Children's phonological development.

Have to remember every child is different which means speech will develop at different stages.

 

 

 The table suggests that children develop two consonant sounds together a lot later than a consonant sound on its own. From the transcripts I have looked at from both Evie and Zach they do find it a lot harder to pronounce words like ‘through’ correctly, however it will be interesting to know at what age they do correctly pronounce it to see if it reflects the table.

At about 4-6 months a child may begin to start trying to create certain sounds mainly consonants and start experimenting with their tone of voice from growls to squeaks.

8 months the child may start to use their tone of voice to mean different things and they start babbling and using certain sounds together.

When the child reaches about 18 months old it should have a vocabulary of between 50-100 words which will most likely be words they are used to and from their common surroundings and things they are familiar with.

At 2 the child should be able to pair words together eg: ‘mummy chair’. Also asks a lot of questions ‘why mummy’. From the table we can see that by three the harder sounds of ‘g’ and ‘k’ are used which suggests at this stage the child will be experimenting in trying to create the sound. They are probably harder for the child as it uses muscles they may not have developed well enough in the mouth.

Doing certain tasks with children can encourage them to speak and introduces them to adult language.

At 3 the child is starting to use sentences and starts understanding and using pronouns such as ‘they’ starting to use tenses and plurals even if they are wrong ‘swimmed’ ‘sheeps’ they understand the basic rule.

Between 4-5 children can talk in more sentences and speak of events that have happened to them and their friends from school/pre-school. They are starting to use harder sounds in their language such as ‘pl’ ‘st’.

About 6 children stop clipping verbs such as ‘running’ as they manage to develop the ‘ng’ sound. Children tend to clip the verb to ‘runnin’ as they have managed to create the ‘ng’ sound. This could be because the muscles are still developing and strengthening in their jaw and tongue.

The ‘th’ is one of the last for a child to pronounce correctly at about 7 years old.

If children can’t pronounce the sound properly they may substitute in a sound that they can pronounce eg ‘pish instead of fish’ because the ‘f’ sound is normally developed later then the ‘p’ sound.

http://www.kidshealth.org.nz/speech-sound-development
http://www.home-speech-home.com/baby-speech-development.html
http://www.babycentre.co.uk/a6573/developmental-milestones-talking
http://www.asha.org/slp/schools/prof-consult/norms/
http://www.asha.org/public/speech/development/12.htm
http://www.asha.org/public/speech/development/23.htm
http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/behaviour_development/a435354-speech-development-the-th-sound
http://www.speaklistenplay.com/2013/01/speech-sound-development.html

Zach's Transcript Analysis.

-Gives praise 'very good' tells him it’s a good drawing, might encourage him to do activities like drawing again.

-Asks him lots of questions 'what are you drawing Zach?' open questions encourage him to talk and extend his sentences. 'We had some banana didn't we?' He can only respond yes or know so its limited his answer, however the mother only leaves a short pause after asking him this before she asks 'what else have we had?' this is a open question. She hasn't given him a lot of time to process the original question before asking the second one. This could also maybe because she realised it was a closed question and wanted him to speak more, or it could be because his body language in the video doesn't look like he is thinking to answer the first one so she’s asked him something else similar to keep him engaged and then encouraging to speak.

-Echoing 'Z: I think I don't H: nah I think you don't' could encourage him to maybe think about the fact he threw his food on the floor.

-Repair 'Z: Bolognay H: Bolognaise' She corrects him so hopefully he will eventually adapt his version of the noun to the correct pronunciation. 'Z: Frough H: Through' His muscles may have not developed to be able to make the sounds for 'through' as a result he has substituted his own sound however he may not be aware of this and thinks he is saying the adult version. As the mother echo's back to him the correct sound, over time he could develop the muscles and be able to say it how adults do.

-3rd person 'N: Mummy's dinner and Daddy's dinner' This could be so the child grown up knowing who is who, however as he gets older he may get confused with how to use certain pronouns like 'you' or 'they' but as parents as they get older they could start using 1st person to describe themselves and as a result the child could eventually, like the other language rules start to understand when to use it.

-Missing of the copula verb ‘I cutting round the edge’ missing out the auxiliary verb ‘am’ doesn’t mean the parents won’t understand what he’s saying.

-He asks his mum if its lasagne she has for tea. He wasn’t sure what her dinner was so gave it a noun he knows from his familiar topics, he overextends by categorising. 

-Zach confuses which noun is meant to be plural ‘so it’s a banana and it’s got skins’ this could be because once a banana is peeled it has many different parts. Or there could be more skins than bananas in his drawing. As a result the mother doesn’t repair his speech and just echo’s it back ‘are the skins off are they?’

-Zach uses a tag question ‘I can’t get it up der no?’ He’s encouraging some response, it sounds in the video like the mother and father are maybe settling down to eat as their food has been bought it which could be why he used to tag question to get their attention. Or he is genuinely confused and maybe questioning himself.

Everyone matters. - Every word is
important despite who said it.
Kate French 04/10/2014
Undoubtedly the work place will be filled with different ethnicities, cultures, ages, social classes and genders. So, it is understandable that there are many different languages and styles of speech. This article should guide you to a better understanding that different speech doesn't mean bad speech.

Different genders in the office.
If we looked overall at male and female's language, it is obvious that they use different approaches to language depending on who they are addressing. Woman are seen to be more co-operative and supportive towards one another, whereas men tend to use more derogative terms towards each other to emphasise they maintain a good relationship.
However it is more likely in the office to have mixed sex conversations. Studies have shown in mixed sex conversations there tends to be more confusion, however this does not mean the other persons point is less valid because you did not fully understand first time. To create the best working environment colleagues need to listen to each other and as a result will progress well as a team.

Methodology for my investigation first attempt

Change in language in the textiles industry.

I have collected a number of articles and pieces of writing to do with textiles, half are pieces of writing to do with fabrics that are made from natural fibers and the other half about synthetic fibers and smart materials. Each piece of writing is to inform and maybe entertain the reader and i have rolled a dice to select the writing I will analyse.

Reliability
-The data is all collected from modern day articles even if the article is about fashion in the 1500's the language is still different.
-Data is collected from different sources, websites, books, first hand research.
-Every piece of writing is to inform someone about the textiles.

Comparability
-The language change between when we only had clothes made out of natural fibers to when science made a huge influence in the textile world and synthetic fibers were invented and smart materials were introduced.

Methodology ideas for investigations.

Investigate replacements of paralinguistic features within texts.

Take a huge sample of different texts, this will ensure reliability.
Will have to maybe make sure the subject the texts are about are the same?
However it could indicate different ages use different features or gender may effect the paralinguistic features.
Choose random texts to write about by numbering them and rolling a dice to choose. However still talk about the ones that stand out afterwards eg:'if I included text ? in this it would....'
Have to make sure everyone's texts used have said its okay to use them.
Try and mitigate the observers paradox by getting permission then talking about things and after a while of talking start talking of the subject I want and hopefully they will have forgotten that I'm going to be using their texts.

This could work as I have family that live in different countries and friends from all over the country however getting enough texts to ensure it is reliable would be difficult.


Investigate the language used by websites that are aimed at different ages.

Look at a website aimed at a primary school student (CBBC) and a website aimed at a older generation (BBC Iplayer) can look at the pages layouts, language used, links, adverts ect.
May have to look at other websites, but they will have to be similar like these two are TV programmes from the same channel aimed at different audiences to ensure its fair. And will have to make sure the websites are aimed at the same ages eg primary children and adults.

This could work however it might be difficult to find lots of websites to ensure its reliable.

Ideas for coursework.

1) I could look at news articles from right wing and left wing newspapers about David Cameron becoming prime minister and compare the different language used.

2) I could look at news articles from American news papers and British news papers about the assassination of Osama Bin Laden.

I'm more interested in articles and written sources. Rather then spoken language.

http://www.bl.uk/learning/langlit/sounds/changing-voices/

http://www.newfieldnetwork.com/New2/News/0611/Language/index.cfm

http://www.rebeccamorgan.com/articles/mgmt/mgmt2.html

http://www.signingtime.com/resources/articles/autism-language/