This document contains a poster about child language acquisition features which is necessary to use in A-Level AQA English Language paper 1 question 4 in order to gain an A.
CLA features
Feature: Definition: Example:
Simplification To make words easier to say, children will simplify Deletion, substitution, reduplication, assimilation or
their pronunciation in certain ways. fronting.
o Final consonants may be dropped (the ‘t’ in ‘hat’)
Deletion Children will simplify some words by deleting o Unstressed syllables are often deleted (‘banana’
certain sounds. becomes ‘nana’
o Consonant clusters are reduced (‘snake’ to ‘nake’)
Substitution Another form of simplification is where children Swapping the ‘r’ sound for the ‘w’ sound so rabbit becomes
will swap harder sounds for easier ones. ‘wabbit’.
Reduplication Where a syllable of a word or sound is repeated, “nightnight”, “woofwoof”, “doggie” or “choochoo”. Often
add an extra vowel or the whole syllable. involves the repetition of CV.
Assimilation Sounds in separate words change when they are put The phrase 'white bag' becomes 'wipe bag' when it is said.
together in speech.
Fronting Sounds that should be made at the back of the A child may say “tootie” instead of “cookie” or “tar” instead
mouth. Produces “t” and “d” in place of a back sound of “car”.
such as /k/ and /g/.
Holophrase A word functioning as a phrase or sentence. A child may say "mine" to say "This is my toy, and I don't
want you to play with it."
o Saying "I runned", "he hitted", "you buyed".
Overgeneralisation Applying a regular grammatical rule in an irregular The suffix used to form the regular simple past tense, "-
situation. ed", has been applied to the stem of the irregular verbs
"run", "hit" and "buy".
Overextension A word is given a broader and more general The word ‘daddy’ used for all men not just the child’s
meaning and is used in more contexts. father.
Under-extension Common semantic errors are made by children Using the word ‘cat’ for their family pet but not applying it
where a word is given a narrower meaning than it to other cats.
has in adult language.
Mismatched One-word sentence that is abstract in its given
statements context. A child makes a statement about one object Saying ‘duck’ at an empty pond.
in relation to another.
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