles and parameters Model", by Conxita Lleo, Michael Prinz, Christliebe El mogharbel (University of Hamburg) and Antonio Maldonado (Universidad Autonoma de Madrid) in "Children's Language, Volumn 9", editied by Carolyn E. Johnson and John H.V. Gilbert.
 

"...learning the language of another culture is one of the most powerful ways to learn about and understand that culture. Because so much of every culture is reflected in its language, language learning is a hallmark of cross-cultural competence." Source: "Developing Cross-Cultural Competence - A Guide for Working with Children and Their Families", Third Edition, by Eleanor W. Lynch and Marci J. Hanson, page 49.
 

"Our results indicate that activities in the home make a considerable contribution to children's ultimate literacy success, both by providing opportunities for children to engage in specific literacy-related activities such as book reading and by developing language skills, including vocabulary, that show immediate and long-term relations to literacy." Source: "Beginning Literacy with Language - Young Children Learning at Home and School", by David K. Dickinson and Patton O. Tabors, page 327.
 

"The ways in which bilingual and bicultural children succeed in learning are essentialy the same as for any children... But research has shown that there are also distinctive features of their experience and knowledge which need to be borne in mind when planning for their learning." Source: "Succeeding in Diversity - Culture, Language and Learning in Primary Classrooms", by Jean Conteh, page 118.
 

"Bilingual students take more time to complete tasks in their second language, so performance on timed tests may be invalid." Source: "Whose Judgement Counts? - Assessing Bilingual Children, K-3" by Evangeline Harris Stefanakis, page 11
 

"The co-existence of two or more languages is rarely a cause of tension, disunity, conflict or strife.  Rather, the history of war suggests that economic, political and religious differences are typically the causes.  Language, in and by itself, is seldom the cause of conflict."

Source: Foundations of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 4th Rev Ed, by Colin Baker, p. 384
 

"Bilinguals appear to understand the symbolic representation of words in print earlier than monolinguals as they see words printed in two separate ways.  In turn, this may facilitate earlier acquisition of reading."

Source: Foundations of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, 4th Edition, by Colin Baker, page 158.
 

"It is uncontroversial that young children who are learning two languages go through at least an early stage in which their utterances show an apparent disregard for the integrity of the two individual languages... Eventually, of course, the two systems will separate, or the children will realize that language choice matters very much indeed, and their speech will be purified, at least in terms of some linguistic homogeneity."

Source: "Bilingualism in Development - Language, Literacy & Cognition", by Ellen Bialystok, page 106.
 

"Speaking two languages is like any other skill.  To do it well, children need lots of practice, which parents can help provide.  Without practice, it may be difficult for children to understand or talk to people in both languages."

Source: http://www.asha.org/public/speech/development/Bilingual-Children.htm