Chapter Five- Lexical Development: Learning Words

Question 1

What is Lexical Development

Answer 1

learning words

Question 2

What is a Word?

Answer 2

• are arbitrary symbols that can be used to refer to things

- a sound sequence that symbolizes meaning and can stand alone

Question 3

what is a mental lexicon?

Answer 3

• our mental lexicon refers to the mental dictionary that stores our word knowledge

Question 4

How many words on average does a collage student know?

Answer 4

150 000 words

Question 5

How many words does a first grader know?

Answer 5

14 000 words

Question 6

What is included in our knowledge of words

Answer 6

1. how to pronounce the words (articulation)
2. what the words mean
3. Grammatical information (nouns, verbs etc)

Question 7

Major milestones of language development

Answer 7

Communication: intentional communication
Phonology: vocal play and canonical babbling
lexicon: first word
Grammar: first word combinations

Question 8

First words in comprehension and production

Answer 8

• first word in comprehension 10-11 months

- first words in production 10-15 months (1 year)

Question 9

What are the different types of first words

Answer 9

1. Specific Nominals - mommy
2. General Nominals - dog, ball, milk
3. Action words- go, up, look
4. Social words- please, no
5. Modifiers - big, outside, mine
6. grammatical function words - is, for, what

Question 10

When do children acquire their first 50 words

Answer 10

happens slowly and usually between 15-24 months

• contains more nouns than verbs
• contains words for common childhood routines (all gone , bye bye)

Question 11

What is a noun?

Answer 11

• Person, place thing
• children say more nouns
• easy to perceive and are stable

Question 12

What is a verb?

Answer 12

• refers to actions and are relational

- relationship between objects

Question 13

What are over-extensions?

Answer 13

• when children use a word in more context than they should

eg. referring to all men as daddy

Question 14

What are underextensions

Answer 14

• when children use a word fewer contexts than they should

eg. using dog only for poodles

Question 15

What are Context-bound words

Answer 15

words might be used only in certain contexts, and only for some functions
eg. child only uses the word duck when he is in the bath with his rubber duck

Question 16

What are Referential words?

Answer 16

• over time context bound words become decontextualized and more flexible and referential
• the create referential meaning that is not context bound, more input and variety among experiences are needed to develop

Question 17

What are Word Spurts?

Answer 17

• after children reach 50 word mark (around 18 months) they acquire words much faster after
• controversial opinions

Question 18

What are the individual differences in first words?

Answer 18

• context bound words are more frequent for some more than others
• less analytic children about language and learn more holistic chunks
• bigger risk taking children may be more open to talking before they are certain about word meaning
• Highly sociable children may value success in specific social situations over learning individual words

Question 19

What are Holistic Chunks?

Answer 19

eg. dontdothat

this is treated a single item to children speaking in holistic chunks

Question 20

What are referential style words?

Answer 20

• use comparatively more nouns and fewer social expressions

- referential children tend to say their first word later than expressive children

Question 21

What are expressive style words?

Answer 21

More social expressions and fewer referential nouns

Question 22

Individual differences in rate of word learning

Answer 22

range in productive vocabulary size for 16 month olds is between 0 and 160 words
-MacArthur-Bates communicative inventory used to measure this

Question 23

What is Speech Segmentation

Answer 23

• speech is not produced with spaces between them, the child must find the word boundaries in a continuous stream of sound
• knowing where the words start and end in a sound system
  eg. LMNOP

Question 24

Mapping problem (Indeterminacy of word meaning)

Answer 24

how do kids know that when u show them a cup and tell this this is a cup, how do they know you are referring to the whole cup and not just the handle or the colour or the context etc

Question 25

how many words a day do children learn on average in the first 6 years

Answer 25

9

Question 26

fast-mapping

Answer 26

when a child who has heard a new word only once have already developed hypotheses about what that word means. though this is not a complete understanding of what it means

Question 27

What are Lexical Constraints

Answer 27

limit the possibilities that children consider when encountering a new word

Question 28

What are the two hypothesis of lexical constraints

Answer 28

1. whole-object assumption

2. mutual-exclusivity assumption: different words refer to different kinds of things