Language Development in Native Speakers/Wriiters

To understand the challenges facing adult learners of English, I believe it has usefulness to look at the normal pattern of language development.

And, potentially, we’re already stuck.

Because we know that in terms of even middle/junior school level, we find a vast variance of literacy levels among native speakers.

Why?

Identifying those factors can play a part in adult language learners making their learning process as effective as possible.

For reasons I will explain in a later blog post, I don’t think it is possible for an adult learner [short of someone who literally can survive on zero sleep each night] to make up for the lost childhood language skills experiences.

But understanding the factors can help such a person define his/her own best learning approach and choose the most effective and efficient activities available to produce best results.

So, on to the typical development.

As a general rule, we will find that children raised around the same time in the same home will have (barring things like developmental delays and learning disabilities) roughly the same level of literacy development by about third grade and continuing to high school graduation.

This is a distinct difference between what we used to call “two-generation families.”  That is, well, we HAD a family altogether, but that last one was a surprise.

And eleven, or thirteen, or fifteen years younger than the previous youngest.

There is a marked distinction in such cases:  these youngsters grow up not only with two parents with adult vocabulary levels, but varying numbers of older siblings with adult, or near-adult, levels of vocabulary.

All the evidence, formal or anecdotal, suggests that one key is EXPOSURE.

Children with older siblings old enough to have adult-level vocabularies, barring complications, acquire greater language skills.

But, as to the norm, what makes the difference?

There can be several factors, some beyond control.

Someone I know who was a teacher indicated there is a correlation [though cause-effect is not proven] between extended crawling-before-walking phases in an infant and literacy levels.

BUT, what I do know that I have seen repeatedly in research is two factors that matter in development of the native speaker have generally been widely accepted as important.

One is exposure, the other is attitude.

Repeatedly, I have seen it reported that the single, most important factor in literacy development for native English speakers is that the child gets read to as soon as possible:  even before comprehension is possible.

Bluntly:  parents who read to their children beginning when they are newborns as a general rule will raise readers and potentially writers.  That seems to be just the way it works.

HOWEVER, there is a second factor:  attitude.

That is to say, no matter how much parents have high-level vocabulary skills, if the internal family attitude is anti-communication, then that child will have a lower literacy level that a child in a lesser language skilled family that places a high value on communication.

What’s the transition?

Exposure involves the level of skill available.  But attitude TO exposure also matters.  A child raised in a home run by two professors of English who, however, are involved in their own worlds and discourage or even FAIL TO ENCOURAGE the efforts of the child are likely to produce a less literate child then a family run by two blue-collar workers who wished their language skills could have made life better and place a high value on communication:  EVEN assuming comparable reading of bedtime stories, nursery rhymes, and so on.  Although in such an instance, it is likely the blue collar workers spend more communication time with the children than the professors.

What pertinence has this to adult learners?

Well, my personal opinion is they need to best streamline their efforts to define their situation as of today and figure out their best supports AND their deterrents.

This will permit them to develop a program that allows them to make up for as much as possible of the lack of not learning the language as an infant.

And not learning the language as an infant involves a variety of challenges I will explore in future entries.

AND, learning the language as an adult [as separate from NOT learning it as an infant] poses its own challenges, which I will also address in upcoming entries.

My personal thanks to the individual who inspired this series.