All normal 

children who grow up in normal households, surrounded by conversation,

will acquire the language that is being used around them.

Have you ever wondered how humans are able to learn, process, comprehend and speak a
language? In this lesson on language acquisition, we'll take a look at some distinctions between
languages and learn how babies come to understand and speak a language.
Once we fully understand language's complexity, it seems truly amazing that babies can learn to
speak and understand without direct instruction. Studies of language acquisition are an important
part of infant psychology that shed light on how our minds process language even as adults. We'll go
over some debates in the field of language acquisition, take a look at an experiment used to study
infants' abilities to understand speech and finally go over some of the main stages of language
acquisition.
One of the big questions for psychologists who study language acquisition is whether we have
innate language centers in our brains, or whether language is completely dependent on learning.
This echoes the larger nature vs. nurture debate that underlies questions in many areas of
psychology. The world famous linguist Noam Chomsky believes that everyone has a universal
grammar hard-wired into their brains. 
Stage 1: By the time they're about two months old, babies start uttering speechlike sounds: 'goos'
and 'gaaahs,' 'cooos,' 'oooohhs' and 'aahhs.' Even though it sounds like nonsense, it's far from
useless, because it helps babies to practice and get ready for producing speech.
Stage 2: Between six and seven months old, babies start babbling repetitive syllables, such as
'bababa.' These syllables include phonemes from the baby's native language, but they don't yet
involve actual words. Psychologists believe that babbling helps babies prepare physically for
speech, but also to come to an understanding about what speech is for: communicating. Babies who
learn sign language even babble with their hands!
Stage 3: Next, when a baby is about 12 months old, they begin to speak words. Even though at first
they can only speak a few words, they understand many more! Usually each utterance is just one
word. This is called the holophrastic stage. At 12 months, most kids can produce three or four
words and understand 30-40. At this point, they tend to overextend the meanings of words, such as
by using the word 'dada' for all men, not just their own father. Certain words tend to be learned
earliest, including 'mama' and 'daddy,' and also 'no' and 'up.'
Stage 4: At around 18 months, babies are able to recognize and point to objects when they are
named. They can also follow simple directions and their vocabulary continues to grow. They begin
speaking in simple, 2-word sentences, such as 'baby hungry' or 'dog brown.'
Stage 5: When they're 25 months and older, toddlers begin to use more complex sentences,
consisting of three or more words. Their vocabulary grows, so that by the age of five they know more
than 10,000 words.
So, we've covered language acquisition from a lot of angles. First, we looked at the debate over
Noam Chomsky's idea of universal grammar. Then, we went over an experiment designed to test
how and when infants come to learn which phonemes are valid for the language they're learning.
Finally, we went over the five key stages of language development in children.

Stages of Language Acquisition

When you see a child chattering to their parents, it's hard to believe they were born without
language. By the time infants are four months old, they begin the babbling stage of language. During
the babbling stage, infants make seemingly random and spontaneous sounds, cooing, squealing,
and gurgling. At this point, outsiders listening in would not be able to tell what language the baby is
learning. Around ten months of age, babbling starts to sound more like the language the child is
learning.
The one-word stage happens around the time the child turns one year and begins to utter sounds
that have meaning, like 'ma' for mom, 'da' for dad, and 'wa-wa' for water. They begin to speak in
simple words, like 'dog' or 'up.'
By the time the child has reached their second birthday, they usually have elements of the two-word
stage. The two-word stage is sometimes called telegraphic speech because, around two years of
age, the sentences created are short and direct, like a telegraph. Babies might indicate their wants
like, 'Want milk,' or 'Go outside.'
Some developmental psychologists believe the time period known as the 'terrible twos' may be a
result of a two-year-old's inability to communicate what they want effectively. For example, the child
may indicate they want a drink, but they are unable to communicate that they would like a drink in
their favorite blue cup. When you give them the red cup, tantrums ensue, and you are left wondering
what went wrong. More parents today have found that teaching an infant to use sign language gives
the child the ability to communicate more effectively at this age, reducing tantrums.
After the two-word stage, language development picks up with amazing speed. Once they've
reached their second birthday, children learn language rapidly and begin to use complete sentences.
Soon the child can not only tell you they would like their blue cup, but they can communicate
whether they would prefer their juice shaken or stirred.
By the time the child reaches school age, they are able to form complex sentences and understand
multiple meanings in communication. Once teenagers are writing their college application essays,
they have amassed a vocabulary of over 60,000 words.

Lesson Summary
Language acquisition is the way we learn language, to speak, write, or to communicate using sign
language. Behaviorists argue that we learn language skills by imitating others who encourage or
discourage the behavior by their reactions or by rewards and punishments. Noam Chomsky and
others believe that our brains are wired to learn language naturally and with little instruction. There is
also the idea that there is an optimal window for acquiring language, the critical period, after which
learning becomes more difficult.
The stages of language acquisition progress from babbling to one-word, to two-word speech in
children. From there, children quickly begin using complete sentences, often by the age of two.
Learning the complex aspects of language continues into the adult years.

The Direct Method

The Direct Method is also known as the Oral or Natural method. It’s based on
the active involvement of the student in both speaking and listening to the new
language in realistic everyday situations. The process consists of a gradual
acquisition of grammatical structure and vocabulary. The learner is
encouraged to think in the target language rather than translate. He or she
hears and uses the language before seeing it written.