Nature of Language and Learning 6.

It is a continuous process and never-ending process

that goes from womb to tomb.
Language
7 Principles in Learning (Dumont et. al. 2010)
is the process of exchanging of messages and creating
meaning. 1. Learners at the center.

-Language Is part of culture. 2. The social nature of learning.

-Language is also intertwined with human biology. 3. Emotions are integral to learning.

Characteristics of Human Language: 4. Recognizing individual difference.

1. Language is a social tool. 5. Stretching all students.

2. Language must be learned. 6. Assessment for learning.

3. The relationship between the sound of a language 7. Building horizontal connections.

and their meaning is arbitrary and dual.
THEORIES OF LANGUAGE/WHAT IS LANGUAGE?
4. Language has rules.
1. For the structuralist, language is a system of speech
5. Language allows human to be creative. sounds, arbitrarily assigned to the objects, states, and
concepts to which they refer, used for human
Acquisition Learning
communication.
-Similar to child's first language
 Language is a system. Language is a system of forms –
-“Picking up” a language elements or items combined in certain ways to create
sentences. Language is a system of structurally related
-Subconscious elements of “building blocks” for the encoding of
-Implicit knowledge meaning, the elements being phonemes (sounds)
morphemes (words), tag memes (phrases and
-Formal teaching does not help sentences/clauses).
Learning  Language is speech. The primary medium of language
-Formal knowledge of language is speech. Speech is language; the written record is but
a secondary representation of language. Language is
-“Knowing about” a language “primarily what is spoken only secondarily what is
written.” Therefore, it is assumed that speech has a
-Conscious
priority in language teaching.
-Explicit knowledge
 Language is arbitrary. The relationship between the
-Formal teaching helps words and the “things” they denote is merely
conventional, i.e. native speakers of English, in some
Nature of Learning
sense agreed to use the sound like cat, is/kaet/ in
1. Learning is a process. English because native speakers of English ‘want’ it to
be.
2. Learning involves experiences and training of an
individual which helps to change his behavior.  Language is for communication.

3. Learning prepare the individual to adjust and adopt in 2. For the transformationalist, language is a system of
the situation. knowledge made manifest in linguistic form but innate
and, in its most abstract form, universal.
4. All learning is purposeful and goal oriented.
 Language is a system which relates meanings to
5. Learning is universal and continuous. substance.
 Language is a mental phenomenon. Theories on First Language Acquisition

 Language is innate. All normal children acquire their  Behaviourism- “Language Learning is a kind of
mother tongue in an amazingly short time. The behavior similar to other human behavior. Language is
innateness of language suggests a genetically imparted learnt in much the same way as anything else is learnt.”
ability for language learning.
• Proponent: B. F. Skinner
 Language is universal. It is universal in the sense that
- language behavior is the production of correct
all normal children the world over acquire a mother
responses to stimuli through reinforcement.
tongue but it is also universal in the sense that, at a
highly abstract level, all language must share key - Language learning is the result of 1) imitation (word-
characteristics which permit us to label them as human for-word repetition), 2) practice(repetitive manipulation
languages. of form), 3) feedback on success (positive
reinforcement), and 4)habit formation.
 Language is creative. Language enables us to produce
and understand sentences we have not heard nor used - The quality and quantity of the language that the child
before. hears, as well as the consistency of the reinforcement
offered by others in the environment, would shape the
3. For the functionalist, language is a dynamic, open
child’s language behavior.
system by means of which members of community
exchange information. It is a vehicle for the expression • Popular in 1950’s and 60’s
of functional meaning.
• Principle: Say what I say
4. For the interactionist, language is a vehicle for the
realization of interpersonal relations and for the  Nativism – “We are born with a Language Acquisition
performance of social transactions between individuals. Device (LAD) and access to Universal Grammar (UG)”
It is a tool for the creation and maintenance of social • Proponent: Noam Chomsky
relations. Language teaching content, according to this
view, may be specified and organized by patterns of -Children are biologically programmed for language
exchange and interaction. and language develops in the child in just the same way
that other biological functions develop.
THEORIES OF LANGUAGE ACQUISITION (Overview)
-The environment makes only a basic contribution,
Behavioral-Skinner -Children imitate adults. Their that is, the availability of people who speak to the child.
correct utterances are reinforced when they get what Therefore, the child’s biological endowment (LAD) will
they want or are praised. do the rest. Children are born with a specific innate
Innateness- Chomsky - A child's brain contains special ability to discover for themselves the underlying rules of
language-learning mechanisms at birth. a language system on the basis of the samples of a
natural language they are exposed to.
Cognitive- Piaget- Language is just one aspect of a
child's overall intellectual development. • 1959

Interaction-Bruner- This theory emphasises the • Principle: It’s all in your mind
interaction betweenchildren and their care-givers.  Cognitive Approach- “Children’s language
DEFINITION AND THEORIES OF FIRST AND SECOND development relies on their understanding of the world
LANGUAGE ACQUISITION or cognition.”

Definition of “first language” (L1): • Proponent: Jean Piaget

• The language(s) that an individual learns first.  Language is dependent upon and springs from
cognitive development. That is, children’s cognitive
• Other terms for “first language”- development determines their language development.
(e.g., the use of words as “bigger” or “more” depends
• Native language or mother tongue
on children’s understanding of the concepts they words get the attention of their parents (e.g. mama,
represent.) dada, etc.) and are again, positively reinforced.

 He argued that the developing cognitive Telegraphic Stage- The telegraphic stage is the last
understanding is built on the interaction between the stage of language before a child can speak fluently and
child and the things which can be observed, touched, begins roughly around 2.5 years of age and onward
and manipulated. For him, language was one of a indefinitely until a child has fluent language skills. to
number of symbol systems developed in childhood, discover these new words, many children at this age ask
rather than a separate module of the mind. Language a large amount of questions typically beginning with
can be used to represent knowledge that children have 'wh', such as 'who, where, what' etc. and in a sentence
acquired through they may look like 'Where Mummy? What that? etc'.

• 1952

• Principle: Language Learning is part of a child’s

cognitive development

 Interaction Approach- “Interactionist theories are

concerned with the interplay between environmental &
biological factors in the process of acquiring language.”

• Focus on interaction

• Proponent: Bruner, Vygotsky

Definition of “second language” (L2):

 a language other than the mother tongue that a

person or community uses for public communication,
esp in trade, higher education, and administration

 a language that a person can speak that is not the first

Four main stages in language;

Babbling Stage. -Babbling is the first stage of language

acquisition occurs between birth and approximately 11
months of age. Children in the babbling stage lack all
features of language except for phonology, where they
can form and recognize sounds/speech but could not
use any of this information to form sentences or to
define words/understand what words mean.

One-word (Holophrastic) Stage.-One word stage the

one word or holophrastic stage occurs between
approximately 11 months of age and Two-word Stage.
After a few months of producing one-word utterances, a
child will begin to use two word utterances and
continue to do so until they are around the age of 2.5
years old. These two-word utterances are usually in the
form of noun-noun or noun-verb.1.5years of age. By
this point in time, children can produce a small number
of isolated, single words and many sounds. This is now
more language specific rather than universal babbling.
By this point in time, children know which sounds and