Semantic Development
One way to promote semantic development is to ensure that learners’ surroundings reflect the language they learn – creating banners, for instance, is a way to facilitate the process of memorizing lexical units. The structural approach, that is, teaching children primarily roots and affixes and their combination, maybe another effective strategy. Using music is a method that helps facilitate memorization processes, and depending on learners’ age, several potential exercises also ensues.
Syntactic Development
Approaches to teaching syntax are not as varied; nevertheless, it is the language competence that warrants a flow of speech. The strategy of sentence combining is supposed to firstly teach how to build simple clauses and later how they can be combined. Focused stimulation requires a teacher to put a syntactical structure in a variety of different contexts – in this way students learn to recognize the structure and implement it into their speech. Signal word identification relies on locating the words that indicate the usage of specific syntactical structures.
Pragmatic Development
Developing pragmatic skills in a foreign language may depend on the level of already acquired social skills in a native language. Charades could be an efficient strategy to learn several pragmatic elements of communication, such as body language. Role-play conversation is an additional method that, besides practicing speaking, incorporates the factor of social interaction into learning. Activities that require students to cooperate in a pair and work towards a common goal augment the potential of learners to interact in social settings in a foreign language.
Listening Skills Development
Incorporating visual clues, gesturing for instance, and reiterating phrases is a part of a strategy named “an auditory sandwich.” Specific auditory tasks that constitute a part of a lesson plan with concrete steps of listening may be considered one of the most used strategies to develop listening skills. Class discussions could help learners to receive additional auditory input in a more comprehensive form.
Speaking Skills Development
The strategy of minimal responses helps learners acquire a foundation for conversations outside the classroom walls. Implementing scripts strategy stems from the idea that most of our verbal exchanges are to a degree cliché – concentrating on tasks that demonstrate various daily situations could train students for a wider range of interactions. Debating and presenting may be a strategy that is meant for more advanced learners; nevertheless, it is capable of significantly advancing speaking skills development.
Rationale
Societal impact on language development occupies a central role in the hypothesis developed by Skinner. Though the researcher’s behaviorist theory of language development has been criticized and invalidated, the accentuation of reinforcement in the acquisition process is what resonates with me most. The idea that positive and negative reinforcement and feedback from surrounding individuals is what activates linguistic faculties is considered to have an array of shortcomings. Nevertheless, from a teacher’s perspective, the theory highlights to what degree support from an authority figure and motivation can increase the efficacy of the learning process. Language development or its absence bears an impact on different spheres of a child’s life. Language, cognition, and social skills are intertwined notions, as each process’s advancement also propels the others. Acquiring concepts, notions, and vital communication expertise is grounded in language, without which adequate progression may be unfeasible. The interactive nature of language is what necessitates the presence of a community for language development. On the other hand, when specific linguistic competencies are obtained, social interaction becomes more effortless for children.