THROUGH LANGUAGE
2. THE CONTRIBUTION OF ORAL LANGUAGE TO THE MASTERING OF WRITTEN LANGUAGE
From a developmental point of view, children first perceive the speech chain as a sound continuum, which they learn to decompose in order to identify its compo- nents. In other words, for language to develop, it has to be seen as an object to be constructed based upon deconstructions, which lead to new constructions, i.e., it is an object which is also exposed to (a special type of) “manipulation”. This kind of
“manipulation”, which is supposed to lead to classification, relies on a sound input and is mediated by the sensory memory, which is characterized by its shortness.
Oral language, unlike the objects the child is used to manipulating, can be neither touched nor seen by the child. It is an object which obliges the child to use auditory perception in order to operate the necessary classification. Moreover, due to its sym- bolization role, language may also be deemed to help in the construction/knowing of other objects, besides being an object of knowledge (cf. Sinclair-deZwart, 1972:
364). But, the relationship between the subject and the object/language should be seen in a state of permanent renewal because language as an object is never stable, due to its use in different contexts (cf. De Lemos, 1998: 21).
If, in the realm of L1 the term learning is sometimes used alongside the term ac- quisition, the reason may be that it is important to create the necessary conditions for
the child to become aware as early as possible of the existence of the units (at first the discrete units) which compose the above-mentioned sound continuum, or speech chain. Undoubtedly, if from an early age the child is exposed to different oral lan- guage events, such as the reading of stories and books, the recounting of stories and daily experiences, the reproduction of songs and rhymes, this will lead to an easier and closer relationship with language in general and to the instilling of a certain awareness at different language levels (phonetic/phonological, morphological, lexi- cal and syntactic).
To lead the child to the discovery that each act of his/her life has a verbal transla- tion and that the objects, animals and persons s/he knows also possess a verbal exis- tence seems to be one of the first steps in language awareness development. For ex- ample, we may make the gestures of jumping, walking, eating, clapping hands, and ask the child to tell us what we are doing. On the other hand, we may say “laugh”,
“run”, “drink”, etc., and ask the child to mimic the actions translated by the words (cf. Girolami-Boulinier, 1993: 12-13). Other exercises may be done to name and identify objects or pictures representing different items (cf. Girolami-Boulinier, 1993: 12). In languages such as Portuguese, where the articles usually precede the nouns and the verbs are conjugated, the children are instructed to give the nouns without any article (cf. Girolami-Boulinier, 1993: 12) and the verb in the base form (cf. Girolami-Boulinier, 1993: 13). The aim of this kind of exercise is to allow chil- dren to become acquainted with the discrete units of their language and, what is more, to feel that the language forms they are used to saying may look different (have different endings or be expanded in different ways) according to the contexts in which they appear. This very simple language exercise already leads the child to gain a certain distance from his/her language – instilling the beginnings of language awareness –, to feel that language also obeys certain rules and to see it as an object which is not passive. In fact, it may even offer resistance to the speaker forcing him/her to make the necessary adaptations.
Subsequently, due to the importance of the child mastering the notion of three (“quantité «3»“ – see Girolami, 2001: 9) before beginning to learn to read and write (Girolami-Boulinier, 1993: 29), it is advisable to familiarize the child with three- element sentences, normally consisting of a subject, a verb and an object (the classi- cal SVO structure). The child is then expected to construct a similar sentence when s/he is faced with three words: two nouns with no pre-determiner and a verb in the base form, and to say the nouns (without pre-determiners) and the verb in the base form when a three-element sentence is proposed (cf. Girolami-Boulinier, 1993: 20- 22).
If one proposes, for example,
“beber” “sumo” “rapaz”
(drink) (juice) (boy)
the child is expected to say “O rapaz bebe sumo” (“The boy drinks juice”) based upon his/her language experience, and his/her pragmatic knowledge. On the other hand, if one proposes:
“O pai lê o jornal”
(The father reads the newspaper)
the child is expected to identify “pai” (“father”), “ler” (“read”) and “jornal” (“news- paper”).
By means of this kind of language exercise, the child becomes familiar with the verb/act as well as with the head words (nouns, pronouns or verbs) – “mots-centres”
according to Girolami-Boulinier (Girolami-Boulinier, 1987: 38) – of the elements of the structures: s/he is not only asked to place them in the correct positions with the necessary additions (articles, endings, etc.), but also to identify them when they ap- pear in a sentence with the necessary agreement.
The number of elements may vary according to the child’s language develop- ment and school level. In other words, the act/action represented by the verb of the structure may be completed by means of different objects and complements (direct and indirect objects and adverbial complements) according to the meaning to be conveyed.
With regard to the complements of verbs/actions, it is important that the child learns both to identify the nature (nouns, pronouns or verbs) of the head words of the elements of the sentence and their function (subject, object, complement) so that the sentence makes sense to him/her immediately. (See Girolami-Boulinier’s functions table (“tableau des fonctions”): Girolami-Boulinier, 1989: 45 and 47; 2000: 74-75.).
If one considers the sentence:
“As flores crescem no jardim”
(The flowers grow in the garden),
the child is expected to identify the act, i.e., the verb in the base form “crescer”
(“grow”), and look for the complement which completes its sense “no jardim” “in the garden”). After this, the subject of the sentence – “as flores” (“the flowers”) – should be easily identified (see Girolami-Boulinier, 1987: 34). The child begins to interiorize the different roles assigned to the elements (subject, direct or indirect objects, and adverbial complements) which complete the sense of the verb/act and may even be able to show them in any graphic representation, without needing to know the metalinguistic labels of the different functions.
The most important aim of this language exercise is to train the child to grasp the nature and function of the elements of the sentences as s/he listens to them or reads them (Girolami-Boulinier, 1987) before learning the grammar labels normally at- tributed to them. This language method helps to create the necessary distance be- tween the order of occurrence of the elements of the sentence and their function. It is perhaps worthwhile remembering that in some languages the subject does not occur systematically in the first position of the sentence. Nevertheless, the child is not supposed to identify the first element of the sentence as the subject. If s/he does so, we have to conclude that s/he has not yet grasped how to turn around the verb/act leading to an immediate understanding of the sentence.
Another way to contribute to the awareness of the existence of linguistic units as discrete entities is the expansion of the head words (“mots-centres”) of the noun phrases and prepositional phrases which may figure as elements of the sentences (see Girolami-Boulinier, 1993: 72 and ff.).
A noun, for example, may be expanded by means of (pre)determiners, adjectives, post-modification (“compléments du nom”) including relatives (“relatives”) (Gi- rolami-Boulinier, 1984: 22; 1993: 78; 2000: 81-82). For example, the noun “jardim”
(garden) may be expanded in different ways:
This way of expanding the noun – restricting its meaning but contributing at the same time to the enlargement of the child’s vocabulary – is useful in the classroom because pupils will undoubtedly benefit from the different suggestions made. For example, in the case of pre-determiners different suggestions may be made (“o”
(“the”), “um” (“a/one”), “este” (“this”), “aquele” (“that”), etc.). Leading the child to notice that different words may be used before the noun according to certain lan- guage principles and aims is an important step towards looking at language as a game or puzzle consisting of different pieces, some of which may be moved around or exchanged. The same can be said about the other types of noun (and pronoun) expansions (by means of adjectives and post-modification including relatives). This type of language exercise encourages the awareness of different parts of speech, which is not only important in terms of oral language development but also in terms of written language.
When the child is taught to identify the nouns in noun phrases and to recognize that they may exist in isolation, s/he is prepared, for example, not to judge nouns and determiners as whole blocks, as only one word. This may be illustrated by the an- swers of Portuguese children attending pre-school and the first year of primary school. They were asked how many words there were in the sentence “O menino come um bolo” (“The child eats a cake”). Portuguese children attending the first year of primary school where asked the same question about the sentence “Olha um passarinho” (“Look at the bird”). Indeed, in the first sentence, they counted “o menino” and “um bolo”, as one word each and thus said that the sentence contained three words (“O menino” / “come” / “um bolo”). The same happened with the sec- ond sentence. They said that it contained two words (“Olha” / “um passarinho”) showing again that “um passarinho” was taken as only one word. That is to say, they did not yet consider the pre-determiner a word. If they had been used to identifying the head words of the noun phrases and their expansions, they would certainly not have done so, Moreover, when Portuguese children from pre-school to the fourth year of primary school were asked if “o” (the Portuguese masculine singular definite article corresponding to the English “the”) was a word, it was observed that some of them did not consider it a word because it only had one letter. Some of them did not 1. Pre-determiner + noun
2. Pre-determiner + adjective + noun 3. Pre-determiner + adjective + noun + post-modification (“complément du nom”)
4. Pre-determiner + adjective + noun + post-modification (“complément du nom”) + relative
“um jardim”
“um belo jardim”
“um belo jardim para passear”
“um belo jardim para passear que fica ao lado de minha casa”
(a garden)
(a beautiful garden) (a beautiful garden to go for a walk)
(a beautiful garden to go for a walk, which is next to my house)
recognize that “o” could be either a word when corresponding to the article or a let- ter, and referred to it only as a letter (Pinto, unpublished).
It is therefore advisable to train the child to identify isolated nouns inserted in the noun phrases where they already appear expanded by means of pre-determiners, adjectives or post-modification including relatives. This is the kind of exercise that reinforces the importance of seeing language as being composed of discrete units which may look different depending on the context and which may be replaced by other units, as long as their nature and function are not violated.
When the child begins to reason in language as has been suggested above, it may happen that, due to the complexity of the language or to his/her restricted vocabu- lary, some linguistic units will not be identified correctly although s/he already re- veals a certain level of morphological awareness. To illustrate this statement, it may be mentioned the case of a child who understood the Portuguese word “nação” (na- tion) – the meaning of which she did not yet know – as a Portuguese noun-phrase
“na São” containing two words she already knows: “na”, the contraction of the Por- tuguese preposition “em” and the Portuguese feminine singular definite article “a”, and “São” the nickname of her maid. This is a constructive error we may expect from children familiar with language manipulation: it already reveals a certain mor- phological awareness and the search for meaning in the speech chain. In fact, speech should always make sense to the child; language – except in certain specific cases – must always make sense when heard or read, as well as when spoken or written. If the child does not understand what s/he is listening to or reading, it is necessary to discover the reason and find out if the child is used to working out the semantic groups and subgroups within the sentence and within the different paragraphs that constitute the text or the speech. If one takes for granted that language is a means to be understood and that language has to be based upon meaning, then the identifica- tion of the semantic groups within the sentence and their main elements is crucial.
When the child is able to identify the semantic groups of the sentence and their head words (“mots-centres”), s/he is also expected to be able to grasp the main idea con- veyed by the sentence. Little by little, depending on his/her language and textual experience, s/he will discover the reason why nouns and verbs are respectively ex- panded and completed in a certain way.
To grasp the nature and the function of the words is important because there ex- ist forms which are apparently similar but whose nature and function have nothing in common. Indeed, the existence of dependent (see, for example, verb, noun and adjective endings) and independent linguistic units (the different parts of speech) has to be taken into account, as well as certain word components which may present similar forms. When, in the above mentioned example concerning the misunder- standing of the word “nação” (“nation”), the child misunderstood the first syllable
“na” of the Portuguese word “nação” (“nation”), which is neither a dependent nor an independent form, with the word “na” (the contraction of the Portuguese preposition
“em” with the feminine singular definite article “a”) which possesses linguistic in- dependence and which appears in many noun-groups such as “na escola” (“at school”), it is evident that the nature and function of the word “nação” was not iden- tified. In other words, the child made a lexical identification error. In this case what is important is the fact that the child is already beginning to feel that certain pieces
of this linguistic puzzle may occur in different contexts. The same morphological reasoning occurred when a child attending the first year of primary school, when faced with the word “umbigo” (“navel”), suggested it was possible to say “um bigo, dois bigos”. That is to say, she also mixed the Portuguese cardinal numeral “um”
(“one”), which coincides with the Portuguese masculine indefinite article “um”
(“a”), with the first syllable of the word “umbigo”. She then detached the other syl- lables of “umbigo” as if they constituted a word *”bigo“ and exchanged the numeral
“um” (“one”) for the numeral “dois” (“two”). This kind of language manipulation already indicates a degree of language awareness and certain sensitivity towards the different possibilities of expanding nouns.
The correct identification of the head words in the noun phrases (for example the identification of “jardim” (“garden”) in the noun phrase “um belo jardim” (“a beau- tiful garden”), as well as the correct identification of the elements of the sentence (for example “as flores” (“the flowers”)/ “crescem”(“grow”)/ “no jardim” (“in the garden”) in the sentence “as flores crescem no jardim” (“the flowers grow in the garden”), and the identification of the act/verb “crescer” (“grow”) and of the com- ponents which complete its meaning (“as flores” and “no jardim”) play a very im- portant role in language development because they imply the understanding of the semantic groups of the sentence and consequently an accurate grasp of the meaning conveyed. It is also important that the child should identify the main verb of the sen- tence and should refer to it in the base form. Moreover, the child also has to become sensitive to the verb endings, which are dependent on the number and person of the subject of the sentence. This is another step towards the development of morpho- logical awareness and of the idea that an action may be represented in different verb forms according to agreement conditions. In Portuguese, the utterance conditions the person of the verb depending on the number (singular or plural) and person (in the case of the pronouns) of the subject of the sentence. If the agreement concerns the noun, then gender also has to be taken into account.
The language method described so far, aims to make the learner immediately grasp the meaning of what s/he is listening to or reading and to understand that it is necessary to know previously what to say when one wishes to say or write some- thing. Although speaking and writing present different features due to their distinct planning strategies (local planning vs. pre-planning) and production timings (see Urbano, 1999; Crystal, 2001), the speaker, and not only the writer, is also expected to use language in such a way as to translate his/her thoughts in a meaningful way.
This method also helps to develop an awareness of language organisation, of the way the different language “pieces” of various sizes and levels (morphological, lexi- cal, syntactic) fit together, as well as of the nature (determiners, nouns, adjectives, adverbs, verbs, etc.) and function (subject, direct and indirect object, complement) of the words in order to get meaning from language.
As has been outlined before, it is important to identify the nature and the function of the words, as there are forms which are apparently similar but.whose nature and function have nothing in common. Furthermore, the immediate grasp of the function and nature of certain words which sound alike but which are different as far as func- tion, nature and written form are concerned (for example: “à” and “há”) or which
have written forms which differ only in accentuation (“e”/”é”; “esta”/”está”) – as a matter of fact, attention is not always paid to accentuation by our school children – also helps children to look at written language from another perspective. This way of looking at aspects which characterize language in general emphasizes the continuum between oral and written language.
In general, language is supposed to convey meaning and it is up to the teachers to show the learner that behind the external language organization which corre- sponds to “how to say” and “when to say” there is, a “what to say”. Practising oral and written language in this way, leading the learner to judge the correspondence between thinking and language, also constitutes the basis of maturity in terms of thinking and reasoning, which is required by any domain of study. If the learner is familiar with different possibilities of translating certain mental representations and aware that certain ways of communicating them are more suitable than others, s/he is doubtless prepared to face any kind of topic because s/he has developed the feel- ing that the role language plays in learning and in communicating is essential.
3. READING AT THE SERVICE OF ORAL AND WRITTEN MASTERING