THEME 4.

2: LINGUISTIC DEVELOPMENT
WHAT ARE THE ELEMENTS OF ORAL LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT?

 Phonological development (learning sounds of the oral language)

 Semantic development (learning meaning of the words)
 Morphosyntactic development (learning grammatical properties)
 Pragmatics development (learning the use of language based on the social and
communicative context; involves conversational and narrative skills).

PHONOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT
PRELINGUISTIC PERIOD (0-2):

First weeks: preference human voice over other acoustic stimuli --> easier to pay attention to the
characteristics of speech. Perception and understanding of speech precede the production of
speech.

 Crying: first use of pulmonary air (sound emissions).

 Laughing, Cooing– vowel sounds, Babbling–consonant sound. (2-7 m)
 Reduplicated babbling (7-10 m): syllable strings CV (consonant - vowel) repeated: ma-ma; pa-pa.
 Modulated or conversational babbling (10-14 m): morecomplex, new consonants, intonation.
The sounds begin to resemble those of the contact language.
 Transition between babbling and the first word (12-14 m): Proto-word productions.

LINGUISTIC PERIOD:

From 12–18-month-old:

 +/-50 words - uses of phonological strategies are appreciated:

 Simplification (limited phonemic repertory) --> p, b, t, m, n, d, l, k, a, e, i, o, u Ex.: chupete
/pete/; abuela /lela; plátano /pato/; galleta /teta; muñeca /keka/; agua /aua/.

From 18 month- 4 year old:

Enrichment phonological repertory - productions more complex. But cannot articulate correctly all
the phonemes; they keep resorting to different phonological simplification processes.

 Substitution: change one sound for another one that is not present in any other segment of the
word (Ex.: gorro /borro/; bota /pota/; rojo /uojo/; Dafa /Rafa; tambor /tambol/
 Assimilation: assimilating a sound by another nearby. (Ex.: globo bobo/; madera /madeda/)
 Reduction: reducing groups of consonants or segments. (Ex.: está /tá/; lapiz /lapi/; diente
/dente)

From 4 years old:

 Advances in phonological adjustment (conscious knowledge of phonology) (Ex.: dumiendo

instead of /dormiendo/, aware of sound changes - /puta/->/buça/- bruixa; pato/gato)
 Relationship with semantical development.
 Produce all consonants and combinations of consonants and vowels, exception of some isolated
consonants: vibrant phonemes reached later (7 years old). r, z, rr

The acquisition of the phonetic repertory culminates between 4-7 years old.

AGE PHONOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT

 up to 12 months prelinguistic vocalizations
12 to 18 months phonology of the first 50 words
expansion of the phonetic repertory. At the end of this period: reduction
18 to 4 years old of phonological simplification processes.
4 to 7 years old culmination of the phonetic repertory. fluent and intelligible speech

PHONOLOGICAL AWARENESS:

Crucial skill. Linked to early reading. Educational situations that stimulate the development of
phonological awareness can be preventive of future learning difficulties.

Necessary to understand how the words of the language are written. Part of the processes that
facilitate reading. Focusing on it is recommended, it is a key component of early childhood
education.

The focus must be on:

 Recognising phonological patterns such as rhyme and alliteration
 Awareness of syllables and phonemes within words
It involves:
 Syllabe awareness
 Rhyme awareness
 Alliteration –inicial sound
 Deleting and manipulating sounds

From 10 year-old advances in understanding variations in intonation and other prosodic traits - as
well as the meaning that carry (irony + sarcasm). Difficult for children until concrete operations
(Piaget)

SEMANTIC DEVELOPMENT

It is related to how children acquire the meaning of the words.

At 12 months transition from babbling to the first words, the use of the first words with meaning
appears around 12 months -it demonstrates firsts abilities of children to use symbols and it marks the
beginning of semantic development (oral production, comprehension first – 8-10 months).

STAGES OF SEMANTIC DEVELOPMENT

Holophrastic speech (13-18 months): use a single word to represent a complex idea: to express
wishes, to indicate the presence of people, objects. Single word=sentence (can be accompanied by
gestures).

Ex. Come here, mama! - There goes mama! - You are my mama! --> Mama Pick me up! --> Up

Two forms semantic development during holophrastic period: accompanies increasement vocabulary.

UNDEREXTENSION
Learn a word for something, without
extending it to other things of same
category.
Ex. the family pet is named dog, but the
pets/dogs in other households not. (A
OVEREXTENSION
The opposite. Use of specific words to designate a
broader set of objects, actions or facts.
Ex.: The family pet is a dog, but cats, rabbits and all
other four-legged animals are also dogs. (A specific
word to name more things)
 general word to name something very
specific).

EXAMPLE OF CONTEXT-RELATED SEMANTICS

Study with bilingues (mother-spanish; father-catalan) allow appreciation of contextualized learning of

words (Ex.: Spanish / Catalan - manzana in the story / poma in real situation, eating.

Child acquires new semantic attributes and representational thoughts, he establish differentiations.
The meaning of words is composed of several semantic features which are gradually acquired.

- Animal + quadruped + with fur = guau guau (for dog and cow) / overextension
- Animal + quadruped + with fur + domestic + carnivorous, etc. = DOG
- Animal + quadruped + with fur + rural + herbivore, etc. = COW

Formation complex semantic fields/ SCHEMES (equilibration processes: assimilation,

accommodation.

STAGES OF SEMANTIC DEVELOPMENT

Telegraphic speech (18-24 months): combine two-words into a

simple sentence

Ex. Cat sleep --> The cat is sleeping Cotxe papa--> el cotxe del papa

MORPHOSYNTACTIC DEVELOPMENT

How children acquire the grammar rules. Acquisition of grammatical morphemes: prefixes, suffixes,
prepositions, pronouns and auxiliary verbs that modify the meaning of words and sentences.

STAGES OF MORPHOSYNTACTIC DEVELOPMENT (24 MONTHS – 7 YEARS)

Overregularization: extend regular grammatical patterns to irregular words. It is the product of

children's internal work on the language. "Correction" occurs gradually... It can last until after of 7

Ex. Dan goed home! --> Dan went home

Adult’s intervention: Repeat the sentence with the correct form

Gradual acquisition: Depends on the internal organization of the linguistic knowledge

PRAGMATICS DEVELOPMENT (2 MONTHS - 10 YEARS, AND ON…)

How children learn the use of language based on the social and communicative context (involves
asking, answering, requesting, giving information, arguing, etc). Related to conversational skills.

(Ex. at 2 years old: phone “hello… goodbye” - the adult involves the child in a conversation).

 Speaking turns: engage in conversational turns (starts prelinguistic period protoconversations…).

 Conversational topic maintenance
 Quantity: regulate the amount of information offered during the conversation .
 Quality, coherence: offer clear information (related to semantic development, vocabulary and
knowledge increasing…). Quality of argumentation processes.

Communicative and linguistic acquisition: Advanced skills (non-verbal + verbal communication)