Language Learning

A Lifelong Process

Joseph Foley, Linda Thompson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781317835905
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Sprachen & Linguistik
• Subtopic: Sprachwissenschaft

Language Learning provides an introduction to language development that differs from existing books in that it traces language and cognitive development (together with the associated debates) from babyhood, through the school years of middle childhood and adolescence, into adulthood and the world of work. Increasingly, the global trend is towards learning to speak, read and write more than one language. Language Learning is a comprehensive book that includes descriptions and discussions of learning more than one language sequentially and simulataneously. The only book to look at language with a lifelong perspective, it is ideal as an introductory student text. Each chapter contains ideas and suggestions for students to follow-up and begin their own small scale investigations into language development.

1	What is language?

1.1 Phonemes or sounds

1.2 Learning the phonemes of English

1.3 Learning words – the lexicon

1.4 Learning the grammar or syntax

1.5 Learning to read and write

1.6 Pragmatics

1.7 Summary

Preposition. An enormously versatile part of grammar as in ‘What made you pick this book I didn’t want to be read to out of up for?’

(Winston Churchill)

We begin our consideration of language development by posing the question ‘what is language?’ This first chapter outlines a conceptual framework for understanding what language is and how this definition of what it means to learn language has changed over time. It is not possible to discuss language without reference to some of the structural features that comprise a language or linguistic system. For some readers, who have studied language development or linguistics before, this may be familiar territory and some of what we have to say may be similar to other descriptions that you already know about. For other readers, this may all be quite new. This opening chapter is important because it provides an introduction to our particular view of language development and what it means to learn language(s). There are important aspects in which our description which may differ from some other descriptions. This is because we are trying to provide an explanation of how all children learn the language(s) of the homes and communities in which they are being raised. Previous descriptions have tended to focus more on descriptions of how monolingual children learn one language. Our concern is more diverse. We suggest that you use this chapter as a point of reference as you continue to read through the other chapters of the book.

Language is a complex system of signs for communication. It comprises a number of structural features. While it has become somewhat fashionable to disregard structure in language learning and to focus instead, almost exclusively, on communication, we stress that it is important to understand the ways in which language systems are systematically organized because it is with and through these structures that meanings are created. Communication is created through the structures. These structured systems range across language use and include sounds or phonemes in spoken language, words or the lexicon, as well as the grammar. These elements or units of the linguistic system cannot be considered as separate from each other. They are all interrelated and work together to create meaning. Hence we argue that meaning or communicative aspects of interaction are not separate from the structure of the language. Meanings are created with and through the structural features.

We begin our exploration of language with an outline of the hierarchy of linguistic units that individually and collectively distinguish linguistic systems one from the other and combine to create the uniqueness of a particular language or linguistic system. In this way, it will be demonstrated that language is actually a complex composition of interrelated linguistic (structural) features, and that language is first and foremost a highly structured, rule governed, linguistic system. The rules have been derived through use by the users (the speakers, readers and writers) of the language, who through their everyday interactions have arrived at the structure or guiding principles.

There are exceptions to this naturalistic approach, whereby governments or learnt bodies have attempted to prescribe the rules of a particular language. One example is the Académie Française which meets regularly to set the parameters of the French language. The Académie prescribes the number of words and expressions that may be borrowed or loaned from other languages and which are permissible to include in official French language use, for example, radio and television broadcasts.

These formal attempts to prescribe rules of language use have not enjoyed the widespread impact imagined. It is the speakers of the language who through their everyday use of the system bring about change or maintain the stability. It is important to stress that all language and linguistic systems are rule bound and rule governed. An ongoing debate in education circles is the difference between children’s spoken and written language. It is often assumed, and sometimes even argued (cf. Honey 1997) that spoken interaction is not only different from spoken text but that it does not have strict rules of use. This is not the case. While spoken texts do differ from written texts in a number of important ways, both are governed by rules. Both are systematic and highly organized.

However, the rules of spoken language differ from the rules of the written language. This is because different channels of language, speech and written text perform different functions of communication. The important point to note is that all languages and all forms, be they spoken, written, electronic, and so on, are governed by rules of use and it is by adhering to these that effective communication is achieved. There are, of course, ways in which individuals can work outside of the existing rules for a variety of communicative effects. This is one way in which changes in language use can occur. Language is dynamic. It changes over time, from context to context and with speakers and the changes that do occur can become systematically regularized as new rules.

So when it is said that one person speaks Hokkien or another speaks Portuguese what in fact is being implied is that the person can use and understand the rules of that particular linguistic system and has a pretty sound grasp of the rules of the system, at each level of linguistic structure. This knowledge about the language system may be intuitive, that is the speakers may be able to apply and use the rules extremely competently but they may not be able to explain to others what the rules are or even explain why they do the things they do with language. Perhaps it is necessary to explain what is meant by the term intuitive knowledge. Intuitive knowledge is deep-seated knowledge of something which has been learnt but which the learner cannot recall having learnt. It should not be confused with innateness, something that people are born with. Most speakers’ knowledge of the linguistic system they use remains at the intuitive level of understanding. They can speak the language, and understand others but they cannot necessarily explain the rules that govern what they are doing. Through the processes of education intuitive knowledge may become overt knowledge that the learner can reflect upon and talk about. A distinguishing feature of educational knowledge is that it is overt knowledge and pupils, as part of the education process learn the rules of language, for example, spelling, punctuation, pronunciation, etc.

In 1975 the Department of Education and Science (DES) in the UK published an extremely influential report on the teaching of English in primary schools. Entitled A Language For Life, the Bullock report as it is popularly known, outlined a skills based four-part model of the (English) language as reading, writing, speaking and listening. It is a model has dominated language curricula and language teaching. Bullock’s model can be illustrated diagrammatically in Figure 1.1.

Figure 1.1 A four-part skill based description of language learning

Learning to speak and understand a language has been primarily associated with the early stages of learning, learning that takes place in informal social contexts such as the home, while learning to read and to write have become established as the central feature of primary education. This model will be reconsidered later.

As a starting point for understanding more about language development it is first important to understand something of the structure of the linguistic system. The defining linguistic features of a specific language system form a hierarchy that begins with the sound system and what is generally accepted as the smallest unit of linguistic analysis, the phoneme. For readers who are not familiar with the structure of language the following section outlines in general terms, some structural features that combine to create a language system.

1.1 Phonemes or sounds

Language comprises a number of individual sounds. These are called phonemes. Each language or linguistic system comprises its own unique set of phonemes. The sounds system varies from language to language. Crystal (1995: 426) reminds us that English has 20 or so vowels and 24 or more consonants. How many of these can you list? While these are each important individually, they are of particular significance in the ways in which they combine with each other to create the unique sound system that distinguishes the varieties of English spoken in diverse geographical locations from Australia to Zambia. There are over 300 ways of combining the vowels and consonants of English to produce units of meaning within the English language system.

In addition to these phonemes, languages also comprise patterns of stress and intonation or in the case of some languages, for example, Chinese and Japanese tones. These features are frequently referred to as prosody. Together, they combine to comprise the phonology of the language. There is evidence to suggest that we begin to learn the phonological system of the language in which we are being raised before we reach our first birthday. Halliday (1978a) one of the founders of the school of systemic functional linguistics (SFL) suggests that the phonological contours of language are the genesis of meanings, the genesis of the semantic system. Systemic linguists, in their description of children’s language in the first years of life, focus on the phonological contouring that the baby makes as one of the key ways in which the young child is beginning to communicate with others (Halliday 1978b and Painter, 1984 & 1999). These phonological contours are referred to by Halliday as tones and they will be discussed in greater detail in Chapter 4.

Some researchers describe baby sounds in terms of biological needs and functions. However, there are other researchers who support the view that babies, even in the first months of life, are capable of a degree of linguistic sophistication. Recent research by Thomas Lee Hun of the language information sciences research centre at City University in Hong Kong suggests that newborn infants are sensitive to subtle distinctions in the language spoken by their primary caregivers, in this case their mother’s language. He suggests that just a few days after birth babies can distinguish between the sounds of the language system spoken by their mother from the sounds of other language systems. Lee Hun’s longitudinal eight-year research programme, has listed the language development stages of eight Cantonese speaking children aged between 18 months and 2.5 years. It is the largest child language research to date in Chinese-speaking communities. From his findings he further claims that the babbling of 10-month-old babies reflects the phonetic characteristics of their mother’s language. Hence the babbling sounds of 10-month-old babies born to Cantonese-speaking parents are made using some of the basic units of sounds (the phonemes) of the Cantonese language. Similarly, babies cared for by English speakers will at around 10 months begin to formulate English phone...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Transcription conventions
• Acknowledgements
• 1 What is language?
• 2 What we know about language learning
• 3 Learning to communicate
• 4 A social view of language learning
• 5 Learning how to ‘get things done’ in the first two years of life
• 6 Language as a resource for learning
• 7 Language development in the school
• 8 Developing language through writing
• 9 Critical language awareness
• 10 Multiliteracies
• 11 Learning language(s): creating a linguistic biography
• References
• Index