STAGES OF ACQUISITION
What stage of language acquisition involves a child using a single word to express an entire meaning?
Holophrastic stage – A child uses a single word to communicate an entire meaning or sentence.
What linguistic level examines children's pronunciation and sound development?
Phonology – The study of speech sounds and sound patterns.
Which theorist identified seven functions of children's language?
Michael Halliday – Identified seven functions of children's language.
Who proposed the Language Acquisition Device (LAD)?
Noam Chomsky – Proposed the Language Acquisition Device (LAD), suggesting an innate capacity for language acquisition.
What does the transcription symbol (.) represent?
Micropause – (.) represents a brief pause lasting less than one second.
A child says, “more juice.” Which stage of language acquisition does this demonstrate?
Two-word stage – Children combine two words to express meaning, typically around 18–24 months.
A child calls every four-legged animal “dog.” Identify the semantic feature.
Overextension – Applying a word to a broader category than its conventional meaning.
A child says “stop it!” to control another person's behaviour. Identify Halliday's function.
Regulatory function – Language used to control or influence another person's behaviour.
Which theorist argued that imitation and reinforcement contribute to language acquisition?
B. F. Skinner – Behaviourist theory; children learn language through imitation and reinforcement.
What does the symbol // indicate in a spoken-language transcript?
Overlapping speech – // indicates that two speakers are speaking simultaneously.
A child says, “mummy get ball,” omitting grammatical function words. Identify the stage and one characteristic.
Telegraphic stage – Children use content words while omitting grammatical function words such as articles and auxiliaries.
A child says “goed” instead of “went.” Identify the grammatical process.
Overgeneralisation (virtuous error) – Applying a grammatical rule to an irregular word, such as adding -ed to “go.”
A child says “why?” to discover information. Identify Halliday's function.
Heuristic function – Language used to ask questions, explore, and learn about the world.
Identify the theorist associated with the Language Acquisition Support System (LASS).
Jerome Bruner – Proposed the Language Acquisition Support System (LASS), emphasizing caregiver scaffolding and interaction.
A child pauses for (2) before answering. What might this indicate about language processing?
Language processing or word searching – (2) represents a two-second pause that may indicate hesitation, planning, or searching for vocabulary.
Explain how reduplicated babbling differs from variegated babbling.
Reduplicated babbling involves repeating the same syllable, such as “mamama,” whereas variegated babbling involves different syllables, such as “badaga.”
A child says “wabbit” instead of “rabbit.” Identify and explain the phonological process.
Gliding – The child replaces the /r/ sound with /w/, producing “wabbit” instead of “rabbit.”
A toddler points at a toy and says “ball!” Identify Dore's function and a possible corresponding Halliday function.
Dore's labelling function – The child identifies an object by naming it. This may also serve Halliday's representational function by conveying information.
A caregiver helps a child perform a linguistic task just beyond what the child can accomplish independently. Identify the theorist and concept.
Lev Vygotsky – Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) – Children develop skills through assistance from a More Knowledgeable Other.
A child pronounces “think” as “fink.” Identify the phonological process and explain it.
Th-fronting – The dental fricative /θ/ in “think” is replaced by the labiodental fricative /f/, resulting in “fink.”
A three-year-old begins using inflections and more complex sentences. Identify the likely stage and explain two developmental changes.
Post-telegraphic stage – Children begin using grammatical inflections, function words, and increasingly complex sentence structures.
Distinguish between underextension and overextension, giving one example of each.
Underextension means using a word too narrowly, such as calling only the family pet “dog.” Overextension means using a word too broadly, such as calling all four-legged animals “dog.”
A child says “I'm a lion!” during pretend play. Explain its function using Halliday and evaluate why Dore's framework may be less appropriate.
Imaginative function – The child uses language for pretend play or creating imaginary situations. Halliday's framework is more appropriate because Dore's functions primarily describe speech acts in the one-word stage.
Evaluate one limitation of Skinner's behaviourist theory using children's virtuous errors.
Skinner's behaviourism cannot fully explain virtuous errors. Children produce forms such as “goed” that adults do not normally model. This suggests that children construct and apply grammatical rules rather than learning exclusively through imitation and reinforcement.
Analyse the following exchange. Identify two language features and connect them to a theory of child language acquisition. Child: “me runned.” Adult: “You ran, did you?”
Grammatical overgeneralisation and caregiver recasting. The child's “runned” demonstrates the incorrect application of the regular past-tense -ed rule. The adult's “You ran, did you?” demonstrates recasting, a feature of child-directed speech that supports Bruner's social interactionist theory through caregiver scaffolding.