Saturday, 31 December 2016

Etymology of the word 'naughty'

The word 'naughty':

In the late 14th century, the word 'naughty' meant needy or having naught/nothing. This then had a semantic to shift to mean evil, immoral or unclean. These meanings are now obsolete.

From 1869, it meant "sexually promiscuous" which is also obsolete. The more modern meaning of 'naughty' is about disobedience which derived from the meaning between 1530-1750 of "a woman of bad character". It is usually used to describe children. The word 'naughty' can also mean improper, tasteless or indecent in modern day. e.g. A naughty word

Thursday, 29 December 2016

1600's Comparison

Romeo and Juliet 1600's

Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,
Which mannerly devotion shows in this,
For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,
And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss.


Modern Day Translation

Good pilgrim, you don’t give your hand enough credit. By holding my hand you show polite devotion. After all, pilgrims touch the hands of statues of saints. Holding one palm against another is like a kiss.


The use of the word, "pilgrim" is almost obsolete, it means someone who travels to a sacred place as an act of religious devotion. This may be because of the context, religion used to be a big part of many people's lives but it is not so much in modern times. 

Monday, 19 December 2016

Young readers should be corrected whenever they make a mistake

Reading is essential for a child's success as it helps them to acquire early language skills. It is recognised as important to language development. Not only does it give basic speech skills but it helps children to communicate more effectively. The term 'corrected' in the question means to tell children the standard use of the lexis they are using and a 'mistake' is an example of a non-standard miscue. 

Ways of correcting children's miscues can be through positive or negative reinforcement. This is from Skinner's Operant Conditioning theory which says that positive reinforcement is when a certain behaviour, in this case language, is praised or rewarded so the child will want to repeat it. In the text, George struggles with the word "sandbags" and his mother takes a phonic approach by telling him to, "sound it out". When he pronounces it right, she gives him positive reinforcement by saying, "well done". George later struggles with this word again and says, "sanbags". This is likely because it is not a local topic and so is an example of low frequency lexis. It is also a compound word with a consonant cluster meaning the 'd' is unstressed. This may be the reason why George struggles enunciating the word. George's mother models breaking down the compound word in to "sand" and "bag". This is an example of scaffolding which relates to Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) meaning that George can say the compound word with support and strategy from the caregiver. After his struggle with the word "sandbags", George is praised by his mother with a "well done". 

Skinner's theory states that negative reinforcement is performing a behaviour to avoid a negative response. An example of negative reinforcement in the transcript is when George says, "we never" and his mother replies, "nooo". This highlights the virtuous error and his mother elongates the word 'no' to mitigate it as it can sound quite harsh. This may be because too many corrections, particularly if they are similar to punishment (another feature of Skinner's theory), may discourage them from reading and reading is a vital element in order for children to learn. George continues to self correct himself when he says, "no we need". This is an example of the 'top-down' cognitive approach as George guesses the word "never" instead of "need" because they have visual similarity. They have the same initial grapheme and are similar word lengths which is why the error is virtuous.

According to Piaget's theory, children develop language abilities in different stages. These are the sensori-motor, pre-operational, concrete operational and formal operational stages. George is 7 years old so according to Piaget's theory is between the pre-operational and concrete operational stages. The pre-operational stage looks at children not knowing the difference between the child interacting with others and thinking out loud. In the concrete operational stage, the child is capable of using logic and of solving problems in the form of stories. In the text, George uses several strategies to work out what words are. He uses the phonic approach and the breaking down of compound words. When George says "to their house", his mother replies "watch the endings". This gives a sense that George often miscues on this which means that he has not quite reached the concrete operational stage as he is not solving problems without assistance yet. Later on in the text he makes the same mistake by saying "made" instead of "may". This time, his mother immediately corrects him. This may be to preserve the flow of him reading as he continues to read the rest of the extract without help.

The context may have an effect on the language used by children. For example, George says "upstairs" instead of "upset" because the image in the book shows Mum on the stairs. This is a word guessing error and his mother prompts him to try again by saying "look at the word". George then use the phonic approach to sound out the word "upset" and he gets it right. He is then praised through positive reinforcement by his mother saying "that's right". This can relate to Bruner's interactionist theory in the children learn language best through interaction with others. George miscuing the "upstairs" with "upset" can relate to the iconic stage of Bruner's theory where information is stored through images. Without George's mother giving him strategies to correct himself, he may miscue far more frequently. These strategies will help with George's cognitive growth as Bruner's theory states that the outcome of cognitive development is thinking.

It is important to correct children when they make a mistake whilst reading as this helps them to learn. However, this can become an issue if children are being corrected too frequently or corrected through punishment. This is because it may discourage them from reading which may affect them later in life. George's mother does not always necessarily correct him but helps him to work out the word through different strategies. Skinner's positive and negative reinforcement helps with child language acquisition as it teaches them if they are miscuing. This will help them to self-correct in the future and become independent readers.

Friday, 9 December 2016

Analysing Children's Writing

In one of the Year 6 pieces of work, they spell the word 'baggy' as "baggie". This can be overgeneralisation of spelling rules because the "ie" can make a "y" sound such as in the word "hippie". This can relate to Stage 6 of Barclay's theory as they are spelling language how it sounds.

CLA Writing Theory

B.M. Kroll (1981)
4 stages in the development of writing.  
 
Stage 1: Preparatory Stage
  • Masters the basic motor skills needed to write
  • Learns the basic principles of spelling
 
Stage 2: Consolidation Stage (age up to 6)
  • Child writes in the same way they speak
  • Uses short declarative sentences which include mainly ‘and’ conjunctions 
  • Incomplete sentences as they don’t know how to finish the sentence off
 
Stage 3: Differentiation Stage (age up to 9)
  • Child becomes aware of the difference between speaking and writing
  • Recognises the different writing styles available e.g. letter, essay
  • Lots of mistakes
  • Use writing guides and frameworks to structure work
  • Write to reflect thoughts and feelings 
 
Stage 4: Integration Stage (12+)
  • Child develops a personal style
  • Child understands that you can change your style according to audience and purpose





Dr Cathy Barclay (1996)
7 stages to a child's developing its writing skills.  
 
Stage 1: Scribbling Stage
  • Random marks on a page
  • Writing and scribbles are accompanied by speaking
 
Stage 2: Mock Handwriting Stage
  • Writing + drawings
  • Produce wavy lines which is their understanding of lineation
  • Cursive writing
 
Stage 3: Mock Letters
  • Letters are separate things.
 
Stage 4: Conventional Letters
  • Usually involves writing the name as the first word
  • Child usually puts letters on a page but is able to read it as words
 
Stage 5: Invented Spelling Stage
  • Child spells in the way they understand the word should be spelt 
 
Stage 6: Appropriate / Phonetic Spelling Stage
  • Attach spelling with sounds
 
Stage 7: Correct Spelling Stage
  • Are able to spell most words