The foundational stage of language acquisition for children is the pre-linguistic. It “begins from a child’s birth to his or her seven months” (Hakim par.3). The tract of the newborn often reshapes after birth to mimic that of a grown-up. Thus, the infant can articulate feelings by crying and producing non-reflexive velar sounds that resemble nasalized vowels, gradually developing into friction noises and murmurs. At this time, the babies anticipate vocal play with their caregivers.
The second stage is babbling, and its primary milestone is the child’s ability to produce babbles from the vocal organs. It occurs from “5 to 12 months, [where] the infant loses [the ability to discriminate between the whole 200 phonics] and focuses on phonemes common to the language heard around him or her” (Johnson). There is vocal play in their interactions with relatives, as they utter random vocalizations. In some instances, they sound like their father tongue. They may express fricatives and affricates and sometimes say nanana or bababa.
The third and fourth stages are one-word and two-word, respectively, and are characterized by the onset of pronunciation. From 12 to 20 months, “one-word utterances are used in place of complete phrases” (Hakim par.13). They can remember events that occurred one or more days ago and try to relate to the current conversation. By the time a child reaches two years old, they subconsciously follow grammatical rules. Furthermore, they start producing multiple sounds and combine two words to communicate with others.
The final stage is the telegraphic stage, where the toddler transitions from double elements to start making expressions. They form the “basic adult sentence structure [which] becomes the basic foundation of [grown-up] language and sequence” (Johnson). The toddler can incorporate morphemes and words that show primary semantic substance. The more they interact, the better their conversation becomes.
Works Cited
Hakim, Azizul. “Stages of Language Development | 5 Important Stages | English Finders.” English Finders, 2018.
Johnson, Andy. “Stages of Language Acquisition.” Bing, 2015.