LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT

• Five Stages of Language Development in Early Childhood:

  1. Cooing Stage
  2. Babbling Stage
  3. One-Word Stage
  4. Two-Word Stage
  5. Telegraphic Stage
• Human language is primarily a communication system

  • It is productive since a finite number of linguistic units and a finite number of rules are capable of yielding an infinite number of grammatical utterances
  • “We are capable of communicating facts,, opinions and emotions, regardless of whether they occurred in the past, are occurring in the present, or will occur in the future.”
• Language is a symbolic system

  • Words and parts of words represent meaning
  • Units of a language refer to things other than themselves
  • Symbols are conventional
• Pragmatic system

  • The abilities that enable us to communicate in a social context
  • Involves cognitive and social skills
  • Conversations take place when participants take turns responding
• Turn-taking requires individuals to alternate between the roles of listener and speaker

  • Effective turn-taking requires recognizing when a response is necessary and appropriate
  • Minimizing unnecessary interruptions is an important aspect
  • Appropriate turn-taking is an important aspect of conversation maintenance
  • Adults contribute a great deal to the structure and maintenance of conversations with young children
  • It first appears between mothers and infants
• Turn-taking in infancy


  Nursing involves a non-verbal type of turn-taking
• Modalities of non-verbal turn-taking


  • Touching
  • Vocalizations
• Touch


  Used to initiate exchanges, soothe each other, communicate emotional states, and involved in infants’ imitation of others
• Facial imitation occurs at 3 months
• Vocal imitation occurs at 12 months
• The first attempts to initiate (non-verbal) interactions often focus on directing the adult’s attention to the infant or an object
• Infants learn to coordinate gestures, looks and vocalizations

  1. Responding

  2. Over time

  3. To communicate intents and wants
• Infants learn to coordinate gestures, looks and vocalizations over time to communicate their intents and wants between 12 to 18 months
• As children acquire language


  They become more verbal than gestural
• • It is also involved in the infants’ imitation of others.
  • Facial imitation (3 months)
  • Vocal imitation (12 months)
• • Touch is used to:
  • Initiate exchanges
  • Soothe each other
  • Communicate emotional states.
• • The first attempts to initiate (non-verbal) interactions often focus on directing the adult’s attention to the infant or an object
  • Point or reach toward an interested object (8 months)
  • Through responding, infants learn to coordinate gestures, looks and vocalizations over time to communicate their intents and wants (12 to 18 months)
  • As children acquire language, they become more verbal than gestural
• Phonology


  Concerned with the perception and production of sounds in language
• Speech stream
• Infants learn to divide or segment the speech stream into meaningful units
• Infant-directed speech (motherese)


  • Higher pitch
  • More exaggerated pitch contours
  • Larger pitch range
  • More rhythmic
• Infants prefer to listen to human speech
• 1. month infants are able to recognise familiar words in an uninterrupted speech stream
• 1. month infants are capable to segment the speech stream into words
• 1. month infants are able to remember the words that they have segmented
• Young infants use a variety of cues to determine when words begin and end in the speech stream
• Strongly stressed syllables


  Cues used by young infants to determine word boundaries
• • Facilitated by the nature of infant-directed speech or motherese
  • Higher pitch
  • More exaggerated pitch contours
  • Larger pitch range
  • More rhythmic
• • Infants learn to divide or segment the speech stream into meaningful units
  • Facilitated by the nature of infant-directed speech or motherese
  • Higher pitch
  • More exaggerated pitch contours
  • Larger pitch range
  • More rhythmic
  • Infants also prefer to listen to human speech
  • 7-month infants are:
  • Able to recognise familiar words in an uninterrupted speech stream
  • Capable to segment the speech stream into words
  • Able to remember the words that they have segmented
  • Young infants use a variety of cues to determine when words begin and end in the speech stream
  • Strongly stressed syllables
• • 7-month infants are:
  • Able to recognise familiar words in an uninterrupted speech stream
  • Capable to segment the speech stream into words
  • Able to remember the words that they have segmented
• • Speech Production
  • Speech production lags developmentally compared with speech perception
  • Reflects the difficulty of learning to control the vocal cords, mouth, tongue and lips
  • Phases of vocal production.
  • Reflexive vocalizations (Birth-2 months)
  • Cooing and Laughing (2-4 months)
  • Babbling and Vocal Play (4-6 months)
  • Canonical Babbling (6-10 months)
  • Modulated Babbling (10 months onwards)
• • Phases of vocal production.
  • Reflexive vocalizations (Birth-2 months)
  • Cooing and Laughing (2-4 months)
  • Babbling and Vocal Play (4-6 months)
  • Canonical Babbling (6-10 months)
  • Modulated Babbling (10 months onwards)
• The development of articulation

  • Children are more likely to use words that they can pronounce
  • The capacity of speech articulation reflects a combination of hereditary an environmental factors
  • Maturation plays an important role in articulation development
  • Children must hear adult sounds to determine sounds and sound distinctions that are relevant in language
  • Sound production is important in that it enables children to practise and improve their articulatory skills
• The Development of the Syntactic System
• Syntax


  Deals with how words and parts of words are related to one another to produce grammatical sentences
• Children's language development stages

  1. Single word utterances (10-18 months)

  2. Two words at a time (18-24 months)

  3. Rapid increase of syntactic knowledge (24-36 months)
• Children begin to produce single word utterances at 10-18 months
• Most children begin to produce two words at a time at 18-24 months
• Children consistently use the words that convey the most meaning
• Children’s knowledge of language and their use of this knowledge are limited