LINGUISTIC AND LITERACY DEVELOPMENT OF CHILDREN AND

ADOLESCENTS

QUESTIONS TO ANSWER.

1. Why does the teacher need to internalize the linguistic and literacy development
of children and adolescents?
Language development and literacy is no doubt a critical part of any child’s overall
development. It supports the ability of your child to communicate, and express and understand
feelings. It also supports your child’s thinking ability and helps them develop and maintain
relationships. (https://www.hope-amc.com/importance-of-language-development-and-literacy-
in-children/) Teachers need to internalize this development because communication is
important, it is a human ability that allows individuals to socially engage with everyone. A child
needs to be guided and taught to grow and improve their social ability. For a child everything
starts at home, learning to communicate is influenced by the people in the house and the society
the child lives in and calls home. There are cases that the environment where the children grow
sometimes produces negative impacts, such as being surrounded by streetwise and those people
who explicitly express their thoughts without considering the people around them. This situation
negatively affects them and may result in inappropriate behavior. In this case, the help of a
teacher is vital for the children who suffer this kind of verbal abuse. Proper counseling and
monitoring are necessary to restore and correct the behavior of the children. A successful
outcome from this attempt for the teacher creates a tremendous impact on the life of a child.
2. Describe bilingual development.
Bilingualism is the ability to communicate in two different languages. Bilingual
education is the use of two different languages in classroom instruction. Languages are learned
most readily during the toddler and preschool years and, to a lesser extent, during elementary
school. Therefore, children growing up in bilingual homes and/or receiving bilingual education
easily acquire both languages. Bilingual children are at an advantage in this increasingly
multilingual nation. Language acquisition is very similar for monolingual and bilingual children,
although some experts view bilingualism as a specialized case of language development.
Children growing up in homes where two different languages are spoken usually acquire both
languages simultaneously. Although their acquisition of each language may be somewhat slower
than that of children who are acquiring a single language, their development in the two languages
combined is equivalent to that of monolingual children. Bilingual language learners proceed
through the same patterns of language and speech development as children acquiring a single
language. Their first words usually are spoken at about one year of age, and they begin stringing
two words together at about age two. Even if the two languages do not share similarities in
pronunciation, children eventually master them both.
(http://www.healthofchildren.com/B/Bilingualism-Bilingual-Education.html)
3. Explain the natural history of language development.
Language development in humans is a process starting early in life. Infants start without
knowing a language, yet by 10 months, babies can distinguish speech sounds and engage in
babbling. Some research has shown that the earliest learning begins in utero when the fetus starts
to recognize the sounds and speech patterns of its mother's voice and differentiate them from
other sounds after birth. (Graven et al., December 2008)
4. Discuss the significance for teachers in learning the different terms under
emergent and early literacy.
Literacy begins at birth and builds on relationships and experiences that occur during infancy and
early childhood. For example, introducing a child to books at an early age contributes to a later
interest in reading. Reading together while he or she sits on your lap promotes bonding and
feelings of trust. The give-and-take nature of babbling, lap games, songs, and rhymes set the
stage for sharing favorite picture books. Exposure to logos, signs, letters, and words leads to the
knowledge that symbols have meaning. The acquisition of skills such as looking, gesturing,
recognizing, and understanding pictures, handling books, and scribbling lay the groundwork for
conventional reading and writing. (http://literacy.nationaldb.org/index.php/early-emergent-
literacy/) The children learn and trust the teacher, therefore the children believe that everything
that a teacher teaches is correct. Thus, the proper teaching and the correctness and reliability of
the information are very important in this stage because children in this early stage are in their
very young age that need to be well facilitated and instructed. Usually, children are just taking
first-hand information at this stage from the teacher.
5. Explain the importance of the application of antecedents of language
development in teaching learning processes.
Antecedent means that which precedes or goes before. Therefore, antecedents of language
development talk about the ways or means which help the child prepare to learn the language.
(https://www.slideshare.net/CorbanOlores/the-antecedents-of-language-development) The key
phrase in this definition of antecedent is ways and means which help the child prepares
learning the language, so it is about the first thing that a child must do in order to learn to speak.
These ways and means may start from a small but eventually turn bigger as a child continues to
learn and interact with others through language speaking.
6. Make a reflection (150 words)
In the beginning, the universe and all the things the universe has was created by words, therefore
spoken words are very powerful. Words create language that allows people to communicate and
understand each other. The words from the language we speak can create and sometimes can
destroy things and feelings. Thus, the choice of words and how we deliver these to express our
thoughts are very important for us to maintain good relationships towards the people we
encounter and deal with every day. Kind words are as soft as a cloud of cotton candies, but a
cruel word can make clouds turn to gray. We should always consider the people around us, there
are children that look at us every day and are willing to hear words and be influenced. We should
teach them and nurture them with good thoughts and connect with them using our language. A
language is what makes the world go round. We may come from different races and different
beliefs, but we are united by the universal language we speak.