Comparison of canonical (well-formed syllabic) babbling in 36 prelinguistic retarded children (17 to 62 months of age) with nonretarded children indicated a low correlation between babbling and developmental age suggesting substantial independence between cognitive development and babbling among retarded children. (Author/DB)

Investigates the perceptual representation of speech by young infants using a modification of the high-amplitude sucking (HAS) procedure. Results demonstrate that the infants' representations preserve detailed information about both the consonantal and vocalic portions of the syllables. (Author/RWB)

A cross-sectional research study and a longitudinal research study failed to replicate previous research findings that indicated a linear relationship between age and mean length of utterance during the preschool years. Instead, a deceleration in age curves, particularly beyond about 36 months, was observed in each sample. (Author/CB)

Dispels teachers' notions that poetry is hard for the young child and suggests practical ways they can capitalize on most children's delight in language and extend that delight into the enjoyment of literature. (FL)

Seeks to determine how consistently a sample of hearing mothers using simultaneous communication to their deaf children signed what they said. Data indicate that the difficulty of simulaneously signing and saying the message predisposes the mothers toward inconsistent simplification in the signed input which may or may not be helpful for language…

Compares social and private uses of language in 12 children 23 to 25 months of age. Based on videotapes of children's free play with an adult, results showed that regulatory, attentional, and informative uses of language appeared in speech addressed to another, while self-regulation, description of one's own activity, and expressive functions…

Describe studies in which day-long recordings were made of nine-year-old children's spontaneous speech. Results indicate that: (1) children aged five to 15 speak some 20,000 words of discourse per day in about two to three hours of pure speaking time; (2) they have an active vocabulary of some 3,000 word-form types. (SED)

Kindergarten children were observed in a classroom situation to discover communicative competence in the sociolinguistic area. These children demonstrated competency in awareness of regularities in use of language in the classroom, ability to publicize confusions, and variations in ways of speaking. (DF)

Examines children's responses to verbal instructions to place objects in, on, or under other objects according to the paradigm developed by Clark (1973). Also assesses children's comprehension of the spatial terms by asking them simply to point to objects in particular relationships without actually manipulating them. (SED)

Defines criteria to identify children's language overextensions and investigates how young children in the early stages of language acquisition rename objects analogically during a standardized play situation. Results indicate that analogic extensions are well within the capabilities of children from one year, eight months to two years, four…

Describes one child's early productions of lexical primary stress, using as a framework the following questions: (1) Is conventional stress used consistently? (2) Are there other alternatives for the placement of primary stress? (3) Does stress assignment appear to be random? (4) Does stress assignment appear to vary with spontaneous vs. imitative…

Presents a case study of the babbling monologues produced by a Dutch child in the six weeks following acquisiton of the first word, which shows that this child's word production and his concurrent babbling are very much related. Concludes that word production influences the course of babbling and vice versa. (SED)

Discusses the types of revision second-grade students conducted on their writing that, at first, were not obvious to the teacher. These include revision in an individual conference with the teacher and revising by expanding a journal entry. (HTH)

Suggests that even the youngest children use systematic strategies in ordering the elements of a story based on causal and temporal relationships. (FL)

Investigates the extent to which children develop the ability to comprehend and explain literal and idiomatic meanings as a function of age and sex. (EKN)