CLA- a re-cap of the basics:

Look at the transcript and decide on the stage (according to Crystal):

Holophrastic? Two-word? Telegraphic? Post-telegraphic?

Give clear examples of why. Link to theorists: Chomsky? Piaget? Tomasello? Vygotsky?

Also- be aware of any contextual pressures.

Note: Holophrastic- likely to be 9-12 months.

Grammar begins… potentially!

Some single words can be used to make a grammatically complete utterance- think what these
might be…

Some children might use present participle –ing inflections.

Negatives no and not might be used in one-word sentences.

Ursula Bellugi identified three states of negative formations in young children:

1. Uses ‘no’ or ‘not’ at the beginning of a sentence

2. Moves ‘no/not within a sentence

3. Attaches the negative to auxiliary verbs. E.g.- I will not…

Semantics:

By the end of the first year, they will probably be able to:

point to some things in answer to a question

respond in some way to situations requiring predictable feedback (say bye-bye)

understand several words even if they cannot say any recognisable words.

Because caregivers will now respond more to utterances that seem meaningful, rather than random
sounds, the baby’s communication will begin to be more deliberate. Note- comment on CDS here-
look for the 13 features.

Phonology:

More control over sounds made- they make sounds when alone- called Vocal Play.
Next: Two-word Stage- likely to be 18 months.

Grammar

It is at this stage that grammar can truly be said to begin.

PIVOT GRAMMAR

Pivot grammar has been defined by some as “a loose grammar governing two-word utterances by
children.”

Braine (1967) aimed to support Chomsky’s ideas (see notes on Chomsky) by investigating the
syntactic rule that children will show and use at the two word utterance stage. In psychology, pivot
grammar refers to the structure behind two word phrases often used by children

Also comment on Brown’s functions.

Semantics:

Look for Over-extension, Under-extension, Over-generalisation, Mismatches.

These ideas seem to support Chomsky. Also refer to Jean Aitchison.

Phonology:

-Assimilation -gog for dog.

Consonant clusters avoided (spr)
Avoidance of ‘quiet’ syllables- e.g. the g in giraffe
Reduplication- repeating syllables common
Prefer initial voiced, final voiceless sounds- eg ‘Boo!’. This leads to Deletion: whereby children miss
out the final consonant of a word- e.g. ‘ca’ for cat
Substitution: whereby children substitute one sound for another. E.g. ‘tip’ for ‘ship’.
During this period children begin to use inflections.
Questions also appear, marked by rising intonation
Other things to look for- Pauses in unusual positions
Next- the Telegraphic stage- 24-40 months

Grammar-

Now using 3-4 words in a variety of grammatical constructions.

E.g. Statements- ‘me got boat.’ ‘It fall down.’ ‘man kick ball.’
Questions- ‘where daddy going?’ ‘What doing it?”
Commands- ‘Open it!’ ‘Put that on there.’
Words are missed (style of telegrams). However, this is not deliberate omission. Words are absent
because they are not yet part of the child’s vocabulary. Function words and inflections are omitted.
Content words, however are usually retained.
Also:
A wider range of inflections might be used (-s for plurals, -ed to mark the past tense of regular nouns.
Other things to look for:
Stress of key words or syllables
Pauses used more to mark grammatically complete utterances
Auxiliary verbs might be used- or omitted.
Modal auxiliaries are used more frequently to convey variations in attitude.
The dummy auxiliary ‘do’ might be used to frame questions and negatives

Contractions like don’t, won’t and isn’t might be used.

The primary verb to be might be used with present participles- possibly incorrectly (A virtuous
error)
Question structures might be becoming more common.
Pronouns might be used- often incorrectly.
Look at Bellugi on pronoun use
Negative structures (see Bellugi) might become more sophisticated
Between 2 ½ -3 years, utterances lose their telegraphic quality.

Semantics:

Look for lexis relating to familiar stories or the child’s personal experiences.
Also look for the child becoming skilful in terms of turn-taking, making appropriate responses and
altering register and making repairs. (Grice’s maxims- quality, quantity, relevance, manner.)

Phonology:
Pronunciation becomes closer to adult forms. Likely to have mastered only 2/3rds of consonants but
will be able to form the whole range of vowel sounds.

Children by this age might be able to use over 12 consonants and pronounce over 200 words in an
intelligible (if possibly immature manner.)

During the second year, Reduplication occurs – the different syllables of a word are pronounced in
the same way- e.g. ‘wowo’ for water or ‘bubu’ for bottle.

Relate to Brown’s study of consonants and vowel sounds.

Finally, the Post-Telegraphic Stage.

Grammar-

Telegraphic speech is now replaced with more sophisticated sentence structures.

For a time, regular and irregular past-tense verbs will be confused and a child may use both a
standard and a non-standard variant (broke/breaked/broked) (overgeneralisation)
Gary Marcus conducted a study that suggested that children often over-regularise past tenses but these errors
gradually disappear. They might mix correct and incorrect versions as they learn how to use them correctly.

There might be examples of co-ordination and subordination.

Inflections are used standardly- see the work of Brown.
The subject and verb might be inverted in questions using wh- words.

Phonology

By age 4, all vowels and diphthongs are in use and only a few consonants still pose problems:
[θ], [ð], [dʒ] and [ʒ]- and certain uses of [l], [ŋ], [t] and [z].
The pronunciation of many words is still idiosyncratic, but adult correction does not seem to help (fis
phenomenon)

After this stage,

Children will acquire what will be their last intuitive grammatical knowledge: comparative
structures; comment and attitude adverbials; the ability to recognise the difference between
similar sentences and an understanding of active and passive sentences.
Other theorists to remember:
Paulson (2004)

Garvey

Halliday