Language Acquisition Beginnings of Language Development

Aims of Session To identify the stages of Language Acquisition To discuss the stages of Language Acquisition and to draw on our own experiences To produce a leaflet on the stages of Language Acquisition

TASK Page 3 Language Acquisition booklets.

Stages of development … NB: Children do not all develop at the same pace. However: Children all around the world do pass through the same set of stages. There is a universal pattern of development, regardless of the language being acquired.

Before birth … Evidence suggests that even in the womb, the growing baby acclimatises to the sounds of its native language. Mehler 1988: French new born babies were able to distinguish French from other languages.

Crying … First few weeks: child expresses itself vocally through crying. Signals hunger, distress or pleasure. Instinctive noise (so not language).

Cooing … Also known as gurgling or mewing. 6-8 weeks old. ‘Coo’, ‘ga-ga’ and ‘goo’. Child develops increasing control over vocal chords.

Babbling … Most important stage in the first year. 6-9 months old. Sounds begin to resemble adult sounds more closely.

Babbling … Consonant and vowel combinations: ‘ba’, ‘ma’ and ‘da’. Bilabial sounds most common (i.e. using the lips). When these sounds are repeated = reduplicated monosyllable

Babbling … These sounds have no meaning. Baby makes far more noise than before. Exercises and experiments with its articulators (parts of the body that make sounds).

Phonemic expansion … Phoneme: smallest element of sound in a language that can display contrast and hence change meaning or function of a word, e.g. initial sounds in ban and Dan. During babbling, number of different phonemes produced increases (expands).

Phonemic contraction … 9-10 months. Number of phonemes produced reduces to those found in the native language (contracts). Baby discards sounds not required.

Phonemic contraction … Evidence: noises made by children of different nationalities starts to sound different. Experiments: native adults have successfully identified babies from own country.

Intonation … Intonation patterns begin to resemble speech. Common: rising intonation at end of utterance. Other variations in rhythm/emphasis may suggest greeting or calling.

The first word … Somewhere around 12 months the child makes its first recognizable word.

New vocabulary … Acclimatised Instinctive Cooing Babbling Bilabial Reduplicated monosyllable Phonemic expansion Phonemic contraction

TASK Design a leaflet for expectant parents informing them of the stages in which their child will learn to produce sounds. You should use the material you have learnt today along with some of your own experiences (if you wish) Think of a title What information do you want to include? How will you present this information (e.g. bullet points, pictures etc.). Think about the layout.