Language
and Learning
Spring 2002
Dr. Weissman
Group Responses to Questions about
Preschool Pragmatic and Semantic Development
1.
Describe the conversational context. What is it? What is the
role of both the parent and the child language learner? Briefly, describe
the preschool monologue.
Conversational context is the situation of the conversation; Conversation with dialogues; turn-taking. This is the primary mode for learning language. Parents are typically the primary initiators of conversations, child follows. Children can introduce new topics within the conversation.
Preschool Monologue: conversations with self. Often serve a purpose such as guidance through a task.
2.
A topic is the content of which we speak. Very briefly
outline what topic knowledge and skills would look like for a 1-year-old,
a 2- to 3-year-old, a 3- to 4-year-old, and a 5-year-old.
1-year-old Can relate to topics. However, the topic must be physically present, and is often themself. Able to initiate topic through gestures, verbalization, and vocalization.
2-year-old
Can now participate in question/answer with another person.
3-4-year-old
More than 1 topic can be discussed, more question/answer form.
5-year-old
Can discuss more topics and use more repetition.
3. In order for conversation to be successful, a speaker will need to consider what his/her listener already knows. Research suggests that 3-year-olds are able to do this. Explain what skills they have that are used as evidence for this ability.
Presuppositions
= assumption for background knowledge
Children
can put more informative information into conversation first, then adjust
based on feedback. They can use words such as “know” and
“remember,” and wh- questions.
By
age 3, children can differentiate between prepositions, adverbs, articles,
etc. They can also modify their answers to correlate with the listener
knows and doesn't know (eliminate redundancy).
4.
What are narratives? What are they used for? What does the
development of narratives look like (i.e., for a 2-year-old, for a
3-year-old, for a child 5+)?
Narratives
include self-generated stories, telling of familiar tales, retelling of
movies, or TV shows and recounting of personal experiences. They are used
for purpose, sense of relevant information, and exchange of information.
The
development of narratives: Two-year-olds are not able to accurately
describe a sequence of events. Two-year-olds are involved in the centering
process. 2-3 year olds begin to tell self generated fictional narratives.
About half of three-year-old children can use both centering and chaining.
About 3/4 of 5 year olds can use both strategies. 4-year-olds can talk
about causality of mental states. 6-year-olds can talk about motives of
behaviors; flow, past, present and future.
Centering
is when a child tells a story that centers around them.
Chaining
is when a child can link events in order.
5.
What is fast mapping and how does it work?
Fast Mapping is when a child has the ability to connect a word and the
object it refers to after only one exposure. First a child gets a rough
definition of the word and how it is used. Over time the child gets a more
defined and absolute definition of the word.
This works in different ways. Sometimes children are able to remember a word because they use the bound morphemes at the end to distinguish what type a word it is. For example, they may see an -ing word and automatically know that it's an action word. Another way children fast map is by memorizing single words as single units. Young children tend to do this.
Two
techniques used for learning new words are contrasting and conventiality.
Contrasting a word is hearing a word for the 1st time and comparing the
word to already existing words, such as hearing the word apple for the
first time and comparing it to orange or ball and realizing it is not the
same word, so fast mapping it and placing it in memory for the next time.
Conventiality is when certain forms will be used to convey certain
meanings.
Word
knowledge and world knowledge play a role.
Young
children are learning 5-6 new words per day.
6.
What are relational terms? Why might children have a difficult time
learning them?
Relational terms include:
Interrogates – concept of time
temporal relations – syntactic relations
physical relations – problems with conservation
locational prepositions – terms differ
Kinship terms – family relations
Children have a difficult time with abstraction.
7.
Pronouns are tricky to learn and the development is variable with
each child. Outline the major developmental themes in pronoun acquisition
and use.
Children first use the pronoun words “I” and then “you.”
Then:
Subjective Pronouns- he, she, it, they
Objective pronouns- him, her, them
Possessive Pronouns- his, hers, their
Reflexive Pronouns- himself, herself, themselves
* This order can vary with
age
Deictic use = pronouns replace things in spatial relations
Anaphora = replace with he/she
