Georgia State University Series:

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Georgia State University Series

• Communication Development
• Day 3, Part 1
• July 2001

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What is normal Communication Development?

• All Babies
• Gestures
• Vocal Signals
• Behavioral
• English
• ASL
• Note All of these serve a pragmatic function.

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Gestural Communication

• Pointing to something
• Holds up what he wants

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Vocal Signals

• Crying
• Babbling
• Cooing
• Gurgling

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Crying May Indicate

• Boredom
• Feeling alone
• Hungry
• Wet
• Tired

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Behavioral Communication

• Trying to open cabinet
• Reach for an object
• Avoid unpleasant situation
• Attention getting

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Communication
Turn Daily Activities into Language Lessons
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Rules for Daily Interaction

• Specific Objectives
• Choose vocabulary and grammar that is
  developmentally appropriate
• Focus on a few goals each week BUT also
• Learn in context
• Talk, Talk, Talk
• Sign, Sign, Sign
• Explain what your doing and why even if it
  appears the child does not understand

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Work on Specific Objectives

• Discuss ways with Resource Team
• Choose developmentally appropriate objectives
• Post on the refrigerator
• Keep notebook
• Who
• How Often
• Childs attempts to imitate

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Objectives (cont)

• Reinforce
• Praise
• Picture Notebook of Family Saying / Signing /
  Playing

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Learning in Context
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Bath

• Count toes
• Sing songs This little piggy
• Drying off and massage with lotion while labeling
  body parts
• Dressing

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Meals

• Count Cheerios
• Peek -a- Boo
• Drop the napkin
• Cover head with napkin wheres ---?

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Play

• Baby dolls feed or dress doll
• Cars Vroom Sounds

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• Trade Books
• Board Books large pictures / few words
• Name Describe pictures
• Repetition

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• Activity Books
• Make a book out of small 5 x 7 picture album with
  pictures of family members, pets, favorite toys
  etc.
• Let child take the book in the stroller, car, bed
  and talk about the pictures

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Making Logical Connections

• Do not assume that the child connects one even to
  another
• Examples
• Drive Thru?
• Greeting Card?
• What day you do it?
• Use pictures sequences to show event relationship

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• Do not assume that the child can anticipate
  events
• Examples
• Going to doctor
• Losing candy
• Having a birthday party
• Have chat Before, Now and Later

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• Do not assume that the child understands
  cause-effect relationship
• Examples
• Hot burner
• To do First, Then

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Watch Ways Your Child Tries to Communicate

• Point?
• Babble?
• Squeal?
• Communicate to get attention?
• Get something he or she wants?

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Both deaf and hearing babies develop
communication skills in similar ways.
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Typical Sequence of Language Learning for Hearing
Children

• Early prelinguistic stage
• Late prelinguistic stage
• Single sign/word
• Early word combinations
• Multi-word combinations
• Expanded grammar
• Adult-like language development

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Early Prelinguistic Stage 0-6 Months

• Infant turns toward a speaker
• Attends to an unfamiliar voice
• Highly sensitive to touch
• Uses different sounds to communicate different
  needs
• Shares sounds with their parents (coos, babbling
  of vowel-like sounds)

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Later Prelinguistic Stage 6-12 Months

• The infant listens when spoken to
• Turns/looks when name is called
• Begins to respond to requests and questions
• Uses sounds, other than crying, for attention
• Babbling sounds like words (dada, mama)
• Utterances begin to vary in stress and have
  adult-like intonational patterns

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Single Sign/Word 12-18 Months

• The infant understands and responds to basic
  communication
• First words appear that are reduplications of
  consonant-vowels (dada, mama, bye-bye)
• Continues the use of jargon (strings of
  non-sensical utterances with varied stress and
  adult-like intonational patterns)

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Early Word Combinations 18-24 Months

• Points to pictures in books, or body parts, when
  named
• Follows/understands simple commands and questions
• Listens/enjoys simple books, rhymes, songs
• Rapidly developing vocabulary
• Combines two words into simple questions/statement
  s (daddy work more juice)

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Multi-word Combinations 24-36 Months

• Infant understands complex sentences
• Understands contrastive meanings of words
  (hot/cold)
• Learns 2-4 new words every day!
• Uses attributes to describe nouns (BIG dog)
• Jargon disappears
• Establish topic-comment relations

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Expanded Grammar 3-4 years

• Understands complex language forms
• Sentences and questions are becoming longer and
  more complex
• 90 of sentences are grammatically correct
• Children will talk about events that happened
  away from their home and what may happen in the
  future

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Adult-like Language Age 5

• Has a large vocabulary, as well as grammar
• Enjoys stories and can answer questions about
  them
• Constructs long and detailed sentences
• Tells long and involved stories
• May tell fantastic, tall stories
• May engage in conversation with strangers

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Typical Sequence of Language Development in
American Sign Language
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Stage 1

• Infant begins to use basic handshapes (B, C, O,
  A, S, 1, 5)
• Begins to use single-signs
• Begins to use simple movements (up, down)
• Begins to combine signs into two sign utterances
• Copies actions/signs of others
• Begins to use headshake with negative sign
• Begins to use questions (yes/no/what/where)

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Stage 2

• Tries to use complex handshapes, but tend to
  simplify them
• Starts to modify verbs
• Begins three-four sign sentences
• Begins to use classifiers
• Storytelling different roles, body shift, facial
  expression (not always clear)
• Substitutes objects that are present to talk
  about objects that are NOT present

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Stage 3

• Uses complex handshapes with accuracy (X, Y, T,
  R, 3)
• Begins to use complex movement (wiggles)
• Continues refining verb modification
• Begins to use noun modification for intensity,
  size, and quality
• Begins to use rhetorical questions (turtle
  run-who win-turtle)
• Begins to use topicalization
• Inconsistent use of points in space when
  storytelling

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Stage 4

• Consistent use of complex handshapes, movements,
  fingerspelling, and names
• Begins to show spatial agreement of objects
• Begins to use conditionals (e.g. if)
• Appropriate use of referencing objects that are
  not present storytelling is clear
• Uses bracketing to indicate wh questions

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Differences between deaf and hearing infants
begin to develop around six months of age.
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At six to seven months, hearing babies begin
producing rapid consonant-vowel productions,
termed canonical babbling
Ba-ba-da-da-ma-ma. However, the deaf infants
babbling decreases dramatically.
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Some experts have hypothesized that there is a
critical period in which children must be
exposed to a complete language in order to have
native-like competence. Lack of a first language
results in the child progressing at a
semi-lingual state.
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Therefore, it is imperative that parents or
caregivers understand how language develops in
their infant in order to assess their progress.
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Studies have found that Deaf mothers use more
facial expression and more gestures when
communicating with their children. This kind of
non-verbal feedback encourages children to look
at their mothers, which is an important step in
supporting visual communication and in developing
speechreading skills. This can be achieved
through several strategies
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Gaining and Directing Attention

• Break the childs line of sight and gain
  attention using movements of the hands and body
• Touch the child
• Use pointing to direct attention while still
  permitting language input
• Reinforce eye-contact by smiling, clapping or
  signing

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Make Language Salient

• Reduce the frequency of communication so it is
  recognized as worthy of attention
• Meaningful
• Relevant

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Reduce need for Divided Attention

• Use short utterances
• Position self and objects in childs visual field
• Move hands, face or both into childs visual field

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Link Language and Meaning

• Bracketing Sign or Phrase at both the beginning
  and end of an utterance
• BIRD TREE SIT(point) BIRD
• Modify Signs Displace, Repeat, Enlarge and
  Prolong sign

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Describe Event While it Happens

• Instead of directing a
• childs gaze to an
• object or event and
• talking about it while
• he or she looks at it, talk
• about the object or
• event before or after
• directing the child to
• look at it.

• With a child who is using
• manual communication,
• the location of the
• signing can be moved into
• the childs line of sight,
• or the childs body can be
• used instead of the
• signers.