Supplementary CLA theorists

Question 1

What are Crystal’s development stages (1996)?

Answer 1

Cries + burps + bubbles (0-3 months), cooing + going (up to 6 months), babbling on, first words

Question 2

Who theorised MLU as a way to track language acquisition?

Answer 2

Roger Brown (1969)

Question 3

How is MLU calculated?

Answer 3

morphemes / utterance(s)

Question 4

How many MLU stages are there?

Answer 4

5

Question 5

Mean lengths + stages

Answer 5

1.1 - 2 = stage 1, 2 - 2.5 = stage 2, 2.5 - 3 stage 3, 3 - 3.5 = stage 4, 3.5 - 4 = stage 5

Question 6

Who theorised a sequence of acquisition of inflections?

Answer 6

Brown (1973)

Question 7

What is the sequence of inflection acquisition?

Answer 7

-ing, plural ‘s’, possessive ‘s’, articles, past tense -ed, third person singular ending ‘s’, auxiliary verb ‘to be’

Question 8

Who theorised the stages of inflection acquisition?

Answer 8

Cruttenden (1979)

Question 9

What are Cruttenden’s three stages of inflection acquisition?

Answer 9

Memorise words on an individual basis, awareness of rules therefore overgeneralisations, correct inflection usage

Question 10

Who published ‘Learning how to mean’, discussing semantic and pragmatic development?

Answer 10

Michael Halliday

Question 11

What are Halliday’s seven functions that spur a child to want to use language?

Answer 11

Instrumental, regulatory, interactional, personal, informative, heuristic, imaginative

Question 12

What is Halliday’s instrumental function?

Answer 12

Language used to fulfil a speaker’s need eg. obtaining food

Question 13

What is Halliday’s regulatory function?

Answer 13

Language used to influence the behaviour of others eg. persuading, commanding, requesting

Question 14

What is Halliday’s interactional function?

Answer 14

Language used to develop social relationships and ease interaction eg. ‘hello’

Question 15

What is Halliday’s personal function?

Answer 15

Language used to express personal preferences / the speaker’s identity eg. attitudes and feelings

Question 16

What is Halliday’s informative function?

Answer 16

Language used to communicate info eg. relaying or requesting it

Question 17

What is Halliday’s heuristic function?

Answer 17

Language used to explore the environment and learn eg. Q+A, running commentaries accompanying play

Question 18

What is Halliday’s imaginative function?

Answer 18

Language used to explore the imagination eg. imaginary worlds, jokes, songs, storytelling