Language development: A complex,systematic, and natural process

Conclusions Although we do not understand very well what the processes are that contribute to language development, it is clear that communication plays a central role. As children strive to become increasingly skilled at communicating their ideas (White, 1959), as they have increasingly complex ideas to communicate (Piaget, 1955), and as they encounter an increasingly diverse set of people with whom to communicate (Brown, 1973), they must learn to use language which is richer and more flexible.When children come to school or to a day care center they already know a great deal about language. They have readily and actively mastered words, sentences and forms of communication which they need in their own family and community. In their new environment—the school or center—children's language development can further be fostered by adults who are receptive to children's efforts at communication. Adults who encourage children to use language in new ways, who attend to what children mean to say and who recognize that children's errors are often not mistakes, are likely to play a positive role in children's language development.Janet H. Kane and Karen Sheingold are on the Staff at Bank Street College of Education.     

Word-learning skills of deaf preschoolers: the development of novel mapping and rapid word-learning strategies

Word-learning skills of 19 deaf/hard-of-hearing preschoolers were assessed by observing their ability to learn new words in two contexts. The first context required the use of a novel mapping strategy (i.e., making the inference that a novel word refers to a novel object) to learn the new words. The second context assessed the ability to learn new words after minimal exposure when reference was explicitly established. The children displayed three levels of word-learning skills. Eleven children learned words in both contexts. Five were able to learn new words rapidly only when reference was explicitly established. Two children did not learn new words rapidly in either context. The latter seven children were followed longitudinally. All children eventually acquired the ability to learn new words in both contexts. The deaf children's word-learning abilities were related to the size of their vocabularies. The present study suggests that word-learning strategies are acquired even when children are severely delayed in their language development and they learn language in an atypical environment.     

大学语文渗透流行语教学的思考——“首要教学原理”在大学语文中的应用探讨

基于“首要教学原理”在“大学语文”中的应用研究,流行语渗入大学语文教学有必要性和可行性。流行语包含着丰富的当下文化因素,可以弥补大学语文课程语言学教学的缺位,是学生积累词汇量、提高母语语言素养的途径之一,恰当使用有利于营造课堂创意氛围。指导学生积累流行语,分析掌握流行语词的构成理据和文化信息等,有助于使用和改造流行语创新自己的语言。     

手语中的同义词

在手语中,有些具有不同形式的手语词具有相同的意义,成为手语中 的同义词。在同一组同义词中,某个或某些手语词可能是由另一个手语词演 变而来,也可以有不同的来源。具有相同意义的手语词,其使用条件也可以 有所不同。手语中的同义词丰富了手语的词汇系统,同时也增加了手语运用 的复杂性。     

The connection between phonological,syntactic and semantic skills and children’s reading and spelling

In recent years two radically different views have dominated discussions about the way in which children learn to read and write. The first view is that the crucial hurdle in learning to read is the discovery of how to do the correct phonological analysis. The second view is that the crucial factor is the use of context, and that children use what they know about the meaning — and particularly the semantics and the syntax — of the passages that they are reading to help them decipher and learn about difficult written words. Learning to read is ‘a psycholinguistic guessing game’ according to this view and children set about it in much the same way as they set about learning to speak. Thus according to the first view children’s semantic and syntactic skills will determine their progress in reading and according to the second it will be their phonological skills. We present longitudinal evidence about a group of children in their first year at school which shows that both kinds of skill do play a part, but that they make entirely different contributions. Semantic and syntactic skills determine how well children make use of the context of what they are reading. Phonological skills affect their use of letter-sound relationships.     

Teachers’ Discussions of Emotion in Child Care Centers

Teachers have the opportunity to discuss the emotions of children as they occur in the context of the classroom. As such, teachers play an important role in the socialization of emotions of young children. This observational study examines teachers discussions of emotions in three child care centers. The findings suggest that child care centers are important social contexts for learning about feelings because of ongoing interaction between teachers and children. Teachers in child care centers use various strategies with children to discuss their emotional expressions. They help children learn to identify emotion-related words, to understand the causes of emotion, and to provide them with constructive means of emotion regulation. The implications for teacher-training programs focusing on methods of facilitation of emotional competence and appropriate emotional socialization are presented.     

5~6岁幼儿对四种基本情绪相关词汇的理解和运用

儿童理解和运用情绪词汇的水平对其情绪理解与表达有重要影响。本研究运用自编的用于描述高兴、悲伤、愤怒、恐惧四种基本情绪的词汇表(共59个情绪词汇),通过准实验研究测量5~6岁幼儿对情绪词汇的理解和运用情况。结果发现,5~6岁幼儿能理解描述这四种基本情绪的词汇约33个,其中“高兴”12个、“悲伤”9个、“愤怒”7个、“恐惧”5个;能运用描述这四种基本情绪的词汇约6个,其中“高兴”2个、“悲伤”2个、“愤怒”1个、“恐惧”1个。5~6岁幼儿理解描述高兴的情绪词汇显著多于描述悲伤、愤怒和恐惧的情绪词汇;运用描述高兴的情绪词汇显著多于描述愤怒和恐惧的情绪词汇;运用描述悲伤和愤怒的情绪词汇显著多于描述恐惧的情绪词汇;运用描述高兴和悲伤的情绪词汇不存在显著差异。5~6岁幼儿对这四种基本情绪词汇的理解和运用没有明显的性别差异。教师和家长应关注幼儿对情绪词汇的理解与运用,并通过为幼儿创设支持性的学习环境,促进其情绪词汇理解和运用能力的发展。     

Communication competence in reading and learning disabilities

Conclusion The evidence indicates that learning-disabled children show pervasive and enduring language problems across a wide variety of language tasks. The studies suggest that the problems experienced by learning and reading-disabled children may fall into the categories of phonology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics as well as nonverbal communication. In terms of nonverbal communication, these children are less accurate in interpreting nonverbal auditory and visual cues. In phonology, it appears that they are less skilled in detecting the segments of single words and thus have difficulty establishing phoneme to grapheme correspondence. In the area of syntax, learning-disabled males are less skilled in dealing with inflection and the comprehension and creation of complex sentences. In semantics, they are less adequate than nondisabled children in defining words, creating sentences, and classifying objects into categories. They show less adequate sentence production, are less skilled at recognizing their errors, and are significantly slower in generating verbal responses. Finally, there is one study that suggests that learning-disabled children may be discriminated by their use of language in social situations. This paper was presented at the 29th Annual Conference of The Orton Society at Minneapolis, November, 1978.     

英汉双语者的语码转换现象

随着越来越多的人能够掌握两到三门语言，一种语言现象逐渐引起了人们的重视。在这些双语者中，当他们在运用自己的本族语进行交际时，自觉或不自觉的借用一些非母语的词和句以达到交流的目的。作者对30名英汉双语者进行了问卷调查，其研究表明，这样的语码转换现象达到了以下三个目的：语言学的需要；强化群体意识；增加对话的趣味性。     

The construction of word meaning in a multicultural classroom. Mediational tools in peer collaboration during mathematics lessons

In this article, we examine the construction of word meaning by students during collaborative activities in a multicultural classroom at a Dutch primary school. The analysis is based on recordings of student talk in small groups of four or five students during mathematics lessons. Difficulties with specific terms and expressions frequently arose during group work. Students could easily ask each other about the meaning of difficult words as a part of the collaborative activities they were accustomed to. In the groups with both Dutch and minority children, the minority students addressed their Dutch classmates as language experts. Conversations about language difficulties also occurred in the groups with only minority students. The conversations about word meaning revealed four patterns: (1) ignoring a question about the meaning of a word, (2) showing the meaning using gestures, (3) explaining, or (4) discussing word meaning. In none of the cases were the language problems solved by referring to the everyday meaning of the word. Instead, the conversations focussed directly on the specialised meaning which the word had in the context of the mathematics lesson. This means that the children used the mathematical discourse as a mediational tool for constructing a mathematical meaning of the words.     

设法利用一切机会使用英语

许多学生觉得英语学习很困难是因为他们缺乏语言学习环境,如果能去国外,他们肯定会学好英语。然而,许多英语学习好的人却从来没去过国外,他们“不管在教室外面还是里面都喜欢营造机会和探索策略练习英语”,所以无论我们是否在国外,如果设法经常使用英语,我们肯营造机会和探索策略练习英语”,所以无论我们是否在国外,如果设法经常使用英语,我们肯营造机会和探索策略练习英语”,所以无论我们是否在国外,如果设法经常使用英语,我们肯定会学好的。营造机会使用英语本身就是很好的策略,而且使用英语还可以帮我们解决难题。那么什么时候开始使用英语呢?怎样使用呢?能不能找到一些技巧呢?根据学习好的同学的经验,应该找得到的。     

在大学英语教学中语境理论的应用——对补缺假说的验证

"补缺假说"论的提出旨在阐释外语学习的机理,强调语言的使用离不开语境,语言与语境知识的有机结合是语言能被正确、恰当、流利使用的前提.通过对"补缺假说"的验证,得出结论,即在大学英语课堂上应通过人为地补足语言的适用语境,有效地融合连用语境教学,帮助学生走出背单词、记语法的误区.     

Three- to Four-Year-Old Children Rapidly Adapt Their Predictions and Use Them to Learn Novel Word Meanings

Adults create and update predictions about what speakers will say next. This study asks whether prediction can drive language acquisition, by testing whether 3- to 4-year-old children (n = 45) adapt to recent information when learning novel words. The study used a syntactic context which can precede both nouns and verbs to manipulate children's predictions about what syntactic category will follow. Children for whom the syntactic context predicted verbs were more likely to infer that a novel word appearing in this context referred to an action, than children for whom it predicted nouns. This suggests that children make rapid changes to their predictions, and use this information to learn novel information, supporting the role of prediction in language acquisition.     

Bilingual poetry: expanding the cognitive and cultural dimensions of children's learning

Stories and poetry have long been considered a resource for the language and literacy development of bilingual children, particularly if they can work with texts in both mother tongue and English. This paper demonstrates that bilingual learning is also beneficial for second and third‐generation children whose English is often stronger than their mother tongue. Presenting data from an action research project in East London primary schools, we show how children investigated metaphor and cultural content in a Bengali lullaby, clarifying concepts through dialogue with their parents. Comparison with a lullaby in English from North America generated additional ideas concerning different cultural values. The learning process enabled children to use their bilingual skills and draw on different aspects of their bicultural identities. Finally, we explain how bilingual poetry can be used to stimulate learning in a multilingual classroom context, through the example of a whole‐class lesson based around Bengali and English lullabies.     

影响教学中扩大词汇量的有效途径

词汇在外语学习中是非常重要的,但是死记硬背记单词则是件既吃力又见效慢的苦差使。实际上,学生们所掌握的词汇都是以一种网状的联系存储在其“大脑词典”当中,如果在教学中能充分利用这一联系,在增加新词的同时不断地复习已存储在大脑当中的旧词,背单词就会达到事半功倍的效果。     

Stylistic Variation at the "Single-Word" Stage: Relations between Maternal Speech Characteristics and Children's Vocabulary Composition and Usage

In this study we test a number of different claims about the nature of stylistic variation at the "single-word" stage by examining the relation between variation in early vocabulary composition, variation in early language use, and variation in the structural and functional propreties of mothers' child-directed speech. Maternal-report and observational data were collected for 26 children at 10, 50, and 100 words, These were then correlated with a variety of different measures of maternal speech at 10 words, The results show substantial variation in the percentage of common nouns and unanalyzed phrases in children's vocabularies, and singficant relations between this variation and the way in which language is used by the child. They also reveal singficant relations between the way in whch mothers use language at 10 words and the way in chich their children use language at 50 words and between certain formal properties of mothers speech at 10 words and the percentage of common nouns and unanalyzed phrases in children's early vocabularies, However, most of these relations desappear when an attempt is made to control for ossible effects of the child on the mother at Time 1. The exception is a singficant negative correlation between mothers tendency to produce speech that illustrates word boundaries and the percentage of unanalyzed phrases at 50 and 100 words. This suggests that mothers whose sprech provides the child with information about where new words begin and end tend to have children with few unanalyzed. phrases in their early vocabularies.     

At-risk readers developing expertise in register switching: evidence from cohesion analysis

Register refers to the variety of language that is appropriate for a particular situational context. This study examines young children’s development of register switching expertise as they become independent readers. Participants were 17 first graders identified by their classroom teachers as at-risk readers and admitted into an early literacy intervention program called Reading Recovery. At both the beginning and end of Reading Recovery, each child was asked to share a story about a personally relevant topic in a face-to-face, conversational context and then dictate that same oral tale as an autonomous/written text intended for a reader audience. The 68 texts (34 oral and 34 written) were analysed for their use of register-appropriate cohesive linguistic choices. It was found that as these at-risk children grew from emergent to independent, strategic readers, they were concurrently developing skills in constructing written register texts by recontextualising the cohesion language patterns in their oral register texts. It is suggested that developing expertise in register switching may compose part of the process of learning to read and write. This finding is discussed in the light of relevant literacy and educational research.     

Room for talk: Peer support for getting into english in an ESL kindergarten

Early childhood classrooms characterized by a predominance of second language learners from a wide mix of language backgrounds have emerged in unprecedented numbers on the American urban scene, lending urgency to the question: What happens when such diverse language learners are increasingly each others' only available peer resource for language learning in the classroom? This article highlights peer support for “getting into English” in one such setting—an ESL kindergarten where the children came from eight different language backgrounds and the teacher was the only native English speaker. Over 6 months of participant observation using qualitative, sociolinguistic methodology, the researcher documented the range of contexts in which case study children came to use English, and the efforts they and their teacher made to understand each other and be understood. In informal contexts for peer talk, children of like and different backgrounds served as resources for each other's use of English. They helped each other begin to use English among a broadening network of peers, for an expanding variety of purposes, and—at least to some extent—with more precision. Moreover, they pushed each other to elaborate and clarify their English. A model of peer collaboration is explored to take into account how children's evolving social relationships served as an impetus for talk in English. Implications for research and practice are discussed.     

幼儿书面语言掌握特点的实验研究

本研究旨在探讨幼儿书面语言识字阅读过程的特点与规律。实验1探讨幼儿不同起步年龄与不同学习时间对书面语言学习效果的影响;实验2与实验3探讨幼儿学习书面语言的最佳时段,其中实验2主要探讨识字学习的最佳时段,实验3探讨阅读学习的最佳时段;实验4进一步探讨幼儿识字学习的最低输入量问题。     

浅议公文语言之美

公文通过锤炼词句来达到言约意丰语言表达的效果。优秀的公文,不仅要正确选择词语,还需熟知词语在不同的语境中含义、情感和风格的变化,熟练运用、巧妙配合,从而体现公文语言准确美、简炼美、生动美、规范美、模糊美、朴素美。