Analysis of Text A

Analysis of exam question Text A

Language acquisition videos

This video talks about second language acquisition through the behaviourist theory. As well as talking about Skinner's views on language acquisition (especially through learning a second language), the video also discusses Chomsky's opposing opinions about the way we acquire language.

This video shows an experiment set up by a cognitive scientist in his own home to find out information about how his own child acquires language from birth to 3 years old. This experiment took place so he and his team could generally find out how children learn to speak, by gathering a great amount of evidence.

In this video typical language development stages are shown from the age of 6 months to 5 years. At each age, the video discusses what types of words the child can say including their range of vocabulary. It states approximately how many words a child knows at each age.  It also discusses a child's ability to structure sentences as they start to combine words together. There are also some video examples to present these stages; ranging from a baby at only 15 months old to a 4 year old. I have learnt what children of different ages typically understand and how they learn language overall - generally, from their parents by interacting with them and repeating words and combinations of words that they hear.

English Language Development

 

 

 

 

 



 

 

 These are examples of my language development in Year 5, when I was around the age of 10. There are examples of my handwriting sheets, my literacy book and my homework diary.

 From my handwriting sheets, you can see my writing was very neat as we were taught to use joint-up handwriting as this age so we could write with a pen. Main focuses were on the shape of the handwriting, as well as the size, the equal space, if it was parallel and written on the line. Around this age, I have just started to write with a pen so I probably tried to make my writing as neat as possible at this stage.

 In the example of my literacy work, I have written a paragraph on mountain forest animals. I can link this work to Kroll’s stages as around age 10, children are said to become confident in grammatical structures which is seen in my work as I use commas, capital letters and even brackets. However, there are a few mistakes where I have used capital letters after commas instead of after full stops – this is something the teacher has commented on saying ‘Remember it is full stops and capital letters who are in love not commas’. I feel by the teacher saying it in this way, I and other students would have been able to remember the rule better.

 My last example is of my homework diary where my reading has been recorded. As my mum was the person who read with me/ listened to me read, she was the one who signed this book. I feel as though I can link this work to Chall’s reading stages as at the age I was at, I was supposed to be reading in order to gain new information. I feel this is partly true as the books I was reading at this time were quite lengthy therefore were based partly on gaining information as well as reading books for entertainment.

My English Language Development

My Own Language Development Story

 As a child my first words were 'mummy' and 'daddy' and I also used to use shorter nicknames for my younger brother. There were no concious decisions behind my own language development however my parents did read to me when I was younger and my favourite books were Disney ones I had as a child, including 'The Little Mermaid' and 'Snow White'. My earliest memories of reading was when my parents used to read to me before bed or when I had to read to them, nearly every day, using books supplied from primary school. I believe that Chall's reading stages have some relevance towards my own language development as I started reading short stories around 7 however this was to improve my own ability to read, not to gain any new information.

Vygotsky's Theory

According to Vygotsky, until children learn to use mental tools, their learning is largely controlled by the environment; they attend only to the things that are brightest or loudest, and they can remember something only if has been repeated many times. AFTER children master mental tools, they become in charge of their own learning, by attending and remembering in an intentional and purposeful way. In the same way that using certain mental tools can transform children’s cognitive behaviours, using other mental tools can transform their physical, social, and emotional behaviours. From being “slaves to the environment,” children become “masters of their own behaviour.” As children are taught and practice an increasing number of mental tools, they transform not only their external behaviours, but also their minds, leading to the emergence of higher mental functions.

Some major themes in the social development theory:
1. Social interaction plays a fundamental role in cognitive development. He felt social learning precedes (comes before) development. He said every function in the child's cultural development appears twice. First on a social level (between people) and then on an individual level for the child.
2. The more knowledgeable other (MKO) - means the person with a better understanding or higher ability than the learner/child. It could be teachers, adults or even peers and computes.
3. The Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). This is the distance between a student's ability to perform a task under adult guidance/ or with a peer compared to doing it independently. Learning occurs in this zone.