Theories of Language Development

Theories of Language Development

• The Nativist Theory: Noam Chomsky

  • Humans have an innate language acquisition device (LAD)
    • It's part of the brain's structure
    • Enables learning and understanding language with exposure
    • Infants born with universal grammar for grasping syntax across languages
    • Uses innate mechanisms to learn and test language rules

• The Cognitive Development Theory: Jean Piaget

  • Language development is closely tied to stages of cognitive development
  • Language emerges as children achieve cognitive milestones (e.g., object permanence)
  • Once children mentally represent symbols, they form words and acquire language

• The Behaviorist Perspective: B.F. Skinner

  • Language is learned through environmental reinforcements
  • Infants associate stimuli with responses, and positive reinforcement encourages sound & behavior repetition
  • Operant conditioning: children imitate speech sounds, and positive reinforcement supports language development

• The Interactionist Perspective: Lev Vygotsky

  • Language development is primarily influenced by social interaction
  • Children acquire language through communication in various social contexts
  • This perspective emphasizes the role of social environments and interaction in language development, incorporating elements from various theories
  • Focuses on how children develop language skills through engaging with surroundings and communication patterns

Stages in Speech Development

• Primitive or Natural Stage:

  • Characterized by:
    • Emotional release
    • Social Reactions
    • Substitutes for objects and desires
      • Words learned by conditioning from parents and siblings
      • Linking words to objects frequently

• Naïve Psychology:

  • Children discover words have symbolic functions
  • Frequent questions about what things are called

• Egocentric Speech:

  • Children talk to themselves during play or work
  • Vygotsky saw this as a crucial developmental tool
  • Self-talk shapes thinking, as spoken words influence thought processes
  • Variations in egocentric speech with task difficulty and age

• Ingrowth Stage:

  • Children manipulate language in their heads, using soundless speech and logical memory
  • Employ inner signs for problem-solving

The Language Development Chart

• 6 Months:

  • Vocalization with intonation
  • Responds to name
  • Responds to human voices without visual cues (turning head and eyes)
  • Responds appropriately to friendly and angry tones

• 12 Months:

  • Uses one or more words with meaning (could be a fragment word)
  • Understands simple instructions, especially with vocal or physical cues
  • Practices inflection
  • Aware of the social value of speech

• 18 Months:

  • Vocabulary of approximately 5-20 words
  • Vocabulary mainly nouns
  • Some echolalia (repeating a word or phrase)
  • Much jargon with emotional content
  • Follows simple commands

• 24 Months:

  • Can name common objects
  • Uses at least two prepositions
  • Combines words into short noun-verb sentences
  • Sentence length averages 1.2 words
  • Approximately 2/3 of speech should be intelligible
  • Vocabulary of 150-300 words
  • Rhythm and fluency often poor
  • Uses pronouns "I," "me," "you" (sometimes confused)
  • "My" and "mine" are emerging
  • Responds to commands like "show me your eyes"

• 36 Months:

  • Uses pronouns "I," "you," "me" correctly
  • Uses plurals and past tenses
  • Knows at least three prepositions
  • Knows chief body parts and can indicate or name them
  • Handles three-word sentences easily
  • Has approximately 900-1000 words
  • 90% of speech should be intelligible
  • Verbs begin to predominate
  • Understands simple questions about environment and activities
  • Relates experiences logically
  • Answers questions about actions (e.g., sleeping, eating)
  • Knows sex, name, age (may not answer all questions)

• 48 Months:

  • Knows familiar animals
  • Uses four prepositions or demonstrates understanding
  • Names common objects in picture books
  • Knows one or more colors
  • Repeats four digits given slowly
  • Repeats words of four syllables
  • Understands "over" and "under"
  • Vowels, diphthongs, and consonants p, b, m, w, n established
  • Engages in make-believe
  • Extensive verbalization during activities
  • Understands concepts like "longer," "larger"
  • Follows simple commands even with objects out of sight
  • Repetitions of words, phrases, syllables, and sounds

• 60 Months:

  • Uses many descriptive words (adjectives and adverbs)
  • Knows common opposites (big-little, hard-soft)
  • Number concepts up to 4
  • Counts to ten
  • Speech is completely intelligible, articulation issues aside
  • Consonants m, p, b, h, w, k, g, t, d, n, ng, y mastered
  • Repeats nine-word sentences
  • Defines common objects based on use
  • Follows three commands without interruption
  • Knows age
  • Simple time concepts (morning, afternoon, night, day)
  • Uses long, compound, and complex sentences
  • Speech is grammatically correct

• 6 Years:

  • Mastered consonants: f, v, sh, zh, th, l
  • Number concepts up to 7
  • Speech is completely intelligible and socially useful
  • Tells connected stories about pictures
  • Understands relationships between objects and events

• 7 Years:

  • Mastered consonants: s-z, r, voiceless th, ch, wh, soft g (as in George)
  • Handles opposite analogies (girl-boy, flies-swims)
  • Understands terms like "alike," "different"
  • Tells time to the quarter hour
  • Simple reading and writing

• 8 Years:

  • Relates detailed accounts of past events
  • Uses complex and compound sentences
  • Few grammatical errors
  • All speech sounds, including consonant blends, established
  • Reads with ease
  • Writes simple compositions
  • Social amenities are present in speech
  • Control of rate, pitch, and volume are established
  • Can hold adult-level conversations
  • Follows complex directions
  • Well-developed time and number concepts

Emergent Literacy

• Children acquire knowledge and skills related to reading and writing before learning to read and write

• Developmental Frameworks:

  • Goodman (1986):
    • Five areas of progress in children's literacy development:
      • Print awareness in situational context
      • Print awareness in discourse
      • Functions and forms of writing
      • Oral language to talk about written language
      • Metacognitive and metalinguistic awareness about written language
  • McCormick and Mason (1986):
    • Hierarchy of knowledge and skills for learning to read:
      • Functions of print
      • Form of print
      • Beginning forms of writing
      • Grapheme knowledge
      • Grapheme-phoneme correspondence
      • Phonological awareness
  • Van Kleeck (1998, 2003) :
    • Components of Emergent Literacy:
      • Context processor
      • Meaning processor
      • Orthographic processor
      • Phonological processor
  • McNaughton (1955):
    • Emergent Literacy's framework is structured around initial family experiences and expertise:
      • Family practices

• Oral Language Skills:

  • Semantic knowledge
  • Syntactic knowledge
  • Narrative discourse
  • Conceptual knowledge

• Impact of Oral Language Skills on Reading Development:

  • Preschool and Kindergarten: Strong reciprocal relationship between code-related skills and oral language
  • First and Second Grade: Code-related skills impact reading, oral language has little influence
  • Third and Fourth Grade: Oral language has an indirect effect on reading comprehension

Explore the key theories of language development, including Nativist, Cognitive Development, and Behaviorist perspectives. This quiz will test your understanding of how these theories explain the process through which children acquire language. Delve into the contributions of Chomsky, Piaget, and Skinner.