Cognitive Processes in Bilingual Hispanic Children

Learning to master the language of the surrounding environment is an essential process in human development. Brian MacWhinney (1998) observes, "Children learn language gradually and inductively, rather than abruptly and deductively" (p. 199). Language acquisition is an important means by which the individual joins and participates in the larger society. John L. Locke (1994, September-October) writes, "Vocalization of babies changes to coherent language due to their need to communicate emotional requirements" (p. 435). Vocalization begins with cries that signal pain, hunger, pleasure, and other essential emotional needs.

According to MacWhinney (1998), this progresses at around three months to include cooing and, at around six months, to babbling. While babbling often sounds the same in babies of diverse cultural backgrounds and "may include some strange sounds like clicks that are not found" in the inf

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ss to believe that major determinants of word learning are social feedback, rather than innate constraints or even word learning biases" (p. 203). Once the child has built a vocabulary of around 100 words, most then undergo what researchers term a "vocabulary spurt," during which the child adds many more additional words and the syntactic structures in which they can be used to his or her understanding. The ways in which language progresses at this stage is highly individual, "self-organizing," in MacWhinney's (1998) words: "There is no preestablished pattern for these mappings and no preordained relation between particular nodes and particular feature patterns" (p. 204). Nonetheless, all children at this stage are developing their own versions of three kinds of maps, which are internal ways of organizing sounds, concepts, and articulations that allow them to make sense of the communication process. It is at this point that the individual may be able to begin to add a second language. As maps begin to form in the child's brain, the structures are now coming into place that will allow him or her to assign multiple meanings and build new cognitive associations. In fact, some research suggests that individuals who begin to learn
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Spanish English, Puerto Rican, John Flavell, John Locke, Bukatko Daehler, Marvin Daehler, References Barinaga, Brian MacWhinney, English Acquiring, , macwhinney 1998, learn language, native language, locke 1994 september-october, spanish english, children learn, word learning, 1998 notes, cognitive development, 1994 september-october, 1998 observes, bower 2000 december, 2000 december 9, macwhinney 1998 notes, macwhinney 1998 observes,
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