CDS & Zach's non-standard language

Child-directed speech techniques and Zach's non-standard language

Halla uses repetition of Zach’s language to feed his speech back to him, for example, Zach says ‘Here it is’ and then Halla echoes ‘Here it is’. Halla uses this child-directed speech technique to help with his language development. This is used similarly in adult language to remember topics and therefore must help a child to remember aspects of speech. Halla also uses language aspects from the theorist Skinner Operant who suggests that a care giver could repair a child’s language through correct adult utterances, which is also identified as positive reinforcement as they don’t use the determiner ‘no’ to correct. However, it could be identified by the child as neither positive nor negative reinforcement as they don't establish the differences between the sounds, but should eventually get used to this utterance. An example of this is when Zach says ‘It doesn't go frough’ and Halla corrects him with ‘It doesn't go through’. This is called simplification through substitution as the child thinks they are pronouncing the adults version and they don’t perceive it as different, another example of this is within this transcript is 'dere'. Within this Halla incorporates the use of repetition and positive reinforcement by correcting him subtly to not upset him or Zach most likely would not notice the correction she makes. Alongside this she mentions Zach being ‘a star’ and thanks him at the end of the recording which lets the child know they are doing well and encourages them to speak. The uses of questions are important for child language development and Halla asks them frequently throughout the transcript. For example the use of tag questions are effective as the question is converted from a statement by an appended interrogative formula, which helps the child establish what they are being asked through the previous statement 'I don't think you wanted those biscuits did you?' this tag question allows Zach to respond with 'I think I don't'. Here Zach uses the contraction 'don't' which could be established as an echo from his mother’s utterance. In addition, Zach asks his mother questions too, for example, 'I can't get it up dere (.) no?' this tag question encourages his mother to reply to him and could be implied as taking aspects of his mother's language and putting it into his own. Zach is in the telegraphic stage and during this time children are rather egocentric, if the situation had changed and Halla did not respond to Zach's question we may have been able to establish this attribute. On the other hand, Zach does identify when it is his turn to speak as he waits for his father to finish talking and then changes the topic to what he is doing - 'It doesn't go frough'. Furthermore, Zach demonstrates non-standard omission through not including the auxiliary verb 'am', for example 'I cutting round the edge' this is also established as ellipsis as we can still understand what he is trying to say but it isn't standard language.