Jigsaw Team 5 Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Language Acquisition

By: Giavona Mondi, Kayton Oglesby, and Ricki Gray-Lawson

Chapter Overview

Chapter 6 focuses on language and its importance to us. Language plays a fundamental role in human connection, information exchange, and expression. It helps convey emotions and identities and is crucial to cognitive and psychosocial development. Exploring language and its developmental processes is important in the hearing as well as the deaf population.

Table of contents

Part 1: Giavona Mondi

Part 2: Kayton Oglesby

Part 3: Ricki Gray-Lawson

Part 1

The Components of Language

Language is defined as a socially shared code. Language can be divided into three major components: Form, Content, and Use. These three components can further be split into five different domains: Phonology, Morphology, Syntax, Semantics, and Pragmatics. Form includes Phonology, Morphology, and Syntax. Content includes Semantics, and Use includes Pragmatics.

The Five Domains

Morphology

Syntax

Phonology

Syntax refers to the order of words and how words are arranged in sentences; it studies phrases, clauses, and sentence types. It allows language users the flexibility to combine words into phrases, to combine phrases into sentences, and to transform one sentence type into another.

Morphology is the second component of language. It studies the structure of words and word formation. It identifies the smallest linguistic units that have meaning. Some words can be viewed as a single unit, and others can be divided into smaller units. The smallest unit of a word is a morpheme.

Phonology refers to the system of rules that govern sound production in a language. Each language can be characterized by the specific phonemes, or speech sounds, that distinguish it as a language. A phoneme is a single sound in a language.

Pragmatics

Pragmatics addresses how language is used to communicate in social contexts. The pragmatic aspect of language examines how those involved in dialogues initiate and take turns during a conversation. Pragmatics influences the word choices we elect to use and how we use these words to interact with our friends, co-workers, and subordinates. Pragmatics is shown when we speak to people differently or animals differently.

Semantics

Semantics focuses on the meaning of words or lexicon. It directs its attention to how words are used to describe objects, people, and situations, and how they can further be used to refer to animate as well as inanimate objects. Semantics relies on the mental dictionaries of an individual.

The Five Domains

This chart from ASHA (The American Speech and Hearing Association) shows the importance of each of the domains of language. These domains are also important in the areas of listening, speaking, reading, and writing. These categories can also be grouped into receptive language, which is listening and reading, and expressive language which is speaking and wirting.

Stages of Language Development

• The foundation for language learning begins as early as infancy.
• During the first week of life babies can begin imitating facial expressions.
• Babbling emerges between 8-12 months.
• Jargon emerges around 12 months of age.

• Children usually gain a vocabulary of about 200-300 words by 2 years old.
• When children have an expressive vocabulary of about 10 words they can understand about 50 words.
• Children add at least five words to their vocabulary every day from 18 months to about 6 years.

• By about 6 years, the child has an expressive vocabulary of 2,600 words and a receptive vocabulary of between 20,000 and 24,000 words.
• As children progress through school they rely on this word base to gather knowledge, perform academic tasks, and engage in social discourse. When they initially enter the classroom it is generally assumed they are “language ready.”
• As language evolves children begin to realize that it is arbitrary, that it is a system of units and rules, and that this system can be used for communication.

Stages of Language Development

• Throughout middle and late childhood, children use these skills to analyze how words are used. This provides them with insights into the world and allows them to understand that words can represent inanimate objects and thus have no direct bearing on their personal experiences. The transition from childhood to adolescence can be observed in classrooms where students are expected to translate their “word knowledge” into “world knowledge”
• The most significantly advanced area of language throughout adolescence is pragmatics. Pragmatics develops more with the more interactions and conversations you have with others.
• In young adults it is important to promote language skills in building friendships.
• It can be nearly impossible for infants with hearing loss before age 2 to master the complexities of successful communication.
• In recent years it has become easier for children who are deaf or hard of hearing to communicate because of technology and teaching methods.
• Language learning spans one’s lifetime. Beginning in infancy, and continuing over only a few short years, most children develop a rich and complex linguistic system.

Modes of communication

The term communication can be defined as a process in which two entities enter into an exchange of information to transmit thoughts, messages, or ideas. Effective communication happens when individuals participating in the interaction are fully involved and aware of each other’s needs and feelings. By paying attention to nonverbal cues such as body language, tone, emphasis, and rate, the listener can understand the emotions expressed by the individual. Three different modes of communication can be defined as Oral, Visual, and Multimodal. Oral communication includes four main modes, Auditory-Verbal, Auditory-Aural, Natural Oralism/Auralism, and the Maternal Reflective Method.

• Auditory-Verbal
• Auditory Verbal or AV therapy is defined as an approach that relies on the application and management of technology with procedures that focus on teaching children who are hard of hearing or deaf how to communicate through speech. This therapy technique is used by restricting lip reading. AV therapy stresses the importance of early identification, the use of binaural amplification, and integration into everyday life.

• Auditory-Oral
• This approach is similar to the AV therapy approach. Both approaches support the importance of early identification, a high level of parental involvement, advanced technology to facilitate auditory input, and interaction with highly qualified AO professionals. The Auditory-Oral approach places emphasis on ways to simultaneously promote the use of residual hearing and techniques that support lipreading. The AV approach supports the idea that educational success can be found in their local schools, while the AO approach supports the idea that success can be measured in many different educational settings.

Modes of communication

• Natural Oralism/Natural Auralism
• Natural Oralism/Natural Auralism or NA, is more commonly known as the “oral/aural” or “auditory/oral” approach. This method emphasizes the use of residual hearing while facilitating natural language development. It shares many ideas with the other approaches, but a difference would be that the NA approach encourages the child to be an active participant in conversation without being corrected.

• Maternal Reflective Method
• The Maternal Reflective Method (MR) and the natural oralism/natural auralism approaches share several features. Both stress the importance of promoting spoken language skills, value the importance of emphasizing the use of residual hearing, recognize the importance of audiological support, and believe that language develops through a conversational approach. However, the MR method stands out from others due to two distinct characteristics. Firstly, it emphasizes exposing children to text right from the early stages. Secondly, it emphasizes reflection, a process that involves writing down conversations and analyzing them with a focus on grammar, register, style, and form, a step described uniquely within the MR approach.

Part 1 summary

The five domains allow a basic understanding of the different areas of language and help us understand the ways in which language develops. Language is crucial in communication with others in our environment. The four methods of oral communication discussed offer many options for parents and others to communicate with a child who is deaf or hard of hearing. While most prefer to use the oral/aural approach, some may choose to utilize sign systems such as American Sign Language.

Part 2

VIsual Modes of Communication

American Sign Language

-ASL is a visual, gestural, rule governed language that was created by and for deaf individuals. ASL is not a form of English and it is not universal. -provides signers with a complete language where they can convey complex ideas, discuss abstract thoughts, and share everything. -Messages are conveyed within the sign space which includes the area from the waist to the top of the head.

Manually Coded English Sign Systems

-Originating in the 1970s, MCE sign systems were developed to assist students with the acquisition of spoken and written English. - There are 6 branches of MCE - The Rochester Method - Signed English -Seeing Essential English (SEE1) -Seeing Essential English (SEE2) -Conceptually Accurate Signed English (CASE) -Contact Signing

The Rochester Method

--This method was originally called "The Great Innovation" -It is a system consisting of only Fingerspelling.

Fingerspelling-a manual representation of the language that is spoken. As words are spoken, they are spelled out letter by letter.

Sign markers are used to illustrate word form changes

Signed English

- The Origins can be traced to the mid 1970s and the work of Harry Bornstein and his associates. - It was initially created for preschool children but was eventually used in elementary schools as well. - It was designed to be used alongside speech with approximately 3,000 sign words and 14 sign markers. - Each sign word represents a seperate word in a standard English dictionary.

Signing exact english

SEE1

SEE 2

- SEE 1 is the oldest of all the Sign Systems. -It is based on the linguistic structure of English. - The system is made up of approximately 5,000 signs

- SEE 2 is an outgrowth of SEE1 and is currently the most widely used sign system. -English words are divided into basic, complex, and compound words. - The SEE2 manual consists of 2,100 signs, 70 affixes and 7 contractions.

Conceptually Accurate Signed English

- CASE refers to the use of signs based on the idea being conveyed rather than the English word being used.- Those that use CASE rely more on the meaning of the word rather than the spelling of the word. - Signs are produced using English sentence structure.

Contact signing

- Also known as Pidgin Signed English - Contact Signing is typically the middle ground between Deaf individuals whose native language is ASL and hearing or deaf individuals who know some ASL but are not fluent. - Signs are produced using English sentence structure.

Sign Tribe Video

Different types of language

Ricki Gray-Lawson

Types of language

There are many different types of language and not just spoken langauge. Language is the base of communication and there anre many different types.

Cued speech

-Used to assist development of a spoken language. -NOT A LANGUAGE -Many speech sounds look the same on the lips when they are produced but are represented by different hand shaped -Example: Mat, Bat, Pat -Designed to fix problems that come with only using listening and speaking without changing all of the goals that come with just using strictly speech https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jn4e9V3oigs

SIgn -Supported speech (SSS)

- Appeared in the 1980"sUsed to denote anytime people used signs to support what they were trying to convey -In an situation families would use this methos to help their child develop speech-Once children can utilize auditory response and produce words correctly, the sign usage is illiminated

SImuntaneous communication

-Simuntaneouc sommunication envolves speaking and signing at the same time. -The main objective is to visually display everything that is being said -Simultaneous communication CAN’T be paired with ASL because you cannot communicate in two different languages at the same time -Manually coded English (MCE) systems (SE, CASE)

Total communication

- Came about in the 1960’s -Studies showed that children who were deaf to deaf parents exposed to manual communication had English skills that were more superior than children with hearing parents that relied on speech to communicate -In the late 1960’s and early 1970's schools started to experiment with different varieties of sign systems. -The goal was to provide students with total forms of communication to enhance their English reading and writing skills

ENhancing language through sign supported speech

- Studies show the similarities in sign and spoken languages exhibit the same linguistic properties such as morphology, syntax, pragmatics, syllabic, and phonological levels.

References

Scheetz, N. A. (2012). Language acquisition: Acquiring the building blocks for communication. Deaf education in the 21st century: Topics and trends (pp. 91-116). Boston, MA: Pearson. YouTube. (2017, January 10). How cued speech works. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jn4e9V3oigs American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. (n.d.). Language in brief. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. https://www.asha.org/practice-portal/clinical-topics/spoken language-disorders/language-in-brief/ Sailors, L. (2022, November 6). Differences between ASL, see, & PSE | quick explanation | sign tribe academy + ASL courses + zoom. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Oci5EtJPJU

Thank YOU!