Chapter 1 Flashcards
Why is information about child language development important?
We need to recognize what is typical and what is not typical so we can intervene as early as possible in children’s lives
Over 70% of America’s prisoners
Cannot read above a 4th grade level
What is Linguistics?
- Linguistics is the study of language
- 2 types of linguistics:
- Sociolinguistics
- Developmental
What is Sociolinguistics?
- Describes language variations based on social and cultural variables
Ex: Being really personal in a culture. (The Philippines is a more personal culture and asks personal questions)
What is Developmental Linguistics?
- Describes nature of emerging language in child’s language acquisition
- Where the kids should be right now with language development
What is communication?
- Exchange of information and ideas, needs, and desires between 2 or more individuals
- Tool for social action
- Lets you get stuff done, lets us communicate
- We are trying to accomplish something
Communicative competence
the degree to which the speaker is successful in communicating appropriately and effectively
What are the two parts of communication?
Speech and Language
Nonlinguistic cues in communication:
- Gestures
- Head and body movement
- look at where the kids communicate
- Eye contact
- Facial Expression
- Body Posture
- Make sure the kids touch the floor
- These vary based on culture
- Home rules and school rules are different
Paralinguistic Cues in Communication:
- Pauses
- Speed (talking to fast)
- Intonation (use of pitch)
- Stress or emphasis
What are Metalinguistic Skills?
The ability to talk about language, analyze it, think about it, judge it, and see it as an entity separate from its content or out of context
What is Speech?
- Verbal means of communicating
- Involves precision in planning and executing specific motor sequence
What is language?
Language is a system of symbols(words) used to represent concepts formed through exposure and experience
A child need to have:
- Exposure and experience
- you cant develop pictures without experience or ever being to a place
3 Properties of Language:
- Social Tool
- Rule- governed system with underlying rules or patterns that occur repeatedly
- It is generative
What is Linguistic competence?
- A language user’s underlying knowledge about the system of rules
- Cannot be measured directly
- We can only directly measure linguistic performance
What is linguistic performance?
- Linguistic knowledge in actual usage
- What we observe
Language is generative:
- Using a finite set of rules and words
- Speakers can generate an infinite number of sequences
What are the language components?
Morphology, Semantics, Phonology, Syntax, Pragmatics
What is Phonology?
-Aspect of language concerned with the rules governing the structure, distribution, and sequencing of speech sounds and the shape of syllables
-We have the IPA
-English orthography is problematic:
Ex:Bough, thought, rough, though, through
What is Morphology?
- Concerned with the internal organization of words
- Words consist of morphemes
- Free and Bound Morphemes
What is a free morpheme?
Free morphemes are independent and can stand alone
What is a bound morpheme?
Bound morphemes cannot function independently—must be attached to free morphemes
What are Derivational morphemes?
- Include prefixes and suffixes
- Change whole classes of words
Ex: Happy (adjective) —> Happily (adverb)
What are Inflectional morphemes?
- Are suffixes only
- Change the state or increase the precision of the free morpheme
- Things like plural –s, past tense -ed
The new Common Core State Standards
- Really emphasize morphological awareness skills
- Kids who have trouble with this have trouble reading
What is Syntax?
- Form or structure of a sentence
- Refers especially to word order
- Each sentence needs a noun phrase and a verb phrase
What is Semantics?
Word meaning
- World knowledge and word knowledge
What is world knowledge?
Person’s autobiographical and experiential understanding and memory of particular events
What is word knowledge?
Verbal and contains word and symbol definitions
What are synonyms?
Different words that carry similar meanings
Ex: Scared/afraid
Beautiful/pretty
Hard/difficult
In therapy for LI (language impaired) students we:
- Teach synonyms- take a word they know and give them a more sophisticated way to say it.
Ex: Tired—> Fatigued
What are Antonyms?
- opposites
- 2 types: Binary Antonyms and Gradable Antonyms
What are Binary Antonyms?
- No middle ground
Ex: (alive vs. dead)- you cant be kind of pregnant
What is Gradable Antonyms?
- Represent 2 different points on a continuum
Ex: (attractive vs. homely)- theres a middle between hot and cold.
What is Pragmatics?
- Rules govern conversational interactions
- Social rules of language
- Social Language
What is discourse?
- Set of utterances used to convey a message
- Conversation
2 types of speech acts:
Indirect and Direct
What is Indirect speech act?
-several possible interpretations, politer Ex: "I like people who come to class early" -Can be taken in different ways
What is Direct speech act?
-Only has one interpretation
Ex: “Please pass the butter.”
What are Important aspects of pragmatics?
- Turntaking
- Establishing and maintaining a topic
- Making relevant contributions
- Repair-correcting conversational errors
Cooperation principle-4 aspects:
- Quantity is important- don’t give too much or too little information
- Truthful and based on sufficient evidence
- Relevant
- Direct- Avoid vagueness
What are Dialects?
- variations that characterize the languages of a particular group
- Each dialect shares a common set of grammatical rules with the standards language
- Dialects are mutually intelligible
Dialect use is influenced by 5 factors:
- Geography
- Socioeconomic
- Racial and ethnic differences
- Situational variables
- Registers are situationally- influenced language variations
- Style shifting
- Peer group
What is style shifting?
Switching back and forth between formal and informal registers
The most common American English dialects:
- Standard American English (textbooks, TV)
- 10 regional dialects (e.g., Southern and Appalacian; these are not on test 1)
- African American English
- Asian English
- Latino English
What is a phoneme?
Specific sounds
Suprasegmental Devices
They can change the form and meaning of a sentence by acting across elements, or segments of a sentence
Deficit Approach
Each dialect has a different relative status
Sociolinguistic Approach
Views each dialect as an equally valid rule system
What are registers?
Situationally influenced language
What is a vernacular?
Causual, informal, or intimate register
What is code switching?
From one language to another
