How Language Affects A Child's Development

Everyday we are developing no matter our age, but it is how we develop children that will tell a tremendous amount an individual. How a child developments is fundamentally important at a young age as it affects all aspect of their lives once the child matures. Throughout the class, we looked at many theorists during the course of the semester as well as looked at many articles pertaining to the concepts of the development of children. The theorists and articles opened up our minds to a world that we have never seen before and concepts about child development we have never been taught but have seen in the practical work we do every week. What makes humans unique is the ability that we have to interpret the language being used, as Lois Bloom

Language – Method of communication either spoken or written, consisting of the use of words in a structured or conventional way. A recognised structured system of gestures, signs and symbols used to communicate. Body of words and the systems for their use common to a people who are of the same community or nation, geographical area or same cultural tradition.

Language is defined by having words to outline matters, movements and qualities or using these words to build up sentences. This means using sentences to build up talks and stories and finally succeeding the guidelines of grammar, so that things make logic.

What is Language? Language as we know it is a form of communication, however if we stop to really think about the concept of what language is, we can see, it is any means used to communicate a feeling, an idea, or the way we exchange points of view with others. Speech, which is the definition of spoken language, is only one example of the different methods we humans use to communicate, as we know other species utilize their own form of language. As children we learn to speak within our family circle and as we grow up our language skills broaden and become endless. Of course we must keep in mind; the development of language can be affected by many factors such as education, culture, environment, a person’s illnesses, the time period a person lives or lived, and whether a language is primary or secondary.

It is believed that babies develop language when they are in the utero and it continues throughout their lifetime. By twelve weeks old, babies may register the sounds they can hear and at the same time make basic visual, auditory and tactile mind maps (Karen Kearns, 2013, P.105). This allows the infant to turn towards any familiar sounds and noises. Babies begin to communicate with people around them quite quickly. By two months old, babies begin to make ‘cooing’ and other noises; this indicates the phonological component of language development. By six to nine months babies begin to experience with a mixture of sounds, and often you will hear a baby babbling. Babbling development is similar across many different languages and even hearing impaired babies will go through this stage. They may copy the sounds they are introduced too or beginning to recognize familiar

The language is defined as “human communication through the use of spoken or written words,” but that definition must include that language is also a cultural identity – “the fact of being who or what a person or thing is”. In other words, the language provides information about your roots; it is one of the most valuable resources to communicate with your mother culture.

The Oxford dictionary defines language as the method of human communication, either spoken or written, consisting spoken or written using in a structured and conventional way. There are approximately 5000 to 7000 languages in the world.

As babies begin developing sounds of language (Phonology) through cooing. They are learning how to manipulate their mouths, tongues and their breathing. This manipulation of their mouth is what allows babies to form an abundance of sounds and eventually words. After a couple of weeks or months, the cooing eventually turns into sounds such as aaa, ooo, and ahh (Otto, 2010). It is during this stage; the phonological awareness starts to take root.

Language is a method in which individuals communicate in order to get their opinion across to the listening party. Language is the tool which ideas can be conveyed in various ways. Typically, language is referred to verbal communication, however, it ranges to all methods of communication i.e. sign language.

The quality of language input influences child language development. Deaf children are unique in the sense that they often have a different modality of language from their parents, providing a platform to investigate the importance of language quality and onset. There are two categories of deaf children: deaf children of deaf parents (DCDP) and deaf children of hearing parents (DCHP). DCDP are referred to as native signers and make up 5-10% of the deaf community population (Lu, Jones, & Morgan, 2016). The language development of DCDP mimic that of hearing children in terms of onset, rate, and patterns of development (Morgan & Woll, 2002). Comparatively, DCHP make up the other 90-95% of the deaf community population and are only exposed to sign

Then, cooing appears when the child is between six to eight weeks old, where the infant demonstrates happy vowel like sounds (Hoff, 2006). At age sixteen weeks infants begin to demonstrate laughter and vocal play (Hoff, 2006). Between six and nine month old babies begin to produce babbling sounds, then they utter their first word around age one (Hoff, 2006). When children speak their first word it is usually as an isolated unit (Goldin-Meadow, 2006), and not considered a major step in phonological development (Hoff, 2006). Children then learn that their first spoken word is composed of smaller parts, which is known as morphology, and that the word can be used as a building block for larger sentences called syntax (Goldin-Meadow, 2006). A child’s first word goes farther then communicating a message between the child and communicative partner, the word retains symbolic meaning (Goldin-Meadow, 2006). At age eighteen months phonological processes develop, in which the child’s speech characteristics begin to transform (Hoff, 2006). Subsequent to eighteen months the child’s vocabulary grows and with this growth the child is able to phonemically represent a sound with the mental representation of every word that possesses a sound (Hoff, 2006).

Language is a “systematic means of communicating ideas or feelings by the use of conventionalized signs, sounds, gestures, or marks having understood meanings” ( Merriam Webster Dictionary, 2012) . Language is essential for humankind. Without language, civilization that we see today; would be impossible. Our thoughts, our dreams, our prayers, communications; everything is language. Language helps in sharing a person’s knowledge and thoughts with others. If language did not exist, we would have been just a different species of animals. It is language, our ability to communicate, understand, that makes us different from animals. It is something made by humans to be understood by humans only; therefore, it can also be described as “ a

Language is believed to the primary element of most human communication throughout human civilization the basic mode communication is by spoken means. For which different languages are generated. Language itself is a system of sounds and words used by ones to express one’s feelings, emotions, thoughts, feelings, etc. People love to spend more time in listening and speaking rather than reading

The existence of language extends back to the dawn of humanity (Gee & Hayes, 2011, p. 7), and is considered a core basic property of the human race. And is vital to the health and wellbeing of humans intellectually as well as socially and emotionally (Perlovsky, 2009, p. 249). It is a symbolic set of rules that from birth humans develop to communicate with one another (Lust, 2006) and is a dynamic process that takes on numerous forms and meanings.

What is a language? My survey reveals to me that it is words we speak, the sounds we make, the symbols we compose, or now and then even just the way we pass on messages. I like to think that a language is a portrayal of our existence. A medium for passing on data that has been seen by a man, to someone else is what a language is. Without a doubt, it consists of words, images and sounds, yet it is a considerably more extensive idea than simply those.