First Language Acquisition Flashcards
Wk 7
What is acquisition?
gaining linguistic competence without conscious attention to language form.
example: first or native languages (L1)
what is language learning?
conscious studying of grammar and vocabulary to learn a language.
- typically applied to learning in a structured setting (classroom)
- referred to as second language acquisition (L2)
innateness hypothesis
we are born with the innate ability to learn a language (or grammar).
universal listeners
how young babies are able to distinguish all sounds of human language.
what is the pacifier sucking experiment
it is an experiment done in newborns to determine what happens when they hear sounds that they have never heard before. babies are exposed to new sounds and we see how they react to them by their pace of sucking.
why is pacifier sucking experiment used
at the newborn age, the babies ability to do other forms of reacting (head turning, or eye gazing) are not fully developed enough.
what is the head turning experiment?
babies associate the change in sound to an appearance in toy and turn their heads in anticipation when a new sound is hear.
what age/stage do babies
- prefer to listen to speech/language over natural sounds
- react to new sounds
- not respond to sound signals that never signal phonemes contrasts in any human language
- ignore the non-linguistic aspects of speech signal
first sounds/ 0-6 months
content words are
nouns, adjectives, such as hope, jump, happy
function words
determiners (the, a, this) and conjunctions (and, or)
which consonants are frequently used in babbling
[p] as in paw
[d] as in dada
[m] as in mama
[g] as in good
how do babies born deaf babble?
vocalizations are qualitatively different from hearing babies. unsystematic, non-repetitive, and random
if exposed to sign language they will babble with their hands.
what and when do/is canonical babbling?
around 8 months babies will start to produce babbling with receptive consonant vowel alterations. ex. bababa or gigigi
what can happen if i child does not babble on schedule?
babies that do not babble on schedule can develop a speech delay or indicate hearing loss
what is stage 2 of language acquisition, and what age does it occur
Babbling, 6-8 months
what sounds do infants produce during early babbling
infants produce many sounds that do not occur in the language of their parents. ex. english infants produce clicks.
sounds that are easy to see and make are the first that babies babble.
what is stage 3, and what age does it occur
one word (holophrastic), one year
how do children use one word?
one word can have many meanings and often babies will use 1 word as a full sentence.
ex. dada can mean
- here comes dad!
- this is for dad.
- this is where dad sits.
- this shoe is dad’s.
why are some phrases part of one word? ex. stop it
because babies will memorize phrases like stop it as one word - stopit. they do not know of the structure of the word/sentence just the meaning.
what is monosyllabic?
when children’s first words are in (CV) form. ex. [sa] for sock, or [ma] for mommy.
what is ‘Fis-phenomenon’?
an experiment showing how children at this stage can comprehend and perceive many more sounds than they can produce.
ex. child referred to their plastic fish as ‘fis’
- when asked “is this your fis” the child says no
- when asked “is this your fish” the child says “yes my fis”
what is stage 4, what age does it occur?
two-word phase, 2 years old.
how does stage 4 start?
syntax begins by stringing 2 words together
ex. i sit, i shut, i see.
what is stage 5, and what age does it occur?
telegraphic stage, from 2-3 years old.
