With the interactionism We put an end to this brief review of the theories about the acquisition and development of language in the baby, among which we have highlighted innatism, behaviorism, and cognitivism.
The Interactionist Theory has as maximum representatives the Russian psychologist Lev Vigotsky and the American psychologist Jerome Bruner. Both were quite similar (though with certain differences) to the relationship defended by Piaget and the Cognitivist Theory between language and thought.
If we had to say what unites the two theories, we could say that they are the social, cultural and psychological rules that guide the child to how to use language in the different contexts in which it moves.
Interactionists believe that, together with the Device for the Acquisition of Language (proposed by Chomsky and the Innatist Theory), there is a kind of help that facilitates the acquisition of language, which would correspond to the child's environment and all the people who interact with it. with the. In this way, in this theory we can talk Scaffolding, Next Development Zones and Formats.
Scaffolding, Next Development Zones and Formats
He scaffolding It is a teaching process that facilitates the learning of the baby and the child. Thanks to him, the child is directed, through small steps he can understand, to achieve the success of a more difficult complete task. All this taking into account the Zone of proximal development of the child.
These Next Development Zones are a way to see whether or not the learning is appropriate to the levels of real and potential development of the child. That is to say, the difference between what the child is capable of doing on his own and what he would be able to do with the help of another more capable person.
The scaffolding can be of two types: vertical (when adults ask the child progressively for more information on the same topic) or routines as a game (the interactions between an adult and a structured child that can offer the possibility of prediction necessary for language development).
Let's look at two examples to understand it better. In the case of vertical scaffolding, while we teach a book to our son, he can spontaneously say "bear." We, who are with him at that time, can respond in many ways: "How many legs does the bear have?", "Have you ever seen a bear?", "What do bears eat?" ...
The other example, referring to the routines to game modes, could be while we bathe or feed the little one. It is a very structured situation, since the child knows what will happen in each moment. Then, we take advantage of that knowledge about the future to encourage the child to use language ("Here comes the sponge to wash your back!", "Open your mouth, the plane comes full of food ...!")
The formats They are those communicative contexts in which the child becomes proficient in language, collecting social regularities and accompanying common moments in the child's life, such as meals, bathing or games.
A very important feature of the formats is that it has a regular routine structure and involves at least two people: the child who is acquiring the language and another person (mother, father, grandfather, sister ...), as well as rules that allow the format is done properly (in the game "cucu-tras" has a structure that is always the same, so the child will learn more easily this routine and can develop language better by anticipating, for example, when it will "disappear "mom or dad and how to make it" come back ").
According to this, the appearance of language depends on the help offered by the structure of social routines in which adults and children are participating.
But the formats must not only be sequences of activities, but must also refer to manifestations of language that take place in a context. That is, they can exist object requirements, which involve the direct requirement of a visible object, to later refer to more distant objects in space and, finally, to those not visible (for example, "give me a glass").
We can also meet invitation requirements through which we require another person to share the activity ("dad come"). And another type may be the help requirements, which makes the child to an adult to help him reach a certain object ("do you open the box?").
Advantages and disadvantages
Like the other language theories, interactionism also has a number of advantages and disadvantages.
Among the first we can highlight:
- Teach the child how to learn language procedures
- It produces in the child self-motivation and strengthens the concept that it has of itself
- The child is responsible for their own learning process
And, on the other hand, there is also a very important inconvenience, and more so in the current times, which is none other than the time factor; in order to generate language, it is necessary that the adult be as long as possible with the child and thus interact with him.
Conclusion
The Interaction Theory He has shown that the acquisition and development of language cannot be explained by attending exclusively to the knowledge and activities carried out by the child individually, or to think that he is simply a recipient of the characteristics and models of language present in his environment.
And so, we conclude this review by theories about the acquisition and development of language in the baby, but not before asking you a question: after seeing these four hypotheses about language acquisition and development, what do you think is the way in which your children begin to communicate verbally with you?
