Role of the environment and responsibility
With the sensitive period ranging between 2 months to 2 ½ years, the child acquires the language well in advance, before he steps into the II sub phase. Thus, it becomes imperative for the parents and the family to support the child in language acquisition. As language acquisition can take place only as a result of co-relative exchange with the environment, the environment has to be suitably prepared so as to support this acquisition. To begin with, the environment should possess various stimulating factors in favour of language acquisition. From the early months onwards, the child must be offered simple exercises for auditory stimulations. In order to do this, the child must be spoken to in a meaningful manner. Further, he should be surrounded with music and objects which create sounds. However, care has to be taken to see that the stimuli must be reasonable within his auditory capacity.
Though he is not capable of initiating any communication, the people around him must use language as means of communication. Gestures should be used to the minimum so that they suitably support the verbal cues. The parents and the members of the family have to use correct form of language. In his presence it is important to keep the grammatical component simple. Baby language should be totally avoided. As he is growing he should be spoken to about the various activities that are performed around him. The sentences should be simple and short. Each sentence must communicate only one thought.
The child may have incorrect pronunciation as his speech organs are still getting strengthened. The adult should avoid making fun of the child. This is also the time when the child is creating his mental faculties. Therefore suitable human activities should be introduced to lead him towards abstraction. Simultaneously, when suitable language is introduced, then the abstraction achieved is of a higher degree. This also enables him to develop his cognition. He should have the freedom to express. As he is starting to communicate comfortably, the adults have to wait patiently. They should not fulfil his needs until asked for. When there is certain difficulty in finding a suitable word, the adult must subtly prompt him, but must never do it directly.
Towards the cognitive development, realistic pictures should be given. It would indeed be ideal to let the child take a field trip on a regular basis. These trips should be planned according to the child’s need. The child should also find the freedom to participate in the situations that arise during field trips. He will also be exposed to the social courtesies and the pragmatic language. The conversational rules should be very subtly introduced from the very early days. Further, the adults around should also practice them. The people around him should experience a great love for language, only then can the child inculcate it. As a very remote preparation for writing and reading, the people around the child must develop a taste for these skills. Even beginning from that period when the child can be propped up in the lap, he should be introduced to reading. The books should have pictures which are realistic. Comic pictures must be avoided. When the child is surrounded by an environment where the people around him enjoy the various forms of language and utilise them in a functional manner as means of communication, then the child would definitely inculcate the right sentiments towards these aspects of language.
CONCLUSION
Language as a human function is created by man in the course of fundamental development. Just as man has evolved through various civilisations, language also follows similar stages of evolution to finally arrive at the sophisticated form. With the formative years and more so the I sub phase, related to the cognitive development, the language development should also take place during the same period. Provision of an environment which is conducive to development, which enables the child to create a language, is of utmost importance. In addition to preparing an environment which includes the various means of development, the adults should realise that they themselves serve as the most important means of language development.
"So with the child’s psychic mechanism of learning
a language. Its work begins in the deepest shadows
of the unconscious mind; there it is developed and
the product becomes fixed. Then only does it appear
in the open. Beyond question, there is some mechanism
at work causing all this to happen.";
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