Brief plan for conducting an essay regarding ‘Child Language Acquisition’ -

You have 1 hour and 15 minutes to complete this essay.

You are aiming to cover a sufficient amount in each of these 3 categories:

• Ao1-LANGUAGE
• Ao2-THEORY
• Ao3-CONTEXT

Introduction:

This is an easy opportunity to include Ao3 and gain context marks. For example, ‘Ruby is in the aunt’s kitchen, they appear to have a close relationship as she has great confidence when communicating with her Aunt’, ‘Ruby’s Aunt is the temporary caregiver for the day as her mother is having another child.’ A sentence which can be put into the majority of CLA essays would be ‘she is in the telegraphic stage but is demonstrating elements of progressing into the post-telegraphic stage, we can see this by most of her utterances being complete *QUOTE*’ .

Virtuous errors:

It is essential that you never refer to ‘mistakes’ when discussing virtuous errors, it is simply the child acquiring language. For example, ‘Ruby’s virtuous error ‘bitted’ is evidence for Chomsky’s LAD device. Ruby has applied the regular simple past suffix ‘ed’ to the irregular verb ‘bite’.’ When discussing virtuous errors, you can then include Chomsky as demonstrated above. It is advisable to discuss 3 virtuous errors.  ‘Semantic ability outstrips phonological ability’

Theorists:

Jean Berko-Gleeson conducted the wug test which is made up lexis which children then apply grammatical rules to. This should be included in this paragraph and you could find a verb where they have changed the morphology. However, this could be 2/3 paragraphs.

Skinner created a reinforcement theory, which discusses encouraging or discouraging the repetition of the lexis. For example, ‘Ruby’s caregiver repeats Ruby’s syntax, but slightly alters her language in order to correct it’

 

Caregiver’s paragraph:

‘Caregiver will subconsciously simplify their language in order to communicate with the child’. The child will be in the critical language acquisition stage and therefore learning and correcting language is essential. Lennenberg said about critical acquisition period 1967. Genie is a prime example of Lennenberg’s CAP, if you haven’t acquired language by the age of 7 or 8, you will not be able to communicate. Suggesting, Skinner and Chomsky are both correct.

Deb Roy& FOX P2:

Speech home project, analysed his owns child development, ‘gaga’ to water. Also, discuss FOX P2- contemporary research which highlights Chomsky is correct. This gene is a protein which is required for proper language development.

Transcript:

Lexis and grammar from the transcript, this ensures that you are using the essay and not just writing your pre-made essay.

Conclusion:

Context and a general summary. Although the study of CLA is relatively new, recent research and the identification of Fox P2, clearly shows Chomsky's LAD is likely to exist. However, it needs to be stimulated for children to fully develop language.

General points:

• Turn taking structure
• Abundance of interrogative syntax
• Use of determiners because of inability to use the correct lexis
• Caregiver shows numerous examples of power
• Politeness features
• 'we' inclusive pronoun
• Gender

SOME OF THESE TOPICS WILL NEED 2-3 PARAGRAPHS TO ENSUSURE ALL THE THEORISTS AND TOPICS ARE COVERED IN SUFFICENT DETAIL!

Exam revision:

Noam Chomsky:
Said that everyone has a language acquisition device in which is a mechanism which gives us the ability to obtain language.


Jean Piaget:
A child must understand a word before they use it.


Jean Berko-Glesaon:
Jean conducted a 'wug' test in a classroom environment. 'Wugger' 'Wugging'. Although the lexis 'wug' was a made up word, the children were able to subconsciously apply the grammatical rules to the lexis. Proves that children learn plurals off by heart.


David Crystal:
Children learn language through copying and imitating others, this is how children develop accents.


A child never makes a mistake, always a virtuous error. Every virtuous error that is made, the child is learning a valuable lesson and is altering their language appropriately.


Vygotsky says that role play assists the children in learning the world around them.


Brown (1973) studied children’s language development between the ages of 20 months and 36 months and found the sequence shown below occurred regularly. The features are also listed in the order in which they were acquired:

1)    –ing

2)    plural ‘-s’

3)    possessive ‘-s’

4)    the, a

5)    past tense –ed

6)    third person singular verb ending – s (eg): he sings

7)    auxiliary verb ‘be’  (eg): I am dancing

Skinner:

Reinforcement theory, you learn from positive and negative reinforcement, and punishment. Encouraging or discouraging repetition of the lexis.