Abstract
This textbook provides a clear and concise overview of language development in the early years and touches on some aspects of development beyond that. In order to become proficient users of a language, there are many stages children pass through and many skills that they acquire. The first eight chapters of this book each tackle a different aspect of the language learner’s journey to near adult-like language usage. Clark presents this information in an accessible way, making good use of appropriate examples in all sections. Throughout the book there are references made to other sections, signposting the reader to where they can find out more about specific topics, yet each chapter could stand alone if there were a particular topic area in which a reader were interested. The final chapters draw together everything covered in the earlier chapters to discuss how language development differs in a bilingual population and considers one proposal for language acquisition, language universals. The language universals proposal is not without criticism (Evans & Levinson, 2009) and this textbook would have benefitted from including alternative explanations, such as a usage-based approach (Tomasello, 2003). At the end of each chapter, summaries reviewing the chapter content provide easy access to the take home messages.
The first chapter describes the sources of language that are available to children and from which they can learn. The primary focus is the input from adult speakers in the child’s environment. Clark pays particular attention to the ways in which adults promote and support the child’s language environment and how they adapt this to the changing needs of the child as their competence increases. This chapter covers the actions of the adult rather than the contribution of the child in initiating interactions.
Chapter 2 turns to the child’s ability to understand and learn the fundamentals required for language development, learning to recognise and produce the sounds and later the words of their native language. This chapter also touches on the early stages of children’s understanding of conversation, for example, turn taking.
Next, Chapter 3 moves to a discussion of how children start to assign meaning to the words and constructions they can now recognise and use. This is an important milestone, as without shared knowledge of meaning, communication between interlocutors is unfulfilling. This chapter overviews the strategies children utilise to decipher meaning and to elicit useful information from their adult communicative partners. It also touches on the requirements of shared knowledge.
Chapter 4 starts from a position in which children have a rudimentary knowledge of the fundamentals of conversation and covers the use of language by children. It covers the more sophisticated skills children need to develop in order to engage appropriately in more meaningful and satisfying interactions. The subsections in this chapter cover pragmatic principles, common ground and inference, which, when combined, increase the success of an interaction. There is also a good explanation of how adults, in particular parents, support the development of these skills.
In Chapters 5 and 6 the focus is on how children learn to combine words and to produce strings that conform to the constructions used in their language. Here the examples provided are particularly useful in understanding the different construction types as there is a lot of technical language. Across the two chapters, there is a progression reflecting the increasing complexity of the utterances and the ideas that the developing child is trying to express.
In Chapters 7 and 8 we return to the development of conversation and how children learn to be good communication partners. This explains the progression in children’s development, where they require less support from adults when engaged in conversation, and focuses on their developing awareness of interlocutor appropriate styles, for example when to use formal versus relaxed language forms. These chapters also cover the more subtle elements of communicating, including perspective taking and incorporating shared knowledge so as to only verbalise necessary information.
At Chapter 9, the textbook moves from detailing the typical monolingual pattern of language learning to briefly cover the challenges faced by learners of more than one language. This chapter considers how children might manage the additional task of acquiring two languages simultaneously, which involves learning two vocabularies and, in many cases, two grammatical systems. It also covers how, early on in development, children manage to navigate the additional factor of knowing which language to use in which situation or with which specific partners. There is a brief discussion of the social benefits of being bilingual, including links with older family members who may speak only one language, cultural awareness and communicative opportunities.
Finally, Chapter 10 rounds off the textbook, using a question and answer format to address further questions and summarise the content of the previous chapters. This is the first chapter that discusses the proposed mechanisms for language learning, although it should be noted that only one perspective is covered. This chapter briefly covers language disorders and the errors children make, describing how the study of these errors can help researchers to understand the necessary components required for language development. Limitations of the study of language disorders are also addressed here.
Overall, this textbook would be useful to students and researchers new to the study of language development, providing a good general introduction to the field of child language. Furthermore, it serves as a good reference guide for more experienced researchers wishing to refresh their knowledge of the developmental trajectory of language learning. One caveat to this is that teachers recommending this textbook to students should be aware that the referencing style is unconventional. No references are provided in the chapters, meaning that following up on specific areas of interest will require some motivation and effort on behalf of the reader. However, references for further reading, broken down by chapter, are provided at the end of the book.