Download preschoolers` developing morphosyntactic skills

PRESCHOOLERS’ DEVELOPING
MORPHOSYNTACTIC SKILLS
Power Point Outline**
• I. Mastering Grammatical Morphemes
• II. Developing Syntactic Elements
• III. Basic Sentence Structure
I. MASTERING GRAMMATICAL
MORPHEMES**
• Around 18 mos. of age, when children start
putting two words together, we see grammatical
morphemes emerge
• For the test, please know Table 9.1 on page 255
• Morpheme
Age Mastery**
• -ing
19-28 mos.
• Regular plural –s
27-33 mos.
• Possessive –s
26-40 mos.
• Past tense –ed
26-48 mos.
• Regular 3rd person –s
26-46 mos.
To assess children’s morphosyntactic
skills:**
• We calculate MLU, or mean length of
utterance
• Instead of counting words, we count actual
morphemes
• Remember, we have free and bound
morphemes
Words vs. morphemes**
• We wanted to eat cookies.
• 5 words
• 7 morphemes
• The PRAXIS always asks you to count the # of
morphemes in an utterance
How many morphemes?**
• The three boys wanted five candies.
• We played all day with my friend’s toys.
• He’s going to cook eggs and bacon.
Count the morphemes in Mark
McKibbin’s utterances:**
• (2.5 yrs old) “I need to get my shoes and socks
on because the stones will hurt my feet.”
• (3 yrs old) “I will give my old pillow to the poor
children so they can sleep better.”
• (3 yrs. old) “Madame Blueberry was sad
because they didn’t have happy hearts at the
Stuffmart.”
II. DEVELOPING SYNTACTIC ELEMENTS
• A. Basic Sentence Constituents
2. Clause
3. Sentence
4. Noun phrase**
• Sentence role filled by people and objects
• The boy is blowing out his candles.
5. Verb phrase**
• Actions or relationships that are central to
the sentence
• The girl lifts the beach ball.
• **The little red hen was eating corn.
• NP
• The students
– NP
VP
are taking notes.
VP
The leaves
NP
were falling down.
VP
The baby
NP
was laughing at the dog.
VP
Youtube
• Weird Al Yankovich Word Crimes
B. Noun Phrase Elements
• 2. Pronouns— a group of forms that can
replace nouns or entire noun phrases**
• I, he, she, we, you, it, they (and variations
of those)
• Common errors: me/I, him/he, her/she,
them/they
• 3. Noun suffixes
• comparatives, superlatives,
derivationals; preschoolers begin to
use these accurately between 3-5
years of age
The derivational noun suffix er
C. Verb Phrase Elements
Copula verbs– to be verbs that serve
syntactically as the main verbs in
sentences
More examples of copula verbs:**
• He is a boy scout.
• They were in their car.
• I am happy.
• **State verbs —express static or unchanging
condition. (That tree is old. The building
stands next to the tree.)
• Process verbs —internal activity or gradual
changes in people or things (thinking,
hearing, stressing, growing, digesting,
learning)
By 5 years of age…**
• Children have
mastered most
verb forms
Youtube examples…
III. BASIC SENTENCE STRUCTURE
(review)
• A. Types of Sentences
3. Passive**
• Noun in subject phrase is passive
and is acted on by noun in verb
phrase
• The toy was played with by the
child.
• The boat was painted by the
woman.
• The notes were taken by the
students.
4. Negative
B. Complex and Compound
Sentences**
• Independent or main clause—can stand alone
• Dependent or subordinate clause—cannot
stand alone
• 1. Complex sentence: Has indep. clause and
dependent clause**
• We will go to the party if it is not raining.
• (main/indep. clause)
(subordinate/dep. clause)
I talked to the boy who has red hair.
(main/indep. clause) (subordinate/dep.
clause)
• 2. **Compound sentence: 2 independent
clauses are linked together by a conjunction
• We ate cookies
and they were good.
– (main/indep. clause)
– John liked her
(main/indep. clause)
but she didn’t like him.
– (main/indep. clause)
(main/indep. clause)
Coordinating conjunctions:
Examples of sentences using coordinating conjunctions in
compound sentences:**
• I wanted to get an A on the test, so I studied
hard.
• We could eat popcorn or we could have Doritos.
• She wanted to go shopping, but she didn’t have
any money.
Rescorla, L., & Turner, H.L. (2015, April).
Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing
Research, 58, 434-444.**
• This study looked at late talkers (at age
2) in comparison to typicallydeveloping children
• Late talkers usually understand what
they hear, but they are late in
expressive language
The study found:
Thus…
How can we help parents be
motivated to seek early intervention
for their LTs?
Power Point Outline**
• I. Mastering Grammatical Morphemes
• II. Developing Syntactic Elements
• III. Basic Sentence Structure