How do children acquire and produce language - By Dr Robert Winston

How do children acquire and produce language - By Dr Robert Winston

 With the first child, I found that a child’s language begins at with their parents. This is a form of primary socialisation. Primary socialisation is how children learn key norms and values from their parents to help them in society in the future. This shows how language and words have such a big importance in children’s developing language.

Another child was learning both Greek and English Language at the same time. I found that it is more natural for babies to learn two languages at a time at a young age. This is because they use a different part of their brain to learn languages at a younger age.

Young children learning to speak on average learn 10 new words a day and just 30 muscles are used to say one word. Children’s speech develops as the larix in their throat sinks. It is originally high so it allows babies to drink and breathe at the same time. However a disadvantage of the larix sinking is it causes the baby to be more prone to choking.

annotation 1700's

1700’s text on ‘Cosmetic water used by the queen’ – Megan Wibrow

There are seven language levels that can be used to examine texts in English Language. These are Lexis, semantics, grammar, phonology, graphology, pragmatics, and discourse structure. Lexis is to do with the specific vocabulary and words selected in the text. Semantic fields are the study of meanings within the text. Next grammar is the organisation of the language within the text. Phonology is the study of any sounds within the text. This isn’t found often in texts. Graphology is the study of visual features of a text such as pictures, format, text font and style. Next pragmatics is the implied meanings. For example why something in the text has been used. And lastly discourse is where the language of the text comes in to.

The text that I am analysing is the Queen's Royal Cookery on how to make a cosmetic water used by the Queen in the 1700s. The purpose of the text is to inform people on how to make a cosmetics product that is commonly used by the queen from the 1700’s. I believe the register of the text is very formal. I think this because of the words selected in the text are highly formal. This pragmatically was chosen as it is from the Queen’s Royal cookery so would hold high formality. I believe the audience of the text book is women above 20 who want to look after their skin as the text is about how to make a product perfect for skin care in the 1700’s. The mode of the text is from a book.

Lexis – nouns, capitalisation, letter change, words not used.

The graphlogical features in the text are the italic writing in the title. I believe that this has been selected to stand out from the other text so readers can see what the text in the book is about. In the text, there is a line ‘a cosmetic water used by the queen’. I think that this has been chosen to be in italics as it shows the importance of the queen using the cosmetic water.

A grammatical feature in the text is how the text uses a list. The example of this is when they are describing the benefits of the product. They say it ‘smooths, whitens, beautifies and preserves’. This allows the readers to know how much benefits the product gives. The text uses declarative sentences as they just simply makes a statements about the product. The text also uses imperative sentences as in the text they are saying commands or requests of how to make the product. This is so people reading the text follow the article.

The text is under the semantic field of cosmetics and beauty. This can be seen in the text as the words selected in the text are ‘completion’, ‘powder’, ‘smooths’, ‘whitens’ and ‘beautifies’. This matches the text’s audience to women.

 Discourse..