1. Adult Communicative Styles and children’s language
Caroline Bowen PhD
Speech-Language Pathologist

2. these slides are about
Language teachers’ communicative styles
The terms ‘teaching’ and ‘teacher’ are used here in their broadest senses.
For a child learning language, parents, pre-school teachers, speech-language pathologists and other adults (and even older children) are all ‘teachers’.

3. ‘communicative style’
The term ‘communicative style’ refers to the way adults (or ‘language teachers’) engage children in conversation …
… the language they use and the way they ask questions.

4. reticent children
Children with communication impairments are often quite talkative at home and with their speech-language pathologists.
These same children may say very little, or nothing at all, at daycare, pre-school school, when “out”, etc.
Think about the points raised in this presentation in relation to helping reticent children to be more “forthcoming” conversationally.

5. intended audience
These slides are for parents and caregivers of children with speech sound disorders including:
functional speech disorders
developmental phonological disorders
developmental apraxia of speech

6. language learning
All children are language learners.
Part of their speech and language development is innate.
Part of it is learned through the modelling of people around them.
Parents are young children’s main speech and language teachers.

7. researchers have investigated teachers’ communicative style
looking at:
The way adults talk to children, or, in other words, the adults’ communicative styles.
The immediate effect of the various ‘styles’ on children’s communication.

8. the adult communicative styles investigated were:
Enforced repetitions
Two-choice questions
‘Wh—’ type questions
Personal contributions
Phatics

9. 1. enforced repetitions
In this ‘style’: The adult asks the child to repeat what the adult says.

10. enforced repetitions A = Adult C = Child
A: What are you doing?
C: Painting.
A: Say ‘Painting a house’.
C: Painting a house.
A: Good girl. Good talking.

11.  bad news! the researchers found…

12. the effect of enforced repetitions on communication
Enforced repetitions do not increase the child’s mean length of conversational ‘turn’.
Children are not able to imitate structures more complex than their spontaneous utterances.

13. 2. two-choice questions In this ‘style’:
The adult asks a child a question that offers two choices:
To say yes / no
To say a word or phrase

14. two-choice questions A = Adult C = Child
A: Is that a red pen?
C: No.
A: That’s right, it’s a blue pen.

15. two-choice questions A = Adult C = Child
A: Is that a red pen or a blue pen?
C: A blue pen.
A: Yes, that’s right, it is a blue pen.

16.   bad news and not such bad news: the researchers found…

17. the effect on communication of two-choice questions
Children’s verbal responses are shorter than with any of the other styles.
Children tend to give single-word responses or non-verbal responses.

18. two-choice questions
It is difficult for a ‘teacher’ to know if the child understands 2-choice questions.
After all, there is a 50% chance of the child answering correctly.
Children can become very passive, leaving all of the responsibility for communication with the adult.

19. two-choice questions
Can be useful to help a child expand a theme.

20. 3. “Wh—” type questions
In this ‘style’:
The adult asks the child a question containing a ‘Wh—’ question word: why, what, where, when, who, whose, which.

21. “Wh—” type questions A = Adult C = Child
A: Where’s the truck?
C: [POINTS]
A: And who’s on the truck?
C: Spot.
S: What’s Spot doing?
C: Driving it.

22.   not such bad news and good news: the researchers found…

23. the effect on communication of ‘Wh—’ type questions
In excess, ‘Wh—’ questions are likely to inhibit children from playing an active role in conversation.
‘Wh—’ questions are only likely to receive an appropriate response if the child understands the question.

24. Wh—’ type questions
Can be useful for monitoring comprehension.
This style leads to the highest incidence of ‘repair’.

25. 4. personal contributions
In this ‘style’:
The adult avoids asking questions and chooses topics of interest to the particular child.
The topic choice is child-led if possible.

26. personal contributions A = Adult C = Child
A: I went to the Great Australian Muster in the holidays
C: Me too!
A: I though it was great.
C: But too noisy. Dad said it was too noisy.

27. personal contributions A = Adult C = Child
A: Your dad though it was noisy? I think he’s right!
C: Mummy said it was noisy too.
Not me. I like it.
A: Noise doesn’t bother you?
C: No, not never!

28.   good news! the researchers found…

29. the effect on communication of personal contributions
Children initiate more conversational turns.
Children initiate more conversational topics.
Children are more talkative.
Some children say more in this style than in the phatic style.

30. personal contributions
There can be ‘uncomfortable silences’ when using this style.
Children and teachers can get over their ‘fear of silence’!

31. personal contributions
Children are afforded more time to think about what they want to communicate, and to plan how to do it, with this style.

32. 5. phatics
In this ‘style’:
The adult tries to say nothing with any ‘content’ apart from acknowledging the child’s contribution
Questions are avoided.
Topics are initiated by the child.

33. phatics A = Adult C = Child
A: That looks good.
C: It’s going up high.
A: True.
C: High up to the sky.
A: Uh-huh
C: Maybe it might fall down. Crash!
A: It might! It’s very high!

34.    very good news! the researchers found…

35. the effect on communication of phatics
The increase in MLUm can be dramatic with this style.
Children may begin to tell stories.
MLUm = the child’s mean length of utterance measured in morphemes (units of meaning)

36. phatics
It is often difficult to follow what children are communicating because they rely on gesture, mime and actions, and they leap from one topic to another!

37. references
Dillon, J.T. (1982). The multidisciplinary study of questioning. Journal of Educational Psychology 74, 2,
Wood, D., Wood, H., Griffiths, A. and Howarth, I. (1986). Teaching and talking with deaf children. Chichester: Wiley

38. summary
Enforced repetitions 
Two-choice questions  
‘Wh—’ type questions  
Personal contributions  
Phatics   

39. Caroline Bowen PhD Speech Pathology Practice 9 Hillcrest Rd, Wentworth Falls, 2782
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