Student resources for Chapter 14: First Language Acquisition
Study guide for Chapter 14: First Language Acquisition
Terminology
You should be able to simply define or explain the following terms and concepts.
| Sensitive period | Phonological error patterns | Functional continuity |
| Cognition | Narrative co-construction | Observational studies |
| Sound substitutions | Experimental studies | Lexical overextension |
| Poverty of the stimulus | Longitudinal research | Mean length of utterance (MLU) |
| Universal Grammar (UG) | Scaffolding | Generalization |
| Formal, nativist theory | Child-Directed Speech (CDS) | Overregularization |
| Functional, discourse-based theory | Speech Acts | Given vs. new information |
Skills
On completion of this chapter, you should be able to perform the following tasks:
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Give examples of some common phonological error patterns among young children.
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Give examples and identify the perceptual basis of children’s lexical overextensions.
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Briefly explain and give examples of children’s overregularization errors.
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Discuss factors that impact when morphemes are acquired.
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Identify linguistic forms used for given versus new information, and explain how these forms reflect their cognitive functions.
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Distinguish between referential function and evaluative function in narrative discourse.
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Briefly discuss the four essential components of acquisition theory.
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Distinguish between nativist theory and functional discourse-based theory.
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Distinguish between the innate endowment assumptions of innate linguistic knowledge versus (general) human cognition.