The quick answer
Long ago, groups of people moved to new places and lived far apart. Their words slowly changed in different ways. After a very long time, they spoke different languages. Today there are more than 7,000.
RankiHola! Bonjour! Konnichiwa! Tanki, why does everyone in the world say hello so differently?
TankiThose are three great hellos. The answer is a story that started thousands of years ago.
More than 7,000 ways to talk
There are more than 7,000 languages in the world. A language is a way of sharing ideas with words, sounds or signs. Some languages have many millions of speakers. Others are spoken by just a few families in one small place.
Languages are not spread out evenly. Some countries have one or two main languages. Others have hundreds.
Languages change, little by little
Every language changes a tiny bit over time. New words appear, and old words drop away. People start saying things in new ways. You can hear this when grown-ups use words that sound old-fashioned to you.
Long ago, there were no phones, cars or planes. When a group of people moved far away, they stopped talking with the people they left behind. Each group’s way of speaking changed in its own way. After hundreds of years, the two groups could not understand each other any more. They now spoke different languages.
RankiThat sounds like the whispering game. A message goes down a long line and comes out totally different.
TankiExactly like that. Only this line is hundreds of years long.
Language families
Languages that grew from the same old language belong to one family. They are a bit like . They often share words that look or sound alike.
- English and German are cousins. Think of water and Wasser, or house and Haus.
- Spanish, Italian and French all grew out of . Latin was the language of Rome.
- Hindi is a very distant cousin of English. They belong to the same big family.
- Mandarin Chinese belongs to a completely different family.
Two languages have the most speakers of all. Mandarin Chinese has the most people who grew up speaking it. English has the most speakers if you also count everyone who learned it later, for example at school.
Here are some more hellos. People say “ciao” in Italian, “konnichiwa” in Japanese and “namaste” in Hindi.
Talking with your hands
Not every language uses sounds. use hand shapes, faces and body movements. Many people use a sign language. Sign languages are real languages, with their own words and their own . Grammar means the rules for putting words together.
There is not just one sign language. British Sign Language and American Sign Language are very different, even though people in both countries speak English.
Try it
Say hello around the world
You need
What to do
- Learn hello and thank you in Spanish: “hola” and “gracias”.
- Learn hello and thank you in French: “bonjour” and “merci”.
- Learn hello and thank you in German: “hallo” and “danke”.
- Write all six words on your paper.
- Greet someone in a different language each day this week.
RankiSo languages grew apart like branches on a tree. Gracias, Tanki!
TankiDe nada, Ranki. That means “you’re welcome” in Spanish.
Big words
- Latin
- The language people spoke in ancient Rome, about 2,000 years ago.
- ancient
- From a very, very long time ago.
- cousins
- Here: languages that are related and share some words.
- sign languages
- Languages that use hands, faces and body movements instead of sounds.
- grammar
- The rules for putting words together in a language.
- deaf
- Not able to hear, or able to hear only a little.
Quick quiz
1. About how many languages are there in the world?
There are more than 7,000 languages spoken and signed around the world.
2. Which old language did Spanish, Italian and French grow out of?
Spanish, Italian and French all come from Latin, the language of ancient Rome.
3. How do sign languages work?
Sign languages are real languages that people speak with their hands, faces and bodies.
For parents and teachers
The large catalogues that linguists use currently list a little over 7,100 living languages, and many of them are spoken by small communities. A fun follow-up is to look for related words across languages, such as night, Nacht and nuit, and talk about how they might be connected. If your family speaks more than one language, that is a wonderful thing to share and celebrate.
Pictures marked “AI generated” were made with AI tools. Ranki and Tanki are AI generated characters. Found a mistake? Write to info@pr-geo.com and we will fix it.
