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Language Development
•By the time a child reaches age 3, he/she will have learned 3000 words
•Noam Chomsky believes every child born with predisposition to learn language
•Infants are innately equipped
•Key task in language development is to learn grammar to allow child to communicate with limited
vocabulary
Language Development
•At birth, infants can distinguish all languages sounds
•Adults cannot!
•Infants lose this ability at 10 months of age
•Then, they can only distinguish sounds in the language they have been exposed to
•In the first year of life, infants master sound structure
Encouraging Language Development: Motherese
•Infants biologically programmed to receive
•Parents programmed to teach
•Motherese is very distinct pronunciation, exaggerated intonation and expression
•Limited to “baby talk” and simple topics
•Questioning encourages response
•Infants prefer this speech to adult speech
Motherese
•Motherese is instinctive
•Even deaf mothers adjust signing!
•As child matures, the parent’s speech adjusts
Cooing and Babbling Stage
•3 months of age, babies start to coo… ooo, ahhh,
•5 months, they babble ma-ma-ma, da-da-da
•Infants around the world use the same sounds!
•At 9 months, sounds become distinct to language
One-Word Stage
•Babies and toddlers understand more then they can say
•Their comprehension vocabulary is larger than their production vocabulary
•Around 1st birthday, infants produce real words, mama, daddy, ba-ba
•Babies use vocal intonation to express meaning
Two-Word Stage
•After 2nd birthday, infants can combine words Mama go, where kitty?
•Articles like a, an and the are not used. Neither are prepositions (on, in under)
•By age three, infant has 3000 word production vocabulary and 10,000 words by school age
Cognitive Development
•Increasing sophistication in cognitive processes- thinking, remembering, and processing
•Most influential theory is by Jean Piaget
•Children actively try to make sense of the world
•4 Cognitive stages: sensorimotor (0-2), preoperational (2-7), concrete operational (7-11), Formal
Operation (adolescence-adulthood)
How children learn
•Assimilation- putting new information into existing schemas (ideas)
•Accomodation- altering or expanding schemas for new ideas
Describe the following to a child:
•A Skunk
•A Rose
•The President
Sensorimotor Stage
•Birth-2 years
•Learning through senses
•Motor Skills
•By the end, they develop object permanence, an object still exists if it can’t be seen
•Develop mental representations of the world, schemas
Preoperational Stage
•Ages 2-7
•Pre-logic..not yet logical
•Instead, symbolic thought develops. They can use images and words to represent ideas.
•Impressive gains in language
•Imagination and pretend
•But still developing…for example
Preoperational Stage
•Children are very egocentric, they can’t see another point of view
•They also can not think in reverse…irreversibility
•Centration- child focuses on one aspect
•Do not understand conservation
Concrete Operational Stage
•Ages 7-11
•Capable of logical thought
•But logic and explanation is very concrete or visible in real life
•Ex. What is friendship?
•Concrete Op answer: When someone plays with me.
Formal Operational Stage
•Adolescence-Adult
•Systematic and logical thinking
•Can grasp abstract ideas and see multiple perspectives
•Emerges gradually and not in all areas…adults tend to think this way in areas of interest
Criticism of Piaget #1
•Piaget Underestimated the Cognitive Abilities of Infants and young children
•Testing did not take into account lack of motor skills
•Renee Ballairgeon used visual tasks to test object permanence and concluded that change is
different in each child
•Children have “event-specific expectations”
Criticism of Piaget #2
•Piaget underestimated the impact of the social and cultural environment on cognitive development.
•Lee Vygotsky- development strongly influenced by environment and culture
•Believes children can attain higher development than their age through support
•Zone of proximal Development used to support this growth
Criticism of Piaget #3
•Piaget overestimated the degree to which people achieve formal operational thoguht process.
•Research shows some adults never reach formal operational thinking
Overall,
•Piaget’s theories are accepted but for those criticisms.
Essential Questions
•What are the stages of language development?
•What are Piaget’s 4 stages of cognitive development?
•What are 3 criticisms of Piaget’s theory?
•How do Vygotsky’s ideas differ from Piaget’s?