Acquisition of ESL by the Young Learners of Rajbanshi Community of Cooch Behar

Rajbanshi community of Cooch Behar is multilingual by nature. From childhood, Rajbanshi children are exposed to two-three languages spoken around them. As a result, apart from acquiring their first language (L1) they pick up words and phrases from other languages and uses them while communicating with others in their day-to-day life. They swap between English and their mother tongue (MT) during the course of their conversation, often without being aware of it. They also intermittently and involuntarily use English words and phrases while using their mother tongue. As a result, English does not remain alien to a Rajbanshi child when s/he gets engaged in the process of learning English as a Second Language (ESL). This paper focusses on the challenges that young learners of Rajbanshi community face in mastering the four language learning skills in the process of learning ESL, despite being exposed to English from childhood.