Language development

Introduction

Language is a major cognitive factor that define humans and which differentiate them from other species whose communication does not involve infinite expression of ideas using words and speech sounds. Language development is an essential process that begins in early stages of human life, where infants are born without a language but as they grow and develop, they start communicating through babbling and speech sounds. The ability to develop language is remarkable but what seems to be remarkable is that studies have been finding evidence for mastery of the skill in more and younger children. These researches have come up with psycho-linguistics theories of how languages are leant and these have come to be widely accepted.  The process of language development can be traced right from the birth of an infant to the interaction with people around them. The initial words uttered by an infant may appear as their language development but by the time they speak the first word at around 12 months, the process has been undergoing for many years. It takes just a few years after birth for all the children that have a normal development to master skills that are necessary for listening and then listening.  

 In the 12 weeks before a baby is born, sounds from the outside world can be clearly heard. The auditory system of a fetus normally develops by the 24^th week and mothers who are expectant may feel the fetus moving in response to a loud voice.  The first experiences of an infant with language can be traced to their early speech sound memories. Infants who are newly born demonstrate a remarkable ability to differentiate various speech sounds happening in languages around the world which is a proof for listening ability (Gerken 2009). The ability of these young ones to recognize various syllables in a speech is influenced by their experience’s frequency.  This ability confirms the new parent’s notion that infants may be able to understand a language before uttering their first words (Jones, 2014). However, the very first utterances by infants after birth most surely crying which is the first essential mode of communication. On their first 3 months, these infants develop cries that are distinct when trying to indicate discomfort, anger or hunger and by the time they are in their third month start cooing and laughing. In the following months, they can produce some sounds that are elongated which then become more complex with time. By the time they are in six month, they are in the babbling stage which where they start babbling through repetition of one syllable (Jones, 2014).  With time, the babbling becomes increasingly complex as sequences with different syllables are produced.  It is remarkable that as the infants attain 1 year of age, they use less speech sounds which are not represented in the home languages; it is suggested that as they lose the ability to differentiate the speech sounds that they do not regularly experience as they listen, they become less likely to utter those particular speech sounds.

Among the first words may be names of what they like or may be invented and they consistently use the words in reference to a given action of object but the adults do not use them. The inventions of the words are referred to as idiomorphs, but their use is normally short-term as the children inter-change them with those worlds preferred by adults (Kennison, 2013). The quality of words produced by children improves with time as they master some sounds more quickly as compared to others.   Eventually, majority of the children achieve the right pronunciation personally  while some may need  lessons for speech therapy whey are provided with direct instruction and even practicing for certain speech sounds (Kennison, 2013).

Vocabulary building

As children growth, their learning process and environment influences them to learning the various vocabularies used in their home language and also in the learning institutions. For a child to attain the adult-sized vocabulary, they have to continuously learning some words on daily basis, usually a minimum of 6 daily on average. It has been observed that the rate of vocabulary acquisition by a child is not normally steady, a phenomena that has been referred as word spurt (Shulman & Capone, 2010).  This could possible due to children’s experience of naming insight , where they realize that there exist a name for everything ; or the possibility of internal changes happening on how a child understands words , which then enables them to learn new words.  Referential learning is the earliest strategy children uses to learn words where such words refer actual environmental aspects and this may involve asking the adults.

 Another strategy is whole object bias, where the children tend to assume that a new word is referring to the whole object rather than part of such an object like texture or color (Shulman & Capone, 2010). Taxonomic bias is another strategy where a child assumes a new word refers to a kind of a thing or object instead of a particular object. To the child, a dog may refer an entire species of animals.  Mutual exclusivity assumption involves the fact that upon associating an object with a given label, another label will not be used to refer to it. In the vocabulary development, overextensions errors happen where the use of words by a child may not confirm to how the adults prefer to use it (Gerken, 2009).

Sentence construction

By the time a child is five years, their skills in language involves understanding and combining words that builds active sentences. The 5-8 years period involves a lot of stories in the process of development and the stories by the children are likely to be more detailed and hence , longer.  During this period, children might combined various words in the right manner , various types of sentences in presenting similar information , employ pronouns and have improved understanding between inferential and factual sentences. The earlier sentences may involve using single-word utterances whose meaning is more complex than can be defined by a single word.  By three years, utterances grow similar to those used by adults’ sentences.  The child masters the sentence skills through various stages which start with appreciation of the meaning of a particular word while figuring how to use the word in the right way. Secondly, the child use affirmative questions to order the verb and subject in the right manner, while in third stage, a child comes up with questions that have the right order of subject verb for both affirmative and negative questions. The measure of the language development and skills is mostly the repetition of a sentence rather than memory limitations.  The repetition also implies that one has mastered the speech and the vocabulary which are the basics of language development (Klem et.al 2015).

Theories of language development

Some key theories have been developed with an aim of explaining development of language. These include the linguistic, behavioral, social interactionist and cognitive theories.  Behavioral theory involves a belief by behaviorists that language is measurable and observable and that the need to utilize a language arises from stimulation. To the behaviorist, what is important is not the language rules competence but the ability to speak the language (Lemetyninen,2012). The environment conditions the children to respond to a specific stimuli using a language and when a child speak his or her parent’s language , they become skillful as a reward. Their ability to respond in a way that relates to environmental stimuli obtained from parents shapes their language more easily than rules’ knowledge. The theory has not been proven in the labs even though it is mostly agreed that an environment rich in language assists communication success in children. Second are Nativist linguistic theories which hold that language development occurs due to   child’s ability to organize language laws but requires human presence to utilize such abilities (Lemetyninen, 2012).  However, the child does not require formal tutelage for this happen. A child already has major language principles at their birth and various parameters and thus, when exposed to a specific language, they can set these parameters and then, deduce different grammatical principles.  This theory has been perceived to be controversial and hence many psychologists oppose the notion of a language being innate. However, that similar fundamental structure is present in all languages and existence of rules in specific languages through which the structure are transformed into particular patterns is used to support this theory (Lemetyninen, 2012).

Social interaction theory employs the context and environment in which the development of a language occurs. The focus in this theory is the language pragmatics instead of grammar which should follow. In this sense, a person beginning to speak and an experienced person such as a child are normally in a setting that is negotiated and where it is possible to receive feedback (Rudd & Lambert, 2011). In this sense, the approach places more emphasis on a cultural environment or a home that makes it possible for a child to acquire a language. The vocabulary is informed by the context or the culture within which a speech is understandable and important. According to this theory, language is usually not universal but is time-bound and into context. A major point of supporting this theory is the notion that utterance will only make sense if an experienced person like a teacher knows the context (Rudd & Lambert, 2011). Cognitive theory holds that a language consist of structures and symbols but is demonstrated as the mental ability of a child attains maturity. The basic insight in this theory is the role played by maturation as the capacity if a child to understand their surrounding increases (Lemetyninen,2012). As such, a child will only understand and speak a language only if they are mature psychologically.

Conclusion

Language defines humans and differentiates them from other species and hence language development is an essential part in human development. Language development is a process that begins even before infants are born and it takes different stages to be achieved fully. Various theories have been proposed in understanding it although no single one has completely explained this complex human quality.

References

Jones, M,(2014).Universal baby sounds .Vol. 15, 10 . Retrieved from: http://www.talk4meaning.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Early-Years-Educator-babbling-PDF.pdf

 (Lemetyninen,2012). Language Acquisition. Retrieved from: https://www.simplypsychology.org/language.html