1. Grammatical Development 1

2. Recap of grammatical terms …
Syntax
Adverbial
Possessive
Inflections
Auxiliary verbs
Determiners

3. Syntactic development…
This lecture on grammatical development is primarily concerned with syntax.
Syntactic development = development of a child’s ability to create grammatical constructions by arranging words in an appropriate order.

4. One-word stage … 12-18 months: child speaks in single word utterances.
‘milk’
‘mummy’
Groups of words may be used as a single unit.
‘allgone’

5. One-word stage …
In many situations, the words simply serve a naming function.
Holophrases: single words which convey more complex messages:

6. Holophrases … ‘juice’ ‘I want some juice’ ‘I’ve spilt some juice’
Context, gesture and intonation: enable parent/carer to understand what child means.

7. Understanding …
Although the child’s utterances are limited, their understanding of syntax is (predictably) more advanced.
Evidence: children at the one-word stage can respond to two-word instructions: ‘kiss mummy’.

8. Two-word stage … 18 months: two-word utterances begin to appear.
Usually: grammatically correct sequence.

9. Two-word stage … Common constructions: S+V ‘Daddy sleep’
V+O ‘Draw birdie’
S+O ‘Suzy juice’
S+C ‘Daddy busy’

10. Two-word stage …
When repeating an adult, children at this stage commonly omit elements, but retain the correct order:
Look, Ben’s playing in the garden.
Play garden.

11. Two-word stage … Utterances focus on key words.
Grammatical function words: commonly omitted (as they carry less information).

12. Meanings of two-word utterances …
Range of complex meanings can be expressed.
Possession: ‘Mummy car’
Action: ‘Paul eat’
Location: ‘Teddy bed’

13. Ambiguity …
The scope for ambiguity at this stage arises because of the omission of inflectional affixes.
Commonly possessive and plural ‘s’ and past tense ‘ed’ are absent.

14. Telegraphic stage …
Age 2: 3 and 4-word utterances begin to be produced.
Some will be grammatically complete:

15. Telegraphic stage … S+V+O ‘Lucy likes tea’ S+V+C ‘Teddy is tired’
S+V+A
‘Mummy sleeps upstairs’

16. Telegraphic stage …
Other utterances will have grammatical elements missing:
‘Daddy home now’
‘Where Josh going?’

17. Telegraphic stage … Hence the name ‘telegraphic’.
Like a telegram, they include key words, but omit elements such as:
Determiners
Auxiliary verbs
Prepositions

18. Telegraphic stage … Wider range of structures will be used:
Questions (interrogatives)
Commands (imperatives)
Simple statements

19. Rapid progress …
3 years: items such as determiners begin to be used regularly.
More than one clause appears
Coordinating conjunctions
Inflectional affixes (see next lecture)
5 years: many of most basic grammatical rules have been learned, though some (e.g. the passive) have yet to be mastered.

20. Vocabulary test … HOLOPHRASE TELEGRAPHIC COORDINATING CONJUNCTIONS
INFLECTIONAL AFFIXES
PASSIVE

21. Tasks! Each team must make notes on their stage AND
Each team must reduce their stage one (or more) of the following:
Less than 15 words
A cartoon
A mime
A song or a poem
Teams will present their work to the class!