J.H.

CERILLES STATE COLLEGE

Mati, San Miguel, Zamboanga del Sur

EEd 209 – Content and Pedagogy

Name:________________________________________________________ Date:________________________________

Lesson 2 First Language Acquisition (FLA) and Literacy Development Learning Outcomes
INTRODUCTION

Language is not biological; therefore regardless of race and ethnicity, children will eventually acquire the language they are
first exposed to in their families especially from their primary caregiver. Since the primary caregiver.is the mother, this language input
came to be called "motherese" in the 1970 (Crystal, 1987). The term "motherese" describes the language adaptation adults make (not
necessarily parents, since some parents do not apply this principle) to give the child maximum opportunity to interact and learn.
Crystal (1987) notes some of these adaptations as posited by C.A. Ferguson (1977).

Before we proceed to the various theories that explain first language acquisition (FLA), let us first understand the following terms so
we will all be grounded on these definitions as we move along with the proceeding lessons.

1. What is a first language? The language first acquired as child like mother tongue and native tongue, or preferred language
in a multilingual situation.
2. What is a second language? It is a non-native language that has an official role in a country. In the Philippines, English and
Filipino are the two official languages of commerce and industry as stipulated in the 1987 Philippine Constitution.
3. What is a foreign language? It is a non-native language that has no official status in the cOuntry. Spanish used to be a
second language in the Philippines in 60s and 70s but lost official status and became a foreign language. This means that
Spanish is no longer officially spoken in the country nor mandated to be taught in the elementary and secondary schools just
like French, German, etc.
4. What is heritage language? It is used to identity languages other than the dominant language. In the Philippines there are
dominant languages like Tagalog, Cebuano and many others but there are some minority languages which are spoken by a
few social groups like Mandarin. In the United States, English is the dominant language while other languages like Spanish,
Korean, Tagalog, etc. spoken by immigrants in their homes but learn English to primarily interact in government transactions
and public communication.
5. What is a dialect? It is a language variety in which the use of grammar and vocabulary identifies the regional or social
background of the user. The measure for us to know that a language is a language is its "intelligibility". Languages in the
world are mutually exclusive meaning they are not mutually intelligible. Two speech forms that are mutually intelligible are
dialects of the same language. A good example of this definition is Tagalong. Tagalog is widely spoken in Bulacan, Metro
Manila, Laguna, Cavite, Batangas, and Quezon. You will observe certain variations or difference in their pronunciation,
accentuation and even some words but speakers of these dialects (or variation) of Tagalog can still understand each other.

Activity 1. ACTIVATE YOUR PRIOR KNOWLEDGE

Note the following questions and think about the answers.
1. What is the difference between acquisition and learning?

2. What is the comparison between speech and knowledge?

3. Is language acquisition true for all children?

4. What is the role of adults in the language and literacy development of children?
 5. What is the relationship between cognition and language acquisition?

INPUT
Through the years, language acquisition has been defined in various perspective and various ways. As language teachers, we
need to understand all of these theories and approaches in order to combine them and make a more responsive theory-based language
curriculum appropriate to our learners regardless of generation. To better understand the complexity of language acquisition of
language acquisition, let us understand the different theories that influenced it.

Behaviorist Perspective

The first perspective to shed light to learning and language acquisition is behaviorism. Behaviorists believe that language like
any other knowledge, skills, and values can be taught to children via repetition, imitation, and habituation. The most influential
behaviorist is B. F. Skinner with his Operant Conditioning Theory which was highly influenced by Edward Thorndike's
Connectionism Theory also known as the Theory of Effect (3 laws of education: law of readiness, law of exercise, and law of effect).

Burrhus FredericC Skinner (1957), most fondly known as B.F. Skinner, is the father of Operant Conditioning. He admits that
every individual has a brain but argues that it is unproductive to study internal systems and that the best way to understand behavior is
to look at the causes of an action and its consequences (operant). He explains that a behavior that is continuously reinforced tends to
be repeated and becomes deeply rooted in an individual's behavior and a behavior that is not reinforced dies-out and is eventually
forgotten. Skinner argued that children learn language based on reinforcement (positive and negative) principles by associating words
with meanings. This theory is called imitation. Children learn to speak, in the popular view, by copying the utterances heard around
them, and by having their responses strengthened by the repetitions, corrections, and other reactions that adults provide (Crystal,
1987). Punishment therefore is designed to weaken a behavior and help a child discontinue a behavior. For example, when the child
says 'ma-ma' and the mother smiles and gives her a kiss, the child will find this outcome rewarding, reinforcing the child's language
development (Ambridge & Lieven, 2011).

Language in the behaviorist perspective is viewed as consistent formal pattern and through imitation and constant practice
language is developed just like in habit. This process is also called habituation. The audio-lingual teaching method (also known as
the military military method) has been influenced by this perspective. This method was designed to help the armies become proficient
in the languages of their allies in during World War I. It has three basic parts.

1. Presentation through oral and dialogue form with little explanation. Errors are immediately corrected, accuracy emphasized,
accurate repetition and memorization of the dialogue is the goal of this stage.
2. Practice through patterned drills to help learners master the structure of the language and fluency Overly emphasized.
3. Application through the use of the memorized structures in different contexts.

Constructivist Perspective

The two most recognized cognitivists are Jean Piaget and Lev Vygotsky. Although both are highly concerned with how
children acquire and construct meaning, their views quite differ but unlike behaviorists, both do not view children as empty vessels
(TABULA RASA) waiting to filled in by an expert and learned adult. Cognitivists argue that children are prewired to learn and
acquire language as they go through different developmental stages.

Cognitive Constructivism

Let us begin with Jean Piaget who argues that children are active learners who construct meaning from their environment.
Jean Piaget (1896-1980) is the proponent of cognitive-developmental theory that explains the interconnectedness of knowledge
acquisition and language acquisition through qualitative changes of their mental processes as they develop (Crystal, 1987;
Schickedanz, 1993; Vasta et al, 1999). He views children as active learners, constructing knowledge over time, as they interact with
their environment (Schickedanz, 1993) through four developmental stages.

Table 1. Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

Stage Age Description

Sensorimotor 0-18 months  Knowledge is acquired and structured through sensory perception and motor
activity. Schemes involve action rather than symbols.
 This development is called object permanence that allows children to create
mental pictures of things they perceive from the environment.
Preoperational 2-6 years  Knowledge is acquired and structure through symbols, such as words, but
schemes are intuitive rather than logical.
 Egocentric; have difficulty seeing viewpoints from others.
Concrete 7-12 years  Knowledge is acquired and structured symbolically and logically, but
Operational schemes are limited to concrete and present objects and events.
 Children acquire inductive reasoning. They begin to solve problems
logically. They begin to value justification and word choice.
Formal 12 years and older  Knowledge is acquired and structured symbolically and logically, and
Operational hypothetical/deductive thinking can be used to generate all the possibilities
 in a particular situation.
 Children acquire hypothetical and deductive reasoning.
Sociocultural Constructivism

Lev Vygotsky proposed a sociocultural model of human, and especially cognitive, development that reflected Marxist beliefs
in the social and cultural bases of individual (Vasta et al, 1999) commonly known as social or cooperative learning. Vygotsky’s view
is centered on the role of culture and social interactions of children with other children and adults in the environment.

The most important contribution of Vygotsky's theory is an emphasis on the sociocultural nature of learning (Vygotsky,
1978; Wertsch, 1986). He explained that every individual has zone of proximal development (ZPD) the gap between actual ability
(AA), something that learners can do on their own and potential ability (PA) something that they can do with help and supervision
(scaffold). A child exploring his environment will need a scaffold like a primary caregiver to help him label the objects he
manipulates. He believed that learning takes place when children are working within their ZPD.

A key idea derived from Vygotsky's notion of social learning is scaffolding (Wood, Bruner, & Ross, 1976 in Slavin, 1997).
He refers to scaffolding as the assistance that is provided by more competent peers or adults which means providing a child with a
great deal of support during the early stages of learning and then diminishing support and having the child take on increasing
responsibility as soon as he or she is able (Slavin, 1997). Tasks within the zone of proximal development are those that a child cannot
yet do alone but could do with the assistance of more competent peers or adults.

Interactionists' Perspective

Bandura noted that the Skinnerian emphasis on the effects of the consequences of behavior largely ignored the phenomena of
modeling- the imitation of others' behavior and vicarious experience learning from others' successes or failures. He felt that much of
human learning is not shaped by its consequences but is more eficiently learned directly from a model (Bandura, 1986). Bandura calls
modeling as the no-trial learning because students do not have to go through a shaping process but can reproduce the correct response
immediately. Take for example a Grade 1 teacher demonstrates how to write the letters of the alphabet and then children imitate
(Slavin, 1997).

Albert Bandura's Social Learning Theory (SLT) explains that children learn from each other and from others through
observation, imitation, and modeling. This theory explains that children imitate the words and language patterns they hear by watching
and listening to the models, caregivers, and family members in their life (Bandura, 1989). This theory has been identified as the link
that bridges the gap between behaviorist and constructivist perspective to learning and language acquisition.

Bandura's (1986) analysis of observational learning involves four phases: attention, retention, reproduction, and motivational
(Slavin, 1997).

1. Attention phase: The first phase in observational learning is paying attention to a model. This explains why children stop
whatever they are doing whenever they see their favorite TV commercial and dance and sing to it, as if mesmerized, no
matter how often it is played throughout the day. This phase actually explains why teenagers are hooked up with pop Culture;
they are visually attracted to this type of stimulus. teachers and adults, therefore, must get first understand what interests
children and use this to capture their attention.
2. Retention phase: Once teachers and adults have learners’ attention, it is time to model the behavior they want students to
replicate and then give learners a chance to practice or rehearse.
3. Reproduction: During the reproduction phase, learners attempt to replicate the model's behavior. In the classroom this takes
the form of an assessment of learners' learning. In homes, this is when children act out the behavior as if it is their own.
4. Motivation Phase: The final stage in the observational learning process is motivation. Children will imitate a model because
they believe that doing so will increase their own chances to be reinforced.

Another contributions of Bandura's SLT are vicarious learning and self-regulated learning. Vicarious learning is the process by
which children learn from the reinforced (negative or positive) learning and/or behavior of other people. Although most observational
learning is motivated by an expectation that correctly imitating the model will lead to reinforcement, it is also important to note that
people learn by seeing others reinforced or punished for engaging in certain behaviors (Bandura, 1986).

Slavin (1997) proposes ways on how teachers can support students to become more self-regulated by focusing students attention
on these cognitive processes and by explicitly teaching students how to learn:

1. Support students to analyze tasks and to set appropriate goals.

 Discuss the importance of analyzing tasks as a first step in learning (Butler, 1995).
 Lay out requirements clearly and discuss criteria for task completion.
 Confirm students' understandings of tasks (in class discussions, through learning logs).
 Emphasize learning objectives rather than the pursuit of grades.
2. Explicitly support students' use of effective learning strategies.
 Talk through the process of task completion with students.
 Teach students effective learning strategies in the context of meaningful tasks.
 Involve students in discussions about the strategies they used to learn and about the relative merits of different
strategies (Borowski, Estrada, Milstead, & Hale, 1989).
3. Support students’ monitoring
 Support students’ effort to identify clear criteria for assessing their own performance.
 Help students to make judgements about the quality of their own performance.
 Encourage students to reflect on their learning, to evaluate the effectiveness of the strategies they used, and to
modify learning approaches, if necessary.
Activity 2. TEST YOURSELF
1. Define:
a. First language

b. Mother tongue

c. Heritage language

d. Dialect

2. Explain how children acquire a language and the processes involved in their literacy development.

3. Compare the different theories of language and literacy development.