How children acquire language

Introduction

Hi my name is Han and I am going to deliver a speech aimed at you parents about how your children acquire language, also known as language acquisition. Do you know the theories of language acquisition? What are the stages of language acquisition? I will be talking about this later on in the speech but first I will ask the question what is language acquisition. Language acquisition is the process involved in learning to use/understand a language and subsystem of language.

Nature of Language Acquisition

This a very important question explaining why your children use language

There are three main purposes of why children use language

Practical Purposes: Which is, your children want to obtain things they need, for example, a toy they found that captured their eyes, or food like candy.

Social Purposes: So that they can be aware and relate to their own feelings and attitudes and lastly Learning purposes which are at school or at home like Using their imagination, creating stories and building ideas.

Skills needed to acquire language

- If a child were to speak a word they must visualize/ picture an object which is called conceptualizing. They must understand language is a tool that supplies their needs, and need to understand social context, gestures and learn system of sounds.

Critical Age

The critical age/period is the time limit during which the baby must be exposed to language if he/she want to acquire language normally. If the child were to not to be exposed to language at this period he/she will have trouble acquiring normal language skills.

e.g. during this critical age parents might teach children new languages because its easier learnt during this time.

Case Study

A female named Genie was locked in a closet at 18 months old by her schizophrenic father.