child language acquisition key terms/concepts

Question 1

what is innateness?

Answer 1

the concept of language being natural and instinctive and something we are all born with

Question 2

what is child directed speech?

Answer 2

the special way adults adapt their language when talking to children

Question 3

when is the average first word said with babies?

Answer 3

13 months

Question 4

what is babbling?

Answer 4

repeating a single syllable over and over eg. bababa dadada mamama

Question 5

what are bilabial sounds?

Answer 5

sounds produced using your lips eg.
b,p,m,w

Question 6

what is a phoneme?

Answer 6

a sound

Question 7

what are feral children?

Answer 7

children brought up without social interaction due to neglect
eg.
Genie Whitley was neglected for 13 years
Oxana Malaya was raised by dogs in Ukraine

Question 8

what is the critical period hypothesis?

Answer 8

the idea that there is a set period of time where language learning is possible, if this period has passed it means that the child won’t be able to learn language fluently
usually 10-13 years old

Question 8

what is cognitive ability?

Answer 8

a child’s ability to understand concepts, words, ideas etc.

Question 9

what is phonological development?

Answer 9

how children learn the sounds of language

Question 10

what is lexical development?

Answer 10

the process of learning words

Question 11

what is semantic development?

Answer 11

learning the meanings of words

Question 12

what is grammatical development?

Answer 12

how to organise and structure sentences

Question 13

what is phonemic expansion?

Answer 13

when the sounds produced by a baby increase

Question 14

what is phonemic contraction?

Answer 14

within a few months the sounds of a baby contracts to those present in their native language

Question 15

describe the concept of understanding coming before production

Answer 15

children can understand words before they can produce them / speak

Question 16

what is a semantic error?

Answer 16

an error to do with meanings

Question 17

what is syntax?

Answer 17

sentence structure / word order

Question 18

what are content words?

Answer 18

words that carry meaning
e.g. nouns and adjectives

usually babies say these first

Question 19

what are function words?

Answer 19

words that carry grammatical function e.g. determiners, conjunctions

babies learn to say these after content words

Question 20

what is pragmatical development?

Answer 20

a children’s ability to learn the unspoken rules of conversation
e.g. turn-taking, politeness

Question 21

what are inflections?

Answer 21

suffixes added to the end of words
e.g.
plural inflection: +s
possessive inflection:+’s
past tense verb inflection: +ed

Question 22

what is over-generalisation?

Answer 22

over using a grammatical rule
e.g.
runnED
sheepS
would be over-generalising the past-tense inflection

Question 23

what’s a virtuous error?

Answer 23

mistakes made by children while learning grammar

Question 24

what are irregular words?

Answer 24

words that don’t take the regular rule

Question 25

what is metalinguistic awareness?

Answer 25

understanding of the structures of language