Theorists

Question 1

What was Noam Chomsky’s theory?

Answer 1

Nativism; believed that learning takes place through an innate brain mechanism (LAD) lang. acquisition device

Question 2

What was Jean Berko and Roger Brown’s experiment?

Answer 2

Phonological errors, child substituting ‘fis’ for fish, but when an adult said “fis” they said no. When the adult asked about the ‘fish’ they responded still with ‘fis’.

Child unable to link adult use of ‘fis’ with the object

Question 3

What was BF Skinner’s theory?

Answer 3

Behaviourism; children imitate and copy adults, receiving pos or neg reinforcement which leads to conditioning of language

• Routine and ritual teaching politeness

Question 4

What did Eve Clarke’s study of first words show about extensions?

Answer 4

• Children overextend physical qualities of objects

- Taste, sound, movement, shape, size and texture

Question 5

What did Piaget say?

Answer 5

• Children are active learners who use their environment and social interactions to shape language
• Cognitive development; child cannot be taught before they’re ready

Question 6

What are Piaget’s 4 stages of development?

Answer 6

Sensorimotor; up to 2, experiences world through senses

Pre-operational; 2-7, language and motor skills develop, language is egocentric (focused on child)

Concrete operational; 7-11, child thinks logically about concrete events

Formal operational; 11+, abstract reasoning skills developed

Question 7

What are Bellugi’s negation stages?

Answer 7

1. No or not at beginning or end of sentences
2. No or not inside of sentence
3. Attaches negative to auxiliaries such as can’t and can use copula verb ‘be’ securely eg. I AM not

Question 8

What are Bellugi’s pronoun stages?

Answer 8

1. Uses own name
2. Recognises I and me but used in different places in sentence
3. Child uses them according to whether they are in the subjects or object position in a sentence

Question 9

What is CDS? Who?

Answer 9

Child directed speech or ‘parentese’; speech used by adults when talking to children to engage and interest a child

Jerome Brunner

Question 10

Examples of CDS

Answer 10

• Repetition
• Higher pitch
• Child’s name instead of pronouns
• Present tense
• Concrete nouns
• One word utterances
• Recasts
• Closed questions
• Exaggerated pauses for turn taking cues

Question 11

What is the ‘wug’ test?

Answer 11

By Jean Berko, child asked to say what two ‘wugs’ were and they successfully added the plural ‘s” even though they wouldn’t have heard it before

Question 12

What are Halliday’s functions?

Answer 12

Instrumental
Regulatory
Interactional
Personal
Representational
Imaginative
Heuristic

Question 13

Instrumental Halliday’s

Answer 13

Fulfilling a need

Question 14

Regulaltory Halliday’s

Answer 14

Attempting to influence other’s actions

Question 15

Interactional Halliday’s

Answer 15

To maintain relationships

Question 16

Personal Halliday’s

Answer 16

To share opinions, preferences and dislikes

Question 17

Representational Halliday’s

Answer 17

Conveying information

Question 18

Imaginative Halliday’s

Answer 18

To create fictional or fantasy worlds

Question 19

Heuristic Halliday’s

Answer 19

Used to discover more about the world

Question 20

What are John Dore’s language functions?

Answer 20

Labelling
Repeating
Answering
Requesting action
Calling
Greeting
Protesting
Practising

Question 21

Virtuous errors

Answer 21

Mistakes made when children are developing grammatically

Question 22

Overgeneralisations

Answer 22

When children over-generalise linguistic rules, such as adding ED to the end of past tense verbs like runnED or adding plural S

Question 23

What was Vygotsky’s theory?

Answer 23

Social interaction; two roles, to communicate and develop understanding, learning through play