NYSTCE -211 TEACHERS OF EARLY CHILDHOOD
(PART I)
Stages of Language Acquisition - Answers- 1. occurs around 2 months old; speech-like
sounds (e.g., goo, ga, ooo, ahh)
2. occurs around 6-7 months old; babbling of repetitive syllables (e.g., bababa) that
include phonemes from baby's native language
3. occurs around 12 months old; holophrastic or one-word utterance stage; babies
understand approximately 30-40 spoken words, and produce 3-4 words
4. occurs around 18 months old; babies recognize and point to objects when these
objects are named, follow simple directions, and can speak in simple 2-word sentences
(e.g., dog brown)
5. occurs at about 25 months and older; toddlers utter complex sentences containing 3
or more words
- by a child's 3rd birthday, they possess a vocabulary of about 450 words
- by 5 years old, children possess a vocabulary of 10K+ words
Language Acquisition - Answers- learning to speak and understand without direct
instruction
- connections to Noam Chomsky's universal grammar (grammatical features are hard-
wired into the brain)
- Broca's area: involved in language production
- Wernicke's area: involved in understanding language
Morphemes - Answers- the smallest units of meaning in a language
- free morpheme: can stand alone with a specific meaning (eat, date, weak)
- bound morpheme: cannot stand alone with meaning
Phonemes - Answers- smallest unit of sound
- vowel and consonant sounds, not all of which exist in English
- regardless of place of birth, infants are able to distinguish between all possible
phonemes until about 12 months old
- at about 12 months old, babies start imitating language
Base Morpheme - Answers- gives the word its essential meaning
- free base: woman in womanly
- bound base: suffix -sent in dissent
Affix - Answers- a bound morpheme that occurs before or after a base
- prefix: affix that occurs before the base; i.e., -ante, -pre, -un, -dis (all prefixes are
derivational)
- suffix: affix that occurs after the base; i.e., -ly, -er, -ism, -ness
(PART I)
Stages of Language Acquisition - Answers- 1. occurs around 2 months old; speech-like
sounds (e.g., goo, ga, ooo, ahh)
2. occurs around 6-7 months old; babbling of repetitive syllables (e.g., bababa) that
include phonemes from baby's native language
3. occurs around 12 months old; holophrastic or one-word utterance stage; babies
understand approximately 30-40 spoken words, and produce 3-4 words
4. occurs around 18 months old; babies recognize and point to objects when these
objects are named, follow simple directions, and can speak in simple 2-word sentences
(e.g., dog brown)
5. occurs at about 25 months and older; toddlers utter complex sentences containing 3
or more words
- by a child's 3rd birthday, they possess a vocabulary of about 450 words
- by 5 years old, children possess a vocabulary of 10K+ words
Language Acquisition - Answers- learning to speak and understand without direct
instruction
- connections to Noam Chomsky's universal grammar (grammatical features are hard-
wired into the brain)
- Broca's area: involved in language production
- Wernicke's area: involved in understanding language
Morphemes - Answers- the smallest units of meaning in a language
- free morpheme: can stand alone with a specific meaning (eat, date, weak)
- bound morpheme: cannot stand alone with meaning
Phonemes - Answers- smallest unit of sound
- vowel and consonant sounds, not all of which exist in English
- regardless of place of birth, infants are able to distinguish between all possible
phonemes until about 12 months old
- at about 12 months old, babies start imitating language
Base Morpheme - Answers- gives the word its essential meaning
- free base: woman in womanly
- bound base: suffix -sent in dissent
Affix - Answers- a bound morpheme that occurs before or after a base
- prefix: affix that occurs before the base; i.e., -ante, -pre, -un, -dis (all prefixes are
derivational)
- suffix: affix that occurs after the base; i.e., -ly, -er, -ism, -ness
