The Child’s Brain: Syllable to Sound
Language initiates a sequence of actions that depend upon the neurological events transpiring inside the brain. This PBS segment takes a viewer on an exploratory journey of how complex an organ the brain is and how we as humans learn to speak. The video focuses on varied personal histories and a multitude of expert commentary in addition to altered teaching methods that aid in explaining how adaptable the brain is capable of being. Not only is the viewer given a sneak peek into the lives of two children who endured daily seizures resulting in their left hemisphere being removed from their brain, but also a child with dyslexia and how he is able to adapt to learning. The various researchers and neuroscientists
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Researchers have learned that during this time, infants up to eleven months old can distinguish between different sounds in languages that are not part of their native speech in addition to understanding language with both the right and left hemisphere, nevertheless around twenty months this changes in most children and the language function begins to shift to the left hemisphere. A neuroscientist, Pat Kuhl, from the University of Washington, who studies the vowels and consonants of language, validated that babies can hear differences between all the sounds used in the various languages of the world, claiming that “babies are outperforming us”. The show claims that “experience determines which connections to take away and which to leave therefore changing the weights of the connections in the brain, depending on personal experiences”. Language development personifies one of these changes. A child’s brain is so resilient and can easily adapt to changes as we are shown with several children throughout the show. Helen Neville, a neuroscientist from the University of Oregon, works with a child named Michael …show more content…
She studies the connections between his complex language system and his communication abilities, trying to decipher why he still struggles with producing sounds accurately. Viewers are shown the brains ability to rewire itself when a child has endured some trauma or disease to the brain, such as dealing with seizures. Katie Warrick is an eight-year-old child who endured a numerous amount of seizures that affected her speech. After struggling with the seizures for several years and exhausting every option available, her parents chose John Hopkins Hospital to perform a surgery that would remove the left hemisphere of her brain where her seizures were originating from. In addition to Katie, the viewer is shown another child named Michael Rehbein who also had the left hemisphere removed to stop his seizures and give him a better quality of life. A neuroscientist at John Hopkins Hospital, Dana Boatmen, began testing Michael shortly after his surgery and discovered that his understanding of speech has not been affected by his surgery, only his ability to speak. Notably, after six months post-surgery, both Katie and Michael were seizure free and on the road
The clip that was particularly memorable was the story of both Katie Worrick and Michael Rehbein’s hemispherectomy. From a neurological perspective, it was astounding to watch both these children survive and function without a part of their brain and if that wasn’t enough they were functioning remarkably well from a cognitive point of reference. I did wonder at first why Katie was still not speaking, but realized that her surgery was still recent when the documentary was made. Just like Michael, who took about 2 years after surgery to regain some of his speech after persistently working on it, Katie too could hope for the same. Having said that, I am also aware of Neuroscientist Dana Boatman’s conclusion that results and recovery times vary from child to child. I did try to find out more about the two children featured in this documentary to see how much life had improved, but could not find any documented information except for an answer to a blog about hemispherectomy by Katie’s mom that said, “My name is Janie Warrick and I live in Richmond, VA. My daughter, Katie who is now 17, had a left hemispherectomy Aug. 8, 2000 in Baltimore, Maryland at Johns Hopkins
In the early stage of human life, an infant who is in their mother’s womb has already experienced communicating their language through actions by responding to their mother’s voice by kicking. Hence communicating their language will then expand from just limited actions to words as they develop throughout the years. And the four structural Language components; phonology, semantics, grammar and pragmatics will be involved during the stages of their language development and these components are significantly supported by the roles of nature and nurture. Fellowes & Oakley (2014, p. 21) ‘The phonological component of language comprises the various sounds that are used in speaking.
Language does not only mean oral communication, there are many other forms of communicating however oral communication is the only one considered “normal.” The book “Deaf Like Me” follows a little girl Lynn throughout her early years of life and relates to us the struggles she endured while trying to fit into the mold of being normal. The story written by her father Thomas Spradley and her uncle James Spradley is an exceptional and moving story walking us through the early attempts of Lynn’s family trying to get her to learn the oral language despite her deafness that did not allow her to develop language by listening to the people around her.
When most people think of the process of language development in “normal” children, the concepts that come to mind are of babies imitating, picking up sounds and words from the speakers around them. Trying to imagine that a child who cannot hear one single sound a person makes can learn to speak a language is absolutely fascinating. These children range from amazin...
The most important deaf people in television right now are Katie Leclerc and Sean Berdy. These two actors play roles in the television drama “Switched at Birth”. The show is about “two teenage girls who discover they were accidentally switched as newborns in the hospital. Bay Kennish grew up in a wealthy family with two parents and a brother. Meanwhile, Daphne Vasquez, who contracted meningitis and became deaf at an early age, grew up with a single mother in a working-class neighborhood.
Jennifer is a 9 year old child who was injured while riding her bicycle. She was hit by a car and suffered several broken bones and traumatic brain injury. While her bones healed, she suffered bruising to her brain. This bruising also caused swelling and damage to her brain. When Jennifer was released from the hospital, she has difficulties speaking, walking, and completing tasks that used to come easily to her.
A 23-year-old man, named Ryan Godfrey was observed in his everyday behaviors to understand how he deals with frontal lobe damage. When he was 7 years, old the doctors discovered a grapefruit size benign meningioma tumor in his brain. After this, he had six more surgeries and his last one left him paralyzed on his left side. This was because most of his tumors were found in the right hemisphere, prefrontal cortex with his last surgery towards the premotor and motor cortex causing his paralysis. Ryan overcame being paralyzed with a desire to play basketball and video games. Today he is running sound for church, working full time and helping with student ministries. People like him can benefit from understanding the brain and its functions.
Eric Lenneberg was the first to propose there existed a critical period to learn a first or native language that was between that began around two and ended with the onset of puberty around thirteen years old. Lenneberg theorized that language acquisition was not possible before age two because of a lack of maturation, while post-puberty acquisition is inhibited by a loss of cerebral placicity occuring when the cerebral dominance of the language function is complete, happening around the time of puberty (Kraschen). “Children deprived of language during this critical period show atypical patterns of brain lateralization” (intro to language) Lenneberg argued that lateralization of the brain during this critical period is key to language acquisition. “The human brain is primed to develop language in specific areas of the left hemisphere but the normal process of brain specialization depends on ear...
Eric Lenneberg was first to propose a critical period for acquisition of a first or native language beginning around age two, and ending with the onset of puberty. Lenneberg theorized that language acquisition was not possible before age two because of a lack of maturation; and later language acquisition was inhibited by a loss of cerebral plasticity. Lenneberg believed brain lateralization occurred around the time of puberty when the cerebral dominance of the language function is complete. Arguing that the left hemisphere houses specific areas readied for language acquisition, with studies of children who have exposure to language withheld through this critical period show “atypical patterns of brain lateralization”. Lateralization is key during this critical period as children naturally and easily acquire the skills for ...
The article “Nature and Nurture in Language Acquisition: Anatomical and Functional Brain-Imaging Studies in Infants” by Ghislaine Dehaene-Lambertz, Lucie Hertz-Pannier, and Jessica Dubois focuses on the study of the left hemisphere of the brain, which is where language is processed. Neuroimaging of infants’ brains show how words that are heard are sorted through in certain regions and how infants uncover characteristics of their native language. Dehaene-Lambertz also points out that it is advantageous for fetus to be exposed to speech while still in the womb. An important point is made when Dehaene-Lambertz and her colleagues establish that “human brains before intense exposure to speech have things in common with the brains of mature and linguistically competent human adults” (367). It is noted that certain parts in the cranial cavity of the brain, such as the auditory cortex, are bigger on the left side than on the right side, giving the cerebrum a slightly asymmetric structure in both the children and adults. Also, this finding is confirmed by Chomsky when he states that “such an organical structure as of the brain” (176) is capable of processing and generating human language. Since an infant’s brain is extremely similar to the adults’ cerebrum that have already mastered language communication, this proves that the infant’s brain is capable of the
... (p. 116). In her article, “Babies Prove Sound Learners,” Sohn (2008), states, “Such studies show that, up to about 6 months of age, babies can recognize all the sounds that make up all the languages in the world” (para.24). B.K. Skinner suggest that the materialization of language is the result of imitation and reinforcement. According to Craig and Dunn (2010), “Language development is linked to cognitive development that, in turn, depends on the development of the brain, on physical and perceptual abilities, and on experiences. Biological and social factors also jointly influence the early development of emotion and personality” (p. 117). In her article, A natural history of early language experience. Hart (2000), states, “Talking is important for children, because complexity of what children say influences the complexity of other people’s response” (para. 1).
To continue with the key features, language is known to be special because of how children are able to learn in ways that are different from learning other things. (Willingham, 2007). Strong evidence shows how prepared the human brain is to learn language with very little stimulation. The results that show this point of view to be true is known to be the worldwide consistency of language learning.
How do children acquire language? What are the processes of language acquisition? How do infants respond to speech? Language acquisition is the process of learning a native or a second language. Although how children learn to speak is not perfectly understood, most explanations involve both the observations that children copy what they hear and the inference that human beings have a natural aptitude for understanding grammar. Children usually learn the sounds and vocabulary of their native language through imitation, (which helps them learn to pronounce words correctly), and grammar is seldom taught to them, but instead that they rapidly acquire the ability to speak grammatically. Though, not all children learn by imitation alone. Children will produce forms of language that adults never say. For example, “I spilled milk on hisself” or “Debbie wants a cookie”. This demonstrates that children have the desire to speak correctly and have self-motivating traits to communicate. This supports the theory of Noam Chomsky (1972)-that children are able to learn grammar of a particular language because all intelligible languages are founded on a deep structure of universal grammatical rules that corresponds to an innate capacity of the human brain. Adults learning a second language pass through some of the same stages, as do children learning their native language. In the first part of this paper I will describe the process of language acquisition. The second part will review how infants respond to speech.
Wilder Penfield and Lamar Roberts first introduced the idea that there is a “critical period” for learning language in 1959. This critical period is a biologically determined period referring to a period of time when learning/acquiring a language is relatively easy and typically meets with a high degree of success. German linguist Eric Lenneberg further highlights Roberts and Penfield’s findings and postulated the Critical Period Hypothesis in 1967. According to the Critical Period Hypothesis (CPH), certain biological events related to language development can only happen in the critical period. During this time, the brain possesses a degree of flexibility (ability and ease of learning a language) and becomes lateralized (assignment of language functions becomes concrete – either in the left or right hemisphere) (Marinova-Todd, S; Marshall, D & Snow, C. 2000 9-10). This critical period lasts from childhood through the onset of puberty (usually at around 12 years of age). Once this period is over, it is more difficult to learn a language because language functions in the brain have become concrete. This hypothesis can be seen with the case of Genie, a woman who was isolated from human interaction and language up to the age of 13. By the time she was rescued, she was well after the critical period for language acquisition, and as such, she did not have a full command of the English language. Had she been rescued before the age of 13, she may have had more linguistic capability. However, this accounts for firs...
Still today, it is the commonly held belief that children acquire their mother tongue through imitation of the parents, caregivers or the people in their environment. Linguists too had the same conviction until 1957, when a then relatively unknown man, A. Noam Chomsky, propounded his theory that the capacity to acquire language is in fact innate. This revolutionized the study of language acquisition, and after a brief period of controversy upon the publication of his book, Aspects of the Theory of Syntax, in 1964, his theories are now generally accepted as largely true. As a consequence, he was responsible for the emergence of a new field during the 1960s, Developmental Psycholinguistics, which deals with children’s first language acquisition. He was not the first to question our hitherto mute acceptance of a debatable concept – long before, Plato wondered how children could possibly acquire so complex a skill as language with so little experience of life. Experiments have clearly identified an ability to discern syntactical nuances in very young infants, although they are still at the pre-linguistic stage. Children of three, however, are able to manipulate very complicated syntactical sentences, although they are unable to tie their own shoelaces, for example. Indeed, language is not a skill such as many others, like learning to drive or perform mathematical operations – it cannot be taught as such in these early stages. Rather, it is the acquisition of language which fascinates linguists today, and how it is possible. Noam Chomsky turned the world’s eyes to this enigmatic question at a time when it was assumed to have a deceptively simple explanation.