EDUC 220 Chapter 5: Language Development, Language Diversity, and Immigrant Education
3 Dec 2015
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Chapter 5: language development, language diversity, and immigrant education. All children master their native language unless severe deprivation or physical problems interfere. In general, cultures develop words for the concepts that are important to them. Ex: colours english language has 3000+ words for colours, whereas others may have as few as 5 children gradually acquire the colour categories that are appropriate for their culture. Languages change over time to reflect changing cultural needs and values. Ex: in the past hunter-gatherer words were needed, now we have added techie words. Likely that many factors biological, cultural, and experiential play a role in language development. But babies quickly begin to focus on and practice speech sounds they hear in their environment and by 12 months are no longer able to distinguish in all the world"s languages. By age 5, most children have mastered the sounds of their native language, but few sounds aren"t mastered.
