How do children acquire

[Pages:3]Linguistics 288b

Acquisition 1

How do children acquire language?

By the age of five, children know most of their language system

But they do this without being taught Thus acquiring language is like learning

to walk We are "designed" to acquire language

What do children do?

They do not memorize all the words and all the sentences.

They learn to construct sentences. They learn to interpret sentences. They construct the "rules" that permit

them to use language creatively. No one teaches them these rules.

Theories of language acquisition

Do children learn through imitation?

a my pencil two foot What the boy hit?

Children do not hear these utterances.

Imitation?

Even when they try to imitate:

adult: He's going out. child: He go out. adult: Adam, say what I say: Where can I put

them? child: Where I can put them?

Do children learn through reinforcement?

Another view: children learn to produce grammatical sentences because they are positively reinforced.

child: Nobody don't like me. mother: No, say "Nobody likes me." child: Nobody don't like me. (repeated 8 times) child: Oh, nobody don't likes me.

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Do children learn through reinforcement?

Research shows that ungrammatical utterances are not corrected

Untrue utterances are corrected Attempts to correct language usually fail

Do children learn through analogy?

Children hear sentences and use them as a sample to form other sentences.

"I painted a red barn" "I painted a blue barn" "I painted a barn red." "I saw a red barn." * "I saw a barn red."

Do children learn through structured input?

"motherese", "baby talk", "child-directed speech"

In our culture, adults do tend to speak to children in a special way (more slowly, more clearly, exaggerated intonation)

But it is not syntactically simpler

Do children learn through structured input?

In many cultures adults do not use a special register to talk to children

In some communities adults hardly talk to babies

But children all acquire language in the same way

Innateness hypothesis

Children extract rules of grammar from their linguistic environment.

Children acquiring different languages and in different social and cultural conditions go through similar developmental stages.

Children acquiring sign language go through parallel stages.

Innateness hypothesis

Children are equipped with an innate template for language.

Universal Grammar

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Innateness hypothesis

Language acquisition is easy Language acquisition is rapid. Language acquisition is uniform. Language acquisition succeeds in spite

of impoverished data: incomplete and ungrammatical sentences, slips of the tongue, etc. Poverty of the stimulus.

Poverty of the stimulus

Question formation:

Jill is going up the hill. Is Jill going up the hill? Jack and Jill are going up the hill. Are Jack and Jill going up the hill?

Move the auxiliary verb to the front of the sentence.

Poverty of the stimulus

Question formation:

Jill, who is my sister, is going up the hill. *Is Jill, who my sister, is going up the hill? Is Jill, who is my sister, going up the hill?

Move the auxiliary of the main clause to the front of the sentence.

Children never make these kinds of mistakes.

Universal Grammar

Children acquire language quickly, easily and without help because they do not start from scratch.

They are not a "blank slate". Universal Grammar helps them extract

rules.

Critical period hypothesis

There is a special window for language acquisition.

Children who are isolated during the critical period never fully acquire language.

Critical period hypothesis

Genie: isolated until almost 14. Learned vocabulary, but limited syntax

and morphology. Deaf children who learn ASL before 12

do better in production and comprehension of complex signs.

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