Describes one student's progress in phonetic spelling in kindergarten and first grade. (DD)

Concludes that youth confers no immediate advantage in learning to pronounce foreign sounds. (RL)

Explores the hypothesis that representation, as measured by object permanence attainment, is the main prerequisite for language acquisition. Differing definitions of representation, differing assumptions about cognitive stages, and differing criteria for assessing cognitive abilities such as object permanence may account for some of the divergent…

The language arts curriculum should involve methods, a content, and an atmosphere which celebrate creative language acquisition. (DD)

Describes a study which led to the conclusion that teachers of writing should stress audience sensitivity instead of mistakenly focusing on language as an object. (DD)

Children aged 5, 7, and 9 were tested on two different tasks to assess their understanding of sentences containing the connectives "when,""as soon as,""before,""after,""if,""if not,""unless," and "unless not." (Author/SB)

A total of 68 children between 10 and 12 years of age were given two role-taking tasks, a self-image questionnaire, and the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test in order to determine the relation between role taking, referential communication, and self-image. (Author/SB)

If we held words half as dear as did our linguistic forebears, our speech and writing would be sharpened and our minds opened to new and splendid vistas. (Editor)

Two predictions based on H. Clark's and E. Clark's hypotheses of the acquisition of word meanings were tested: (1) when learning words which have both spatial and temporal meanings, children will understand the spatial meanings first, and (2) children understand the positive member of an antonym word pair before they understand the negative…

Infants (N=24) with history of otitis media and tube placement were tested for categorical responding within a visual familiarization-discrimination model. Findings suggest that even mild hearing loss may adversely affect categorical responding under specific input conditions, which may persist after normal hearing is restored, possibly because…

Examined processing of noun-noun compounds in which the internal noun is pluralized (such as "new books shelf"), contrary to normal constraints prohibiting such constructions. Tested 36 3- to 5-year olds on their interpretations of compounds fronted by an adjective. Results suggest that children's word formation processes allow complex…

Presents a computational study of children's acquisition of word-to-meaning mappings, approximates this task as a mathematical problem, and presents an algorithm for solving the problem, illustrating the algorithm's operation on a small example. Notes that computational simulations demonstrated the robustness of the algorithm and illustrated how…

Proposes a model for explaining constraints imposed by predicates on selecting arguments appropriate for the predicates. The model has two components, a taxonomic representation of concepts and probabilistic formalization of selectional constraints defined in terms of that taxonomy. Describes four computational experiments testing the model's…

Shows how to characterize language learning in a finite parameter space, such as in the "principles-and-parameters" approach, as a Markov structure. Explains how sample complexity varies with input distributions and learning regimes. Finds that a simple random-step algorithm always converges to the right target language and works faster than a…

Studied the factors that govern immigrants' acquisition of a second language through 22 interviews with illiterate Kurdish refugees in Sweden and immigrants with at least 6 years of schooling. The pedagogic conclusions that can be drawn relate mainly to measures for increasing motivation and the need for achieving greater contact with target…