A-Level AQA English Language - Child Language Acquisition

1. What does the Behaviourist approach say about language acquisition? 2. What did Skinner suggest? 3. Limitations of Behaviourism - Virtuous Errors. 4. Limitations of Behaviourism - Developmental Milestones. 5. Limitations of Behaviourism - David McNeill. 6. Limitations of Behaviourism - Critical Period. A-Level AQA English Language - Child Language Acquisition Children acquire language through imitation and reinforcement. Skinner suggested that a child imitates the language of its parents or carers. Successful attempts are rewarded (positive reinforcement) as the caregiver will praise the child for using the correct word. Undesirable behaviour is simply not rewarded (negative reinforcement). Mistakes made by children show that they are actively working out and applying rules of language. For example, a child who says 'drinked' instead of 'drank' is over-applying a rule. The 'mistakes' occur due to irregular verbs. The vast majority of children go through the same stages of language acquisition apart from extreme cases like Genie. The sequence of steps for language acquisition seems to be largely unaffected by the treatment the child receives. Children are often unable to repeat what an adult says, especially if it is a structure the child has not yet started to use. For example, David McNeill proved this. Data - The child is asked to say 'Nobody likes me' several times by the mother but can only say 'Nobody don't like me' or 'Nobody don't likes me'. Children who have not acquired language by the age of about seven will never entirely catch up. For example, Genie. Lenneberg coined the term 'critical period' in reference to the period of early childhood when children must be exposed to social interaction and language in order to master it for themselves. 7. Bee found that while motherese can be used to explain how aspects of individual children's environments help or 2 / 11 Limitations of Behaviourism - Bee (1989). 8. What does the Innate Theory suggest about language acquisition? 9. What is the Language Acquisition Device (LAD)? 10. Universal Grammar - Chomsky 11. What was the Wug Test? 12. Evidence to support the Innateness Theory - Slobin. hinder them from talking, it doesn't explain the underlying causes of language acquisition. Chomsky argued that children must have an inborn faculty for language acquisition. The process is biologically determined. A child is able to interpret what it hears through the natural faculty LAD. Chomsky stated that all human languages share common principles. It is the child's task to establish how the specific language they hear expresses these underlying principles. For example, the LAD contains the concept of verb tense and the children work this out through hearing words. The notion that all human language possess similar grammatical properties which the brain is 'hard wired' to be able to decode and use. Jean Berko Gleason: The Wug test was designed to investigate the acquisition of the plural and other inflectional morphemes in children. It aimed to show that children learn language through patterns and not imitation. A child was shown a bird-like drawing called a 'wug'. They were then showed another 'wug'. Children who successfully acquired the allomorph /s/ of the plural morpheme will respond with 'wugs'. 76% of 4 and 5 year olds responded correctly with 'wugs' meaning that children's understanding of morphology goes beyond what they have been taught. Slobin has pointed out that human anatomy is peculiarly adapted to the production of speech. We have evolved a vocal tract which allows the precise articulation of a wide repertoire of vocal sounds. Also, Broca's area and Wernicke's area of the brain have been identified as being involved in speech development. 3 / 11 13. Evidence to support the Innateness Theory - Sign Language. 14. Limitations of the Innateness Theory - Chomsky. 15. Limitations of the Innateness Theory - Bard and Sachs (1977). 16. What does the Cognitive Theory say about language acquisition? 17. What is seriation? 18. What is object permanence? Sign language is a complex and fully grammatical language. Children learning to sign as a first language pass through similar stages to hearing children learning spoken language. Children who have never learnt speech through hearing but can use sign language shows that language is an innate ability. Chomsky's work on language was theoretical. He didn't study real children. It doesn't take into account the interaction between children and their carers. It also doesn't take into account the functions of language. Bard and Sachs published a study of a child known as Jim, the hearing son of deaf parents. Jim's parents wanted him to learn speech. He watched a lot of TV and listened to the radio. However, his progress was limited until a speech therapist was enlisted to work with him. Piaget argued that a child has to understand a concept before they can acquire the particular language form which expresses that concept. Language can't develop until cognitive development occurs. For example, a child can't use comparative adjectives like 'small', 'smaller' and 'smallest' until they understand the concept of size. There will be a point in a child's intellectual development when they can compare objects with respect to size. Piaget suggested that a child who hadn't yet reached this stage wouldn't be able to learn and use comparative adjectives like 'bigger' or 'smaller'. During the first year of life, children seem unaware of the existence of objects they can't see. By 18 months, they have realised that objects have an existence independently of their perception. There is a link between object permanence and the learning of labels for objects. 19. Nelson and others, using this cognitive processing explanation, think language is an extension of the child's 4 / 11 Limitations of the Cognitive Theory - Nelson (1985). 20. Limitations of the Cognitive Theory - Vygotsky. 21. What does the Interactionist Theory say about language acquisition? 22. Features of Child Directed Speech 23. Child Directed Speech - Expansion 24. Child Directed Speech - Recast 25. Child Directed Speech - Mitigated Imperatives 26. IRF Structure (initiation, response, feedexisting meaning making capacity. This fits with the fact that children will generally begin to engage in pretend play at about the same time as their first words are expressed, indicating they are using symbols in the form of words and also symbolic pretend objects. Zone of proximal development - 'The distance between the actual development level as determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more capable peers.' This theory stresses the importance of language input from care-givers. Language can only be learnt in the context of interaction. Bruner suggests that the language behaviour of adults when talking to children (child-directed speech or CDS) is specially adapted to support the acquisition process. This is known as scaffolding. 1) Change in pitch 2) Slower and clearer speech 3) Repetition 4) Grammatically simpler sentences 5) Tag Questions 6) Use of nouns in place of pronouns When a caregiver develop or add detail to a child's utterance When a caregiver repeats the child's utterance but provides a corrected version An instruction given in a way that means that it doesn't appear as a command - but a more gentle suggestion (This is a politeness strategy). This was originally suggested as a way of analysing educational discourse but is also a useful construct in early childhood conversation, as the aim is often to educate. A-Level AQA English Language - Child Language Acquisition. Study online at 5 / 11 back) - Sinclair and Coulthard (1975) 27. Jean Berko Gleason (1975) 28. Shieffelin and Ochs (1984) 29. What is the Language Acquisition Support System (LASS)? 30. What did Wells find (1987)? 31. Limitations of the Interactionist Theory. 32. What do Karmiloff and For example, Mother asks 'What do we say to Granny?' Child responds with 'Thank you.' Mother praises child for correct response by saying 'Well done Timmy.' This is one of many ways that child directed speech can be used to model pragmatic/discourse conventions. Jean Berko Gleason identified that father's tended to use more commands and teased their children a little more. She found that fathers referred the children to their mothers if domestic needs arose. Mothers tended to use less complex constructions and were more sensitive and responsive to their children. (This study may be a little outdated). Shieffelin and Ochs have studied how language is acquired in different cultures. Although it is generally regarded as important that caregivers employ child directed speech, this is not a universal concept. The Kaluli Tribe in Papua New Guinea has been identified as not using specific child directed speech and yet the children do not experience late language acquisition as a result. 1) Gaining attention - Drawing the baby's attention to a picture. 2) Query - Asking the baby what the object is. 3) Label - Telling the baby what the object is. 4) Feedback - Responding to a baby's utterance. Wells showed that the rate of language development at 30 months is related to the proportion of mother's speech to the child during shared activities such as joint book-reading, play or sharing household chores. We have seen that there are cultures in which adults don't adopt special ways of talking to children, so CDS may be useful but seems not to be essential. They argue that none of these theories are able to explain language on its own. We need to take all of them into account. A-Level AQA English Language - Child Language Acquisition. Study online at 6 / 11 Karmiloff-Smith argue? (2001) 33. Features of the Crying to communicate a physical need to their caregiver Pre-verbal Stage like hunger. Cooing is used as an attempt of a response (0-12 months). by the infant. From 6 months onwards babies are able to point to things as an answer to a question. 34. Features of This is when the child starts to produce one-word utthe Holophras- terances. These one word-utterances can mean a whole tic Stage (12-18 sentence. For example they could say 'juice', implying they months). want some more juice. Neologisms are common if the infant can't pronounce the word they require. Intonation is used to signify different meanings. 35. Features of the Two-word utterances usually contain two nouns or a noun Two-Word Stage and a verb. For example, 'dog bark' meaning 'the dog is (18-24 months). barking'. Pronunciation is inconsistent with words being shortened and syllables being under stressed. They start to experiment with inflections. They also begin to ask questions with intonation. 36. Features of The child starts to produce longer and more complex the Telegraph- grammatical utterances. Syntax appears to be in the coric Stage (24-30 rect order. the child's vocabulary extends massively. Promonths). nunciation of words isn't always accurate. Suffixes are sometimes overused, for example 's' to mark plural nouns like 'information' into 'informations'. Present participles are more likely to be used. 37. Halliday's Func- Phase One: 9-12 months tional Language Instrumental - Language as a means to obtaining material Model needs, e.g. generalised requests for objects. Regulatory - Language to control the behaviour of others, e.g. request for an action to be performed. Interactional - Language to communicate with others, e.g. Vocalisation upon appearance of person. Personal - Language for direct expression of feelings,