Adults tend to take language for granted - until they have to learn a new one. Then they realize how difficult
it is to get the pronunciation right, to acquire the meaning of thousands of new words, and to learn how those
words are put together to form sentences. Children, however, have mastered language before they can tie their shoes.
In this engaging and accessible book, William O'Grady explains how this happens, discussing how children learn
to produce and distinguish among sounds, their acquisition of words and meanings, and their mastery of the rules
for building sentences. How Children Learn Language provides readers with a highly readable overview not only of
the language acquisition process itself, but also of the ingenious experiments and techniques that researchers
use to investigate his mysterious phenomenon. It will be of great interest to anyone - parent or student - wishing
to find out how children acquire language.
Written in an accessible style and assumes no knowledge of linguistics, so accessible to the general reader
and to parents with young children
Deals comprehensively with all the major phenomena involved in language development: sounds, words, meanings
and structure
Draws on the latest research in the field, giving readers an appreciation not just of 'what' we know about
language acquisition, but 'how' we know it