WUG test and grammar through the 4 stages

The WUG test.

Why did she choose those words?
I believe she chose those words to un familiarise the participant, if she used a word like duck, the participant would most likely know what a baby duck was called, where as if she used an imaginary word, the participants have to think about what possible answers there could be

Overgeneralisations

I runned – child is using a regular verb ending over an irregular one, because regaular ones are the most common

two mouses – child is using a regular noun ending for an irregular noun

my foots

he feeled shy

he satted on the truck

he drived himself.

All these examples are a form of over generalisation, children assume that all rules apply for regular and irregular nouns verbs and adjectives. This supports Chomsky’s theory of innateness

child is using a regular verb ending over an irregular one, because regular ones are the most common, they are also adding regular suffix/prefixes onto words because they are common, and the child thinks that that is how you say all the pre-suffixes, this is a classic example of overgeneralisation in children.

15 months: Holophrastic stage

• Bye Mummy – mummy; in direct contact with child.
• Isee – two phrases merged into one
• Allgone - two phrases merged into one

In the holophrastic stage, the child can only say and process one word at a time, and cannot create phrases. They may force tow separate words together because they cannot grasp the concept of two words, phrases or sentences.

20 months: Two word stage

• All fall down -
• Teddy tired – using adjectives; abstract; tired – form exposure. Referring to more things around her, has a sense of what things are
• Gone, where Mummy gone? - Repetition of gone
• More juice – imperative, could have different meanings, child wants more, there could be more, could be a question

At this stage the child is starting to use two words to create more of a meaning to their words, but cannot use conjunctives, prepositions or articles yet. In the two word stage all the words the child uses are still mainly what I directly around the child; words like Mummy, juice and teddy. But the child is learning words like tired; feelings and emotions.

28 months

• Teddy's hat came off – preposition
• Harry's got a big, big green truck – using more than one adjective, big and green, getting more sense of describing things

At this stage(Telegraphic) the child is learning how to construct sentences and can use basic adjectives like big, the child is gaining more sense of the world around them. Also at this stage the child will be starting to use questions, by inverting; it is, to is it, to form a question.

36 months

• Little Luke hit me, he did – me, Luke – sense of who she is and who other people are
• I am going to see Harriet another day tomorrow – another day tomorrow, using two phrases to describe the same thing – network building
• I don't like faces, I want to see children's ITV – subject pronouns start to appear, acquisition of negation

In this stage the child is learning to make connections between words (Network Building) words like; another day; tomorrow. She is also learning proper nouns like other people’s names.

40 months

• Look at my knee. I felled over in the playground – definite article
• Once upon a time there was a little girl and she got beautiful hair and then the monster killed her and then she got dead and then and then the beautiful fairy came and made them better again – she got dead – over generalising; she got sick.

At this stage the child is able to structure sentences, but is making some key grammatical mistakes, like over-generalisation; she got beautiful, dead; the child is overgeneralising from she got sick. Another example is I felled; the child is using a regular verb ending for an irregular verb.