Does Age Matter in Language Learning?

Over the years of teaching Cebuano to different foreigners, I have been asked a million times about who learns a language faster:  a young l...

Over the years of teaching Cebuano to different foreigners, I have been asked a million times about who learns a language faster:  a young learner or a senior learner?  I have a prepared answer to that question, of course, I would say it's the younger learner.  Now, you might ask me why.  I always go back to that course I had in my university days when I was studying language teaching.  According to Noam Chomsky,  everyone has a Language Acquisition Device or LAD that enables infants to acquire and produce a language.  Though that theory is still being contested, and scientists believe that it is a pseudoscience, I am a major supporter and believer of the LAD.  

Language starts and develops gradually as an infant grows until he/she becomes an adult.  Language begins with the creation of sounds, then producing words, phrases, sentences then longer proses.  

Now, this doesn't mean that seniors can no longer learn a new language.  In fact, they should learn a new language because it keeps their brain active and stimulated.  Having to master new vocabulary, recalling it everyday, writing it down, reading it out loud, practicing dialogues, all these stimulate the brain and increase its activity.   Seniors will take more time in acquiring a new language though because of different 'baggages,' factors that weigh them down.  For example, problems or issues about their jobs, children, relationships, finances, and others are mental baggages that prevent them from devoting time in language learning, thus slowing down their ability to learn the language.  

On the other hand, children are in what we call the "tabula rasa state."  Their minds are like sponges that absorb things around them.  They mimic what they hear and retain them easily.  That is why children learn many languages simultaneously.   When I was growing up, I was exposed to three languages daily, so I speak them fluently.  And there was another one that I could hear often but I paid no mind so I did not learn it at all except for an isolated word or phrase that stuck in my mind and are hardly useful.  

So what I'm saying is, it is better to start learning languages at an early age because retention is more permanent and faster.  On the other hand, it is not impossible for seniors to learn a language, they just need more time and put more effort in learning a new language .