Complexity and interaction: comparing the development of L1 and L2
In research into first and second language development, the focus has mainly been either on the formal features of learner language alone (both L1 and L2) or on the interaction between learners and their caretakers (L1) or native speaker peers (L2).These research traditions have been kept a part even though it has been widely acknowledged that both first and second languages are appropriated essentially in social interaction. This paper aims to strengthen the connection between social and formal approaches by combining interactional views with those focusing on the structural complexity of learner language. Some excerpts from L1 and L2 interaction data (in the Finnish language) are discusse…
Generativistit ja konstruktivistit rinnan - äidinkielen omaksumisen teoriat vertailussa
Kirja-arvostelu Arvioitu teos: Ben Ambridge & Elena V. M. Lieven: Child language acquisition. Contrasting theoretical approaches. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2011. 448 s. ISBN 978-0-521-74523-9. nonPeerReviewed
Kielen oppimisen monet näkökulmat
Dynamics of morphological processing in pre-school children with and without familial risk for dyslexia
Difficulties in phonological processing and speech perception are associated with developmental dyslexia, but there is considerable diversity across people with developmental dyslexia (e.g., dyslexics with and without phonological difficulties). Phonological and morphological awareness are both known to play an important role in reading acquisition. Problems in morpho-phonological information processing could arguably be associated with developmental dyslexia, especially for Finnish, which is a rich morphologically language. We used MEG to study the connection between morpho-phonology in the Finnish language and familial risk for developmental dyslexia. We measured event-related fields (ERF…
Early signs of dyslexia from the speech and language processing of children
The Jyvaskyla Longitudinal Study of Dyslexia project (JLD) has followed the development of 200 children from birth until 10 years of age. Half the children are from families in which at least one of the parents has dyslexia, thus the child has a high risk of becoming dyslexic, and half have no such risk. Here the main findings of four studies in linguistics from the JLD project are reviewed. The speech processing skills were studied in 6, 18, 24 and 30-month-old children. The findings show that early signs of dyslexia can be detected in speech processing both phonologically and morphosyntactically. These precursors can be seen in perception or production of duration, in the prosody and phon…
MLU and IPSyn measuring absolute complexity
This article compares the results of Mean Length of Utterance (MLU) and Index of Productive Syntax (IPSyn) with the structural complexity of spontaneous utterances produced by 30-month-old Finnish children in a semi-structured playing situation. The comparison was carried out in order to determine the aspects of structural complexity which can be detected with MLU and IPSyn. This research adopts the frameworks of absolute complexity together with a multidimensional view of utterance structure and, furthermore, applies it through Utterance Analysis (UA). The results of the comparison between the metrics and changes in structural complexity discovered by UA reveal that MLU and IPSyn do functi…
Coherence between brain activation and speech envelope at word and sentence levels showed age-related differences in low frequency bands
Abstract Speech perception is dynamic and shows changes across development. In parallel, functional differences in brain development over time have been well documented and these differences may interact with changes in speech perception during infancy and childhood. Further, there is evidence that the two hemispheres contribute unequally to speech segmentation at the sentence and phonemic levels. To disentangle those contributions, we studied the cortical tracking of various sized units of speech that are crucial for spoken language processing in children (4.7–9.3 years old, N = 34) and adults (N = 19). We measured participants’ magnetoencephalogram (MEG) responses to syllables, words, and…
Characteristics of Weak and Strong Readers in a Foreign Language
This study investigated the cognitive (first language [L1] and foreign language [FL]), linguistic (L1 and FL), and motivational characteristics of weak FL readers in contrast to strong readers in 3 groups of L1 Finnish-speaking learners of English, aged 10, 14, and 17 years. This cross-sectional study covered a wide range of potential correlates, and therefore predictors, of FL reading based on previous research on reading in first, second (L2), and foreign languages. The weakest and strongest FL readers (1 standard deviation below or above the mean reading score) in each age group were selected for the comparisons reported in this article. The FL (English) skills other than reading were fo…
The development of narrative productivity, syntactic complexity, referential cohesion and event content in four- to eight-year-old Finnish children
This study focuses on the development of narrative structure and the relationship between narrative productivity and event content. A total of 172 Finnish children aged between four and eight participated. Their picture-elicited narrations were analysed for productivity, syntactic complexity, referential cohesion and event content. Each measure showed a developmental trend. Concerning consecutive age groups, significant differences were observed between four- and five-year-olds in productivity and event content and between five- and six-year-olds in referential cohesion. Multiple regression analysis showed that the relationship between productivity and event content was important, and espe…
EVALUATIVE LANGUAGE IN SPOKEN AND SIGNED STORIES TOLD BY A DEAF CHILD WITH A COCHLEAR IMPLANT: WORDS, SIGNS OR PARALINGUISTIC EXPRESSIONS?
In this paper the use and quality of the evaluative language produced by a bilingual child in a story-telling situation is analysed. The subject, an 11-year-old Finnish boy, Jimmy, is bilingual in Finnish sign language (FinSL) and spoken Finnish. He was born deaf but got a cochlear implant at the age of five. The data consist of a spoken and a signed version of “The Frog Story”. The analysis shows that evaluative devices and expressions differ in the spoken and signed stories told by the child. In his Finnish story he uses mostly lexical devices – comments on a character and the character’s actions as well as quoted speech occasionally combined with prosodic features. In his FinSL story he…
A complex case: a morphosyntactic approach to complexity in early child language
FM Lea Nieminen tutki väitöskirjassaan 2½-vuotiaiden lasten kielen kompleksisuutta eli monimutkaisuutta ja sen arvioimiseen käytettyjä mittareita. 2½-vuotiaat näyttävät sukeltavan kielen kompleksisuuteen vähitellen. Ensimmäisessä vaiheessa kompleksisuus näkyy enimmäkseen sanojen taivuttamisena (esim. [Tää] [menee] [syö+mään]). Tässä vaiheessa ilmauksissa käytetään vasta hyvin vähän sellaisia komponentteja, jotka koostuvat kahdesta tai useammasta sanasta (esim. [Tää tyttö] [istuu]). Seuraava askel on näiden kummankin kompleksisuuskeinon levittäminen kahteen komponenttiin (esim. [Tää tyttö] [menee] [syö+mään]). Kolmas vaihe on se, että ilmauksen komponentteja aletaan muokata enemmän kuin vain…
Laajan koululaisaineiston tutkimuseettiset haasteet
The article focuses on the ethical practices involved in collecting and organizing large datasets, which can also impact the quality of the data and the study as a whole. We report our experiences in the DIALUKI project (Diagnosing reading and writing in a second or foreign language), in which we visited over a hundred schools to obtain a dataset of over a thousand variables from nearly a thousand pupils. Such a project is interesting from the ethical perspective, as data collection for such a large project requires special attention to ethical standards and issues throughout the project, from planning and recruiting the participants to organizing, storing, analyzing and interpreting the da…
Identification of Reading Difficulties by a Digital Game-Based Assessment Technology
Computerized game-based assessment (GBA) system for screening reading difficulties may provide substantial time and cost benefits over traditional paper-and-pencil assessment while providing means also to individually adapt learning content in educational games. To study the reliability and validity of a GBA system to identify struggling readers performing below a standard deviation from mean in paper-and-pencil test either in raw scores and grade-normative scores, a large-scale study with first to fourth grade students ( N = 723) was conducted, where GBA was administrated as a group test by tablet devices. Overall, the results indicated that the GBA can be successfully used to identify st…
Kaksikieliset oppilaat suomea ja venäjää kirjoittamassa : minun rakkaus väri - valeasininen ja violetti
The present study focuses on Russian-Finnish bilingual pupils’ writing performances which were evaluated on the Common European Framework of Reference scale by three raters. The aim is to investigate how the pupils differ in their two languages in writing. In addition to CEFR-ratings we attempt to characterize the pupils’ performances on a more qualitative level as well as to describe their background in order to understand the reasons behind the level of their performances. Especially the pupils performing poorly in both languages are discussed. The results show that growing to become bilingual is complex: in addition to speaking Russian at home, the immigrant pupils should also read and w…
Kielen keinot ja kielimaisemat
The Development of Russian Heritage Pupils' Writing Proficiency in Finnish and Russian
James Cummins has stated that “a cognitively and academically beneficial form of bilingualism can be achieved only on the basis of adequately developed first language (L1) skills” (1979, p. 222). In this chapter we focus on bilingual writing development and its connections to learners’ cognitive and linguistic skills in L1 and L2 and background factors. Our participants come from Russian-speaking immigrant families living in Finland. All participants go to Finnish schools and are either integrated into mainstream classes or have started a preparatory class specially designed for recently arrived immigrant children. The basic aim of this chapter is two-fold and thus, the study is introduced …
Ei, bii, sii – vai jotain ihan muuta? Lukutaidon alkeet vientituotteeksi
Jo yli 200 000 suomalaislasta on saanut tukea lukemaan oppimiseen Ekapelistä, tutkimustietoon pohjautuvasta lukutaidon alkeiden teknologia-avusteisesta oppimisympäristöstä. Ajatus lukutaitoon johdattelevasta tietokonepelistä syntyi jo vuosia sitten Jyväskylän yliopistossa tehdyn dysleksiatutkimuksen yhteydessä. Vaikka Ekapelin ideana olikin alun perin tukea niitä, joille lukemaan oppiminen tuottaa vaikeuksia, peli on havaittu hyväksi kenelle tahansa aloittelevalle lukijalle. Tästä syntyi ajatus tehdä pelistä uusia kieliversioita myös niille lapsille, joille lukutaito on isojen ponnistusten takana esimerkiksi heikon opetuksen, vieraan kielen tai yhteisön epäileväisten asenteiden takia. UNESC…
Neural correlates of morphological processing and its development from pre-school to the first grade in children with and without familial risk for dyslexia
Previous studies have shown that the development of morphological awareness and reading skills are interlinked. However, most have focused on phonological awareness as a risk factor for dyslexia, although there is considerable diversity in the underlying causes of this reading difficulty. Specifically, the relationship between phonology, derivational morphology, and dyslexia in the Finnish language remains unclear. In the present study, we used magnetoencephalography (MEG) to measure the brain responses to correctly and incorrectly derived Finnish nouns in 34 first grade Finnish children (21 typically developing and 13 with familial risk for dyslexia). In addition, we compared longitudinall…
From abugida to alphabet in Konso, Ethiopia
Abstract This study examines the interplay between phonological awareness and orthography in Konso, a Cushitic language in Southwest Ethiopia. Thirty-two adults reading the Konso abugida but with minimal exposure to alphabetic literacy completed an orally administered phoneme deletion task. The responses were then examined using the minimal edit distance hypothesis (Wali, Sproat, Padakannaya & Bhuvaneshwari, 2009) as a framework for the analysis. The results suggest that the difficulty of a deletion was related to the way the phoneme was represented in the Konso abugida. Content-based error analysis of the incorrect responses gave indications of how Konso abugida readers’ processing of …
FIN-LARSP-MENETELMÄN SOVELTUVUUS MORFOSYNTAKTISTEN TAITOJEN ARVIOINTIIN KIELELLISESSÄ ERITYISVAIKEUDESSA
Artikkelissa selvitetään suomen kieleen sovelletun Language Assessment, Remediation and Screening Procedure -menetelmän (FIN-LARSP) käyttökelpoisuutta morfosyntaktisten taitojen arvioinnissa kolmella lapsella (4;1–4;9), joilla on kielellinen erityisvaikeus (KEV). LARSP kehitettiin alunperin englannin kieleen mutta siitä on myöhemmin tehty sovelluksia useisiin kieliin. Nyt esiteltävän pilottitutkimuksen tulokset osoittavat, että tieteellisessä tutkimuksessa FIN-LARSP puolustaa hyvin paikkaansa suomenkielisten lasten morfosyntaktisten taitojen analysointi- ja diagnosointimenetelmänä. Pilottitutkimuksemme tulokset ovat linjassa muiden menetelmien (IPSyn) antamien tulosten kanssa. Lisäksi tutki…
Ensuring Sufficient Literacy Practice with Tablet Technology in Zambian Schools
Tablets are a promising mobile device for disseminating e-Learning materials at schools in Africa. E-learning materials can be especially useful for the practice of early literacy skills. Introducing mobile devices to schools can be challenging as teachers are required to make changes to their daily routines and the use of technology can be problematic in overcrowded classrooms. This study aimed to find out the most optimal way of providing GraphoGame literacy intervention via tablets for grade one learners in an urban school environment. The study tested whether GraphoGame mounted on tablets increases initial literacy skills among grade one learners. Three different conditions for providin…