of eight" (Tchalo 1987, p. 3). To quote Tchalo:
Three significant concepts regarding child NL acquisition bear mentioning: (1) at all levels of language, i.e. phonological, morphological, syntactic, and semantic, the acquisition of features proceeds along a hierarchical continuum whereby each successive level builds upon a preceding one; (2) comprehension preceeds [sic] production; and (3) cognition develops at the same time language does in the young child" (p. 3).
This is the 'traditional' and still widely held position. It is, however, not shared by all linguistics scholars.
One of the problems in defining critical or sensitive periods is that the pin-pointing of maturational stages depends very much on the scholar's point of view. "The essential difference is the implication that the consequences for the organism may not be irreversible if the sensitive period passes and the given acquisition has not fully occurred" (Goldenson 1984, p. 669).
Gathercole (1988) has attempted to debunk what she calls the "myths" of first language acquisition. "Emp
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