Key concept

The main theme or keyword of a particular post, maybe with reference to a teaching or national curriculum topic.

  • Year 13: Heather and Sarah’s Powerpoint on CLA theories

    Behaviourism (B.F. Skinner 1950s-60s) Language is learnt by positive reinforcement (offering a reward for ‘good behaviour’) and negative reinforcement (for ‘inappropriate behaviour’) Language is a particular social behaviour that follows this model. Positive reinforcement can be verbal praise or reassurance, and negative reinforcement could simply be correction. Skinner wanted to apply his theory to all […]

  • Year 13: Going beyond Chomsky and Skinner in Language Acquisition — Notes and question adapted from Myszor

    Many researchers followed up on what Chomsky speculated upon: children’s knowledge of grammatical rules. However, the idea of impoverishment (parents’ language is insufficient) prompted others to look in more detail at language experience, with an emphasis on social circumstances and the language of adults. Two key factors are important: 1. Social or experiential factors 2. […]

  • Year 13: Exam question on Language Acquisition

    Here is Adam, in the year following his first word combinations at the age of 2 years and 3 months (Pinker, 1994a). The numbers by the transcript indicate his age, so 2;3 means two years, three months and so on. Look carefully at the following changes in his language development, and using the systematic framework […]

  • Year 13: English Language Revision quiz on Acquisition

    English Language A Level Revision Quiz – key theories Explain what these terms mean which Michael Halliday uses for his taxonomy: Instrumental use of language Regulatory Interactional Personal Representational Heuristic Imaginative What were John Dore’s complaints about Halliday’s taxonomy? He replaced them with: Labelling, repeating, answering, requesting action, calling, greeting, protesting, practising Why is very […]

  • Child Language Mock Exam Question 2 by FGI/Myszor

    Read the following extract very carefully. This transcript is a conversation between Katherine at 27 months and her mother. Consider the aspects of the baby’s speech: ability to use verbs (tenses, tag questions); functions and conversational (pragmatic) skills; use of inflexions; the MLU, the comparing the score with Brown’s stages (see page 3 of Myszor); […]

  • Halliday’s Functions of Language in the Child Language Acquisition Debate (by Nick Christodoulou)

    Several attempts have been made to catalogue the different functions of language, and to chart child language development in terms of the increasing range of these functions to be found in the growing child’s repertoire. Michael Halliday’s taxonomy is documented below:- Instrumental: Language used to fulfil a need on the part of the speaker. Directly […]

  • H G response to mock Child Language Acquisition exam question with teacher comments

    Read the following extract, and using your knowledge of Skinner, Chomsky, Piaget and Bruner, analyse the interaction between child and mother discussing The Snowman by Raymond Briggs. M is mother, K is Katherine, 2 year old.M: So what’s this book about? K: Snowman M: Mmm. What’s the snowman doing? K: ‘S flying. M: Mmm. Who’s […]

  • Useful Child Language Acquisition links

    Useful websites on Child Language Acquisition http://www.universalteacher.org.uk/lang/acquisition.htm

  • Give children rewards and they’ll soon fleece you

    As a teacher, I’ve tried every bribe in the book The news that a mother rewards her 13-year-old daughter with cigarettes when she behaves has confirmed what I’ve been thinking for a while – rewards are, at best, ineffectual and, at worst, positively damaging. A jobless single mother, Tracy Holt, 43, of Gosport, Hampshire, is […]

  • The truth about communication in schools

    This is the full text of a speech I gave under the title ‘Silent Voices, Still Lives’ Welcome and thank you for coming. My talk is entitled ‘Silent Voices, Still Lives’ and focuses upon the importance of teaching communication skills properly in schools. It is divided into two parts: firstly, I will look at the […]

  • One long SATS test

    In this emotional indictment of our education system, the writer and teacher Francis Gilbert explains how an obsession with testing has broken enthusiasm for learning The decision by the Children’s Secretary, Ed Balls, to kill off the Sats exams for 14-year-olds is arguably the most momentous decision taken by a politician since Gordon Brown became […]

  • How to make your child succeed at GCSE

    The truth about exams So just what is the key to success at GCSE? As a teacher in various state schools for the past two decades, I still chew over the issue virtually every day! Just recently, I was talking late into the night at a Year 11 Parents’ evening. The parents of these sixteen-year-olds […]

  • How a good headteacher can save a school

    Without leadership and discipline, chaos rules. But this is exactly what the Government is allowing to happen, argues Francis Gilbert A few years back, I taught at a school that terrified me. Just walking down the corridor was hazardous. Frequently, children would rush up behind me and hit me on the back of the head, […]

  • Links to English teaching sites at the Guardian

    A useful page of links to English language teaching resources can be found on the Guardian‘s website here.

  • Worrying about schools

    The worrying has started! My child is in Year 4 but already I’m worrying about where he might go to secondary school. Living as I do in Tower Hamlets, the choices are rather stark. There’s an Academy which all the parents want their child to go to; there’s a pretty good Local Authority comp but […]

  • Please, Mr Johnson, stop tinkering with our schools

    THE Education Secretary, Alan Johnson, is definitely a worried man. You only have to look at the all the spin issued by his department to know that something is up. The school inspectors Ofsted issued a report last week, 2020 Vision, that called for every pupil to have lessons and exams tailored to their "personalised" […]

  • Spooks in the classroom

    Of all the roles I thought I might play as a classroom teacher, it never occurred to me that I might be called upon to be a spook. Social worker, surrogate parent, cleaner, technician, crowd controller, salesman for the damaged goods of the national curriculum, yes – but I never imagined I might be required […]

  • Rewarding the bad, punishing the good

    I knew he’d be difficult to teach: a child who had learnt that violence is generally rewarded with bribes, and good behaviour is ignored or punished.

  • Education failures are a national tragedy

    Finally, the trousers are coming off the Government’s education policies. The news that teenager Paul Erhahon, who was murdered by a gang of youths last Friday in a quiet London suburb, had suffered an earlier knife attack at school has, together with other teenage stabbings and murders, offered a glimpse of the sordid underbelly of […]

  • How Jamie and school meal fascists turn kids into junk food addicts

    Her words are enough to make Jamie Oliver tear his hair out. Joanne, 14, a pupil at a large comprehensive in London, is sucking her Triple Power Push Pop as she explains to me why she insists on stuffing her mouth with such sweets. "I don’t buy any of the stuff in the canteen, it’s […]