Critical period hypothesis is a research of language acquisition by many linguists (2)

Class: 7 Number: 24 Name: SharonIntroductionCritical period hypothesis is a research topic of language acquisition studied by many linguists. There are two types of critical period hypothesis. On the one hand, children learning language must do so before puberty or it cannot be learned. On the other hand, children learning language shoul d do so before puberty or it will be hard to learn. What’s more, chil dren learning their first language are influenced by the environment. In ad dition, many linguists believe that the environment has an impact on chil dren learning language in different ages of chil dren.SummaryThe authors explain that there is a critical period of language acquisition which is the most influential time of children’s first language acquisition. This is the strong hypothesis. For example, a child named Genie who was took to a black room and was bind on a chair. Her parents used many ways to afflict her. They just allowed her to eat the liquid food, not the solid food. Genie’s father wa s a cruel person that he abuse Genie’s mother, Genie’s brother and Genie. Her father didn’t let Genie’s mother and brother talk in front of Genie, So that Genie didn’t have opportunities to listen to others.Her mother ran away with Genie and Genie’ brothe r when Geniewas 13 years. Then after nearly 12 years abuse, Genie was sent to Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. The medical workers gave Genie two mental tests. These tests showed that her mental age was only 13 month ol d. At the beginning of entering the hospital, Genie could only speak about 15-20 words and couldn’t express her anger. She walked like a rabbit. She couldn’t dress herself or eat solid food. She almost lost ability in her daily life. In the hospital, James Kent became her doctor and took some measures to help her acquire language. Kent tried his best to l et Genie express her own anger. And medical staffs talked to Genie and smile at her in the hospital. After a period of time, Genie learned to wear clothes, walked normally, and be friendly to some people she liked. After her access 6 months, her mental age was the equivalent of 5 to 8 ages.Later, Jean Butler ad opted Genie and brought Genie to her home. Butler started to look after Genie and helped Genie solve the problem of incontinence. And Genie learned to say some simple words to answer other’s questions and expressed her anger through words from Butler.After Genie left Butl er’ home, David Rigler adopted Genie. Rigler offered bedroom and bathroom for Genie. Genie learned to chew solid food and appreciate others in her words in Rigler ’home. In there, she overcame the scare of dogs and cats. And after a period of time, shecould do some simpl e housework and went to school.After 7 years training, Genie improved herself in und erstanding of words and grammar than before. Besid es, she could say many words and phrases, but her grammar is still not good.On the other hand, the weak critical hypothesis believes that after puberty, chil dren learning language is delayed. For instance, when E.M was born, he became a deaf chil d. His parents tried to help him listen, but not successful. Then he began to go to schools when he was 9 years ol d. He went to regular school for 1 year and later entered deaf school for 2-3 years. Others taught him to read and speak. Then He could read, speak and spell with written words down. When he was 15, he was able to use hearing aid to listen and got out school. Then he got together with his family members and relatives.E.M was more likely to depend on home sign to communicate with other people. After 48 month, he was used to communication with gestures and verbal production that others taught him.People gave him and Genie some texts and draw conclusion that E.M and Genie performed good in different tasks. For example, He could know some word class and comprehended almost possessives. But Genie had difficulty with almost possessives. Although E.M learned and und erstood some language, he is still not good at learning language.Agree or DisagreeI agree with the weak hypothesis that there is a critical period of humans’ language acquisitions that people learning language is easier and faster than any other life time. After the critical period, chil dren learning their language will delay.For example, I started to learn English which is my second language from my primary school. But most primary schools in our country were not paid more attentions to English learning. Even though we had English classes, we just learned some very simple words.Later, I went to a good junior middle school. Chinese, mathematics and English became the most important subjects in our school. Then our teacher began to teach us words, grammar, writing and listening. I made great progress in English when I was 11 years old. I wrote simple compositions and practice my listening comprehension in the class. And many of us could und erstand the meaning of the dialogues and short essays of l earning comprehension. Our teacher would l et us perform the English dialogues. Every month we had exams of all subjects, and many of us were got high English scores.When I was 12 years old, I transferred to another school. In this school, many students didn’t study English carefully. They coul dn’t know how to answer some simple questions, like how are you. Ilistened to my English teacher carefully and actively answered his questions, because I was interested in English. On once occasion, one of my classmate and I represented our class to take part in an oral English competition and got the second place. However, I am a lazy girl and I didn’t recite English words or review my English notebook after class. I gradually discovered that I didn’t learn English easy like before. At that time, I was 14 years ol d.To finish my junior middle school education, I entered high school. My English teacher showed partiality to a few students. As a result, most of us lost the confidence to learn English and our grades fell. Then I didn’t listen to the teacher or give up my English learning. Later, I couldn’t understand the meaning of our tex ts or analyze sentence constituents. After half of 2 years, I had to learn my English on account of college entrance examination. I used three days to recite all the vocabularies of senior high schools. Nevertheless, it is difficult for me to l earn grammar and sentence constituents.Now, I am an English major student and still interested in English. I can write English compositions, communicate with others in English, read English books. However, I can only speak simple words with others and can’t imitate their accents. My listening comprehension is also bad.ConclusionAs a result, I consent to the weak hypothesis that a critical period of language acquisition is significant for chil dren’s language acquisition. However, the development of chil d’s language is delayed after this period. That’s to say, they can learn something but not completely. Their ability of language acquisition coul dn’t make up. They must begin to learn language all the time, otherwise chil dren can’t make progress.。