In this study, it was searched for the extent to which proverbs and idioms were included in the children's books that were taught to elementary school students. Children's books which are taught at the stage of children's vocabulary enriched rapidly and significantly, present the vocabulary of the mother tongue and its universe of meaning to a…

Adult English language learners in the United States approach the learning of English pronunciation from a wide variety of native language backgrounds. They may speak languages with sound systems that vary a great deal from that of English. The pronunciation goals and needs of adult English language learners are diverse. These goals and needs…

English titles of medical research articles (RAs) are of great importance, the quality of which can, to a certain degree, affect impact factors of the articles, because many readers will make a decision as to whether to read on after reading titles. However, the special genre has not been extensively studied to date. This paper is designed to…

A total of 16 mothers and 16 fathers were recorded in dyadic sessions with their children (eight five year olds, eight two year olds; half boys, half girls) and with an adult. Noise-free questions and declaratives were analyzed for pitch and frequency range. Results suggest that both fundamental frequency and range are significantly influenced by…

This study compared pragmatic language behaviors of three hard of hearing, four deaf, and five hearing adolescents. The average percentage of parameters rated appropriate were: 100% for hearing; 87% for the hard of hearing; and 93% for the deaf. Subjects' language was also compared to typical adolescents' pragmatic characteristics and coping…

Mothers' recasts and other contingent replies to their children's utterances were examined in 2 groups of 14 mother-child dyads--either with language-impaired or non-language-impaired children. Mothers' overall use of recasts was highly similar for the 2 groups. (Author/DB)

This study compared the relative use by four male and four female youth with mental retardation of linguistic (grammatical) devices identified as characteristic of typical female speech (qualifying markers, question styles, and politeness terms). Females produced significantly more qualifying markers than did males, although neither question style…

A paper drafted nearly 30 years ago defines distinctions between theoretical and ideological inquiry, between curricular and noncurricular events, and between instructional and agential kinds of curricular events. (31 references) (MLF)

This analysis of 17,602 frequently used words found that 616 orthographic rimes occurred in rime families as building blocks of almost all the 43,041 word syllables. Of these, 436 were both regular and consistent in pronunciation, and only 86 had less than a 90 percent level of consistency. Results suggest the usefulness of rime units for teaching…

This study, with 30 preschool children with specific language impairment (SLI) and 30 controls, found a dissociation between limited learning of training targets (words, affixed forms) and limited bound-morpheme generalization (BMG) performance. Results suggest limited BMG reflects problems not with storage or access of facts but with the…

Two strategies that children use to figure out new word meanings--attention to linguistic form class and the assumption of lexical contrast--were examined. It was found that very young children use both form class and lexical contrast to interpret new words. (PCB)

The study compared the deviant, repetitive language of 33 males (9 with Down syndrome, 12 with fragile X syndrome, and 12 with autism). Results indicated that males with fragile X syndrome manifest deviant, repetitive language that is distinct from males with either Down syndrome or autism. (DB)

Measures fathers' and mothers' linguistic involvement in the development of communication between young siblings--infants and toddlers. In a laboratory setting, 39 families, each with a mother, a father and two children, were videotaped in semistructured activities. Results suggest that fathers very actively direct sibling interactions, especially…

The relationship between Eastern and Western languages is explored. Possible origins and the spread of language over the Eurasian land mass are discussed. (CW)

This document presents a study of natural language understanding of computer programs. In the study, the performance of IRUS, a natural language query system designed to interface with a database, was compared with the performance of preschool and early elementary school children in answering questions about a specific database. Questions used in…