Theories of Language Acquisition
Maitreya Bird-Walker

Nativist
Pre-programmed ability for language

Social Interaction

Behaviorism Imitation of certain actions

Chomsky

LAD - Language Acquisition Device: the mind is predisposed for language acquisition #

Universal Grammar: the belief that any child can learn any language as the rules are the same throughout all

Theories:

Innate Hypothesis: the natural, born ability to learn language; language is hard wired into the functions of the brain as templates, but must be activated to grow and develop

Biological Predisposed: there is a genetic routing that encodes the brain to naturally learn languages

Brunner

Environmental and Biological OR "Nature vs. Nurture"

Social Support and Context OR Nurture: children will learn language through stimuli from their given environment as well as from their family or caregivers

Significant Biological OR Nature Predisposition for Language: children have a born ability to learn language, it just needs to be activated

Scaffolding: teachers should allow students to come about an answer on their own through collaboration (facilitating); this allows student to unfold information, therefore LEARN, problem solve

Infant Directed Speech: baby talk, using different sounding tones to expose the baby to various pitches

B.F. Skinner

Learning Behaviors

Bandura

Operant Conditioning: actions are given positive or negative reinforcement to continue or discontinue an action; adapting language based on given stimuli

Classical Conditioning: language is learned through specific actions; repetition is important to receive a response

Reward (+) or Punishment (-) (Reinforcement):

Observation and Imitation: watching what another does and then attempting to recreate the same action that was viewed; with language, it is the babbling to imitate sounds adults make, smiling back at adults

Connectionism: chronology order for learning by the difficulty of information; learning takes place in a serious of step that build upon one another before moving onto the next step

Metacognition: the ability to analyze and process one's owns thoughts; this is important in language as it allows children to place sounds with letters, letters to words, and words to sentences

Example: learning how to walk; moving around ---> crawling ---> walking

Lenneber's Thesis:

Critical period: there is a period of time where it is ideal and prime for a child to learn a language as it will be near impossible or extremely difficult later on if not learned well or not at all

Pre-existing Information: experiences assist in problem solving, therefore being able to make connections and predictions

Risk-free Environment

Creating a safe, welcoming environment when teaching language provides students with the support needed in trial and error for discovering words, combination, sentences, and dialogues