1. Michael Halliday's Seven Functions Of Language
1.1. According to Michael Halliday (1975), we are forced to interact with other people and with our environment. We therefore need a means of doing so. He
1.1.1. Instrumental Language = Language is used to fulfil a particular need
1.1.2. Regulatory Language = Language is used to influence others' behaviour
1.1.3. Interactional Language = Language is used to develop social relationships and ease the process of interaction (phatic communication) eg small talk
1.1.4. Personal Language = Language is used to express ideas, opinions and individual identity
1.1.5. Representational Language = Language is used to convey facts and information
1.1.6. Heuristic Language = Language is used to learn and explore the environment
1.1.7. Imaginative Language = Language is used to create an imaginary environment. May accompany play.
2. Chomsky's Language Acquisition Device
2.1. Children are born with an inherited ability to learn any human language. They could not possibly learn a language through imitation along
2.1.1. He believes all children are born with an instinct for a universal grammar, which makes them receptive to the common features of all languages.
2.1.2. Innate ability to acquire language
2.1.3. Grammatical/syntactic structures are innate: child only has to learn vocabulary
2.1.4. Errors arise from over generalising a rule
2.2. Support: -The stages of language development occur at roughly the same ages in most children, even though different children experience very different environments.
2.3. Children's language development follows a similar pattern across cultures
2.4. Children generally acquire language skills quickly and effortlessly
2.5. Deaf children who have not been exposed to a spoken language may make up their own language
2.6. Children make virtuous errors of tenses and syntax by applying deep language structures before they are aware of the correct forms
2.7. The subject-verb form of grammar is common to all languages and children seems to be aware of this structure even when they make up their own languages.
2.8. Against: Jerome Bruner's Language Acquisition Theory
3. Crystal's Stages Of Language Development
3.1. Stage One: This is where children say things for three purposes: To get something they want To get someone’s attention To draw attention to something
3.2. Stage Two: This is when children usually ask questions, “where” questions come first. Children become concerned with naming and classifying things. They may also begin to talk about the characteristics of things for example: big/small. Children are taught to learn things in opposite pairs such as up/down and hot/cold.
3.3. Stage Three: children would be asking lots of different questions but often signalling that they are questions with intonation alone. Begin to express more complex wants by using more grammatically correct language. Children refer to events in the past and less often in the future.
3.4. Stage Four: This is when children use increasingly complex sentence structures and begin to: Explain things Ask for explanations using the word: “why?” Making a wide range of requests: “shall I do it?”. They use complex sentence structures, have flexible language tools for expressing a wide range of meanings. The most remarkable development is their comprehension of language and use of abstract verbs for example “know” to express mental operations. Pragmatic understanding and suit their utterances to context or situation. Children also use negation (denial/contradiction). Able to use auxiliary verbs and may duplicate modal verbs “please, can I, may I”.
3.5. Stage Five: Children regularly use language to do all the things that they need it for. They give information, asking and answering questions, requesting directly and indirectly, suggesting, offering, stating and expressing.
4. Imitation Theory
4.1. This theory states that children learn by imitating speech they hear from adults and older children.
4.1.1. Support: Children not exposed to language do not speak eg. in 1920 two ‘feral’ children named Amala and Kamala were found in India having been reared with wolves – they had no language. Mention Skinner
4.1.2. Against: Children produce utterances that they will never have heard an adult produce. Even when a child is deliberately trying to imitate, s/he is unable to produce sentences beyond her grammatical capability. Cazden’s 1972 research – child repeatedly uses the form “holded” despite adult rephrasing the sentence several times with the correct form “held” – the child did not notice the difference.
5. Jean Aitchison Three Stages of a Child's Acquisition of vocabulary
5.1. "Language has a biologically organised schedule". In 1987, she identified three stages that occur during a child’s acquisition of vocabulary: labeling, packaging and network building.
5.1.1. -Labelling: The child learns the names of objects, processes and ideas.
5.1.2. -Packaging: The child tests out and learns the limit of the labels (this is where over- and under-extensions might occur)
5.1.3. -Networks: The child begins to understand the connections between things and realises that objects belong to categories - they would recognise that there is such a thing as ‘fruit’ and that ‘pineapple’ and ‘banana’ both belong to that category while ‘carrot’ belongs elsewhere.
6. B.F. Skinner Behaviourist Theory
6.1. Language is acquired by conditioning, the process whereby the child imitates the sounds around them and receives praise and approval.
6.2. We learn to speak the language we grow up with and adopt the accents of those around us.
6.3. Jim and Genie show the limitations of the theory of LAD.
6.4. Study 1: Bard and Sachs (1977) studied Jim, a child of deaf parents. His parents wanted him to speak normally and didn use sign language. He spent a lot of time watching TV. He learnt a lot of language but could not produce any himself until placed with a speech therapist. According to Chomsky’s theory, the LAD would have enabled Jim to speak but he failed to do so, suggesting that the LAD itself was not enough for Jim to learn to speak.
6.5. Study 2:
6.6. Genie was an infamous case of parental neglect. She was discovered in Los Angeles at the age of 13 tied to a chair in a small room in the family home where she had been confined throughout her life. She had no language and could only grunt. When she was in care she eventually began putting two, and, later, three words together . The rapid language development which would have been expected thereafter never materialised. Genie never appeared able to sequence words which Chomsky felt was critical in the LAD. This supports the idea that there is a critical period for native language acquisition. However it does not definitely prove or disprove any theories of an innate system for language acquisition.
6.7. Against:
6.8. The behaviourist theory is unlikely to account entirely for language acquisition.
6.9. Each child produces an infinite number of utterances, many of which they will never have heard before.
6.10. Children make virtuous errors of grammar and language which adults do not generally do.
6.11. Babies and children seem to pass through the same stages of language development.
6.12. Children correct their own language to a standard form even when adults do not correct them.
6.13. Children can understand more language than they are able to speak.
7. Eric Lenneberg Critical Age Hypothesis
7.1. Chomsky's initial theory was supplemented and popularised in 1967 by the linguist Eric Lenneberg.
7.2. He stated that the LAD must be activated at a critical period for native language acquisition to take place.
7.3. From birth to puberty is considered a sensitive time for acquisition of a native language.
7.4. Argues against Chomsky's LAD and is of the opinion that Chomsky was “brilliant but wrong”. He cites recent evidence from neurology,genetics and linguistics, all of which points to there being no innate programming. Ritchie appears to veer towards a more Skinner like view.
7.5. “Children learn language just as they learn their other skills, by experience”.
8. Katherine Nelson
8.1. Katherine Nelson’s work considers pragmatics, she classifies language according to its purposes or functions. She views language acquisition as a bridge between a child’s social and cultural growth with their growing knowledge of the world.
8.2. She believes thought precedes language and the children learn words that fit into the context of a scene. Nelson classified the word types within children’s early vocabularies.
8.2.1. Nelson identified two different types of children by their vocabularies:
8.2.1.1. - ‘Referential’ children had a vocabulary that was made up of at least 50% naming words - they used their language to refer to things and to describe the world around them.
8.2.1.2. - ‘Expressive’ children were those with a higher proportion of social and modifying words.
8.2.2. In Katherine Nelson's (1973) seminal study of 18 children's first words, she found that most had a word that was used in just this way before they learned 50 words – and six of the children had one among their first ten words.
9. Jean Piaget Stages of Language Development
9.1. Piaget believed that children are born with cognitive ability which develops along with the child and upon which all subsequent learning and knowledge is based: for Piaget, language development goes hand in hand with cognitive development.
9.2. Idea that language development depends on psychological maturity
9.3. He believed that children construct an understanding of the world around them and this understanding develops in four stages:
9.4. 1. Sensorimotor Stage: babies acquire their earliest knowledge through their physical actions and the sensations they experience. The stage lasts until the age of two. Feature: the development of object permanence for the child (they realise things apart from themselves have an independent existence eg, “ball”, “mummy”).
9.5. 2. Preoperational Stage: between the ages of two and five. Feature: able to think in more definite terms, the child thinks of the world in relation to themselves.
9.6. 3. Concrete operational stage: between the ages of five and twelve. Feature: the child is able to use language for situations outside their immediate experience. They understand conservation, the ability to see that a particular quantity will stay the same even if it is put into a different-shaped container.
9.7. 4. Formal operational stage:the final childhood stage, from the age of twelve, adolescents are able to understand abstract ideas and the language associated with them.
10. Lev Vygotsky
10.1. Cognitive theorist who developed Piaget's ideas of the stages of child development.The social interaction and guidance that a child receives determines their thinking and learning. He believed that learning could be accelerated through guidance and support.
10.1.1. According to Vygotsky (1978), much important learning by the child occurs through social interaction with a skillful tutor.
10.2. Learning takes place by interacting with the environment
10.3. Learning precedes development as a child is faced with situations that are unfamiliar and out of reach of what the child currently knows.
10.3.1. Vygotsky states cognitive development stems from social interactions from guided learning within the zone of proximal development as children and their partner's co-construct knowledge.
10.4. Through support the child bridges the gap (known as the Zone of Proximal Development) between present skills and knowledge and future achievements.
10.5. Appropriate and well-organised instruction allows achievable goals to be attained in the ZPD.
10.6. Vygotsky believed that language development acted as a stimulus to cognitive development.
10.7. The more knowledgeable other (MKO) assists the child in the ZPD
10.8. The concept of the More Knowledgeable Other is integrally related to the second important principle of Vygotsky's work, the Zone of Proximal Development.
10.9. This is an important concept that relates to the difference between what a child can achieve independently and what a child can achieve with guidance and encouragement from a skilled partner
11. Jerome Bruner
11.1. Chomsky's LAD has limitations which were addressed by Jerome Bruner, with the Language Acquisition Support System.
11.2. According to Bruner the innate abilities of the child (the LAD) are supported and brought out by parents, family and educators.
11.3. Adults provide ‘scaffolding’
11.4. The ‘peek-a-boo’ game is an early introduction to conversational turn-taking
11.5. Bruner, like Vygotsky, emphasized the social nature of learning, citing that other people should help a child develop skills through the process of scaffolding.
11.6. His theory stresses the role of education and the adult.
11.7. Interactional theorists, such as Jerome Brunner believe that the CDS (Child Directed Speech) used by parents 'scaffolds' a child's language acquisition and supports its development, and gave this system the title of LASS (Language Acquisition Support System), which actually links to Chomsky's nativist theory of the LAD.
11.8. -The LASS is particularly important between the ages of two and five, when the child’s language learning is most intense. This links with the idea that there is a critical period for native language learning to flourish.
12. Spanish priest St Ignatius of Loyola
12.1. ‘Give me a child for the first seven years and I will give you the man’. 16th Century
12.2. Highlights the fundamental importance of the family and wider circle in the young child’s environment.
13. Grice’s Maxims
13.1. Grice’s maxims of conversation are a collection of maxims proposed by linguist Paul Grice to describe principles that people intuitively follow in order to guide their conversations, in order to make their communicative efforts effective. There are four main maxims, which revolve around the quantity, quality, and relevance of what people say, as well as on the manner in which they say it.
13.2. While these maxims were originally meant to describe how people intuitively communicate, they can be used to actively guide the way you communicate in various situations. As such, in the following article you will learn about the maxims of conversation, and see what you can do in order to implement them in practice, so you can make your communication as effective as possible.
14. Harry Ritchie
14.1. Argues against Chomsky's LAD and is of the opinion that Chomsky was “brilliant but wrong”. He cites recent evidence from neurology,genetics and linguistics, all of which points to there being no innate programming. Ritchie appears to veer towards a more Skinner like view.
14.2. “Children learn language just as they learn their other skills, by experience”.
15. Basil Bernstein
15.1. One theory which links language with educational achievement is the restricted code and elaborated code, a theory by Basil Bernstein which was published in 1971.
15.1.1. Restricted code: language which assumes a shared understanding amongst the speakers. It is limited and generally uses a limited lexical range and syntax structure, and is used among members of a close-knit community such as a family.
15.1.1.1. The restricted code is briefer, more condensed and is context-bound (related to the particular situation such as those who are talking and where they are) so that only the immediate group are able to understand it.
15.1.1.1.1. Restricted code: - Simple and short sentences
15.1.2. Elaborated code: language used more broadly in society which is more complex in lexis and syntax.
15.1.2.1. The elaborated code explains things more fully so that everyone can understand it.
15.1.2.1.1. STick image of the two diagrams
16. Jean Berko Gleeson
16.1. A famous experiment was carried out by Jean Berko Gleeson in 1958 to show the application of grammatical rules by children.
16.2. A selection of children were shown the following picture of an imaginary creature which Berko Gleeson called a ‘wug’.
16.3. They applied the grammatical principle of adding ‘-s’ for plurals and replied ‘wugs’.
17. Roger Brown
17.1. “Brown's Stages” identified by Roger Brown 1925-1997. The stages provide a framework to predict the path that normal expressive language development in English usually takes.
17.1.1. Browns Stage I
17.1.1.1. 12-26 months, children are expected to have mean length of utterance measured in morphemes of about 1.75 morphemes.
17.1.1.2. In stage I they have built up a 50-60 word vocab
17.1.1.3. They have the ability to produce Stage I sentence types see above.
17.1.2. Stage II
17.1.2.1. 27-30 months
17.1.2.2. They learn to use “-ing” ending on verbs, “in”, “:on” and “s”, plurals.
17.1.2.3. Mean MLUm 2.0-2.5
17.1.3. Stage III
17.1.3.1. 31-34 months
17.1.3.2. They learn to use irregular past tense, possessives
17.1.3.3. Mean MLUm 2.5-3.0
17.1.4. Stage IV
17.1.4.1. 35-40 months
17.1.4.2. They learn to use articles, regular past tense, third present present tense
17.1.4.3. Mean MLUm 3.0-3.75
17.1.5. Stage V
17.1.5.1. 41-46+
17.1.5.2. They learn to use third person irregular, more complex sentence structures
17.1.5.3. Mean MLUm 3.75-4.5