Assignment for linguistics course: attached in doc for clarity, but here's a summary of instructions: Instructions: Read through the sample and analyze the student language. Note features that you bel

Assignment for linguistics course:

Grade 2: Levels Beginning through Developing (1-4)

Instructions: Read through the sample and analyze the student language. Note features that you believe give you insights into (a) the student’s sound system, (b) his/her morphology, (c) his/her syntax, and (d) his/her semantics (lexical development). 

I am including a sample below. It should give you an idea of the kind of analysis to shoot for.

Sample: Grade 4, Level 1

Phonology: Possible problem with fricatives - subbing voiced stop [d] for voiced interdental fricative[ð] and alveolar [s] for alveopalatal [ʃ] (if ‘si’ is ‘she’ reduplication and not inversion of ‘is’ for ‘is eat’ (see syntax, below). Additionally, there may be some vowel issue indicated by the sub of ‘a’ for the ‘e’ in ‘the.’ It would be necessary to hear the informant speaking in order to determine whether the vowel letters reflect underlying articulations. There is also the possibility of challenges in the tense/lax high front vowels (sweme), especially in the context of a nasal consonant.

Morphology: Uses potential phrasal structure for complex verb form (is sweme, si eat) without appropriate inflectional morphology {-ing}. Spelling is accurate for base nouns (cat, fish) but not for the verb (sweme). It is unclear whether ‘si’ is an inversion of ‘is’ or a misspelling of a reduplicated pronoun ‘she’. Additional investigation would be needed to determine.

Syntax: Sentence structure is limited to simple (single thought) sentences. There is evidence of understanding of S-V-O basic word order. There is evidence of emerging understanding of article + noun usage for noun phrases. The verb phrase structure is problematic, with unnecessary auxiliary verbs in two frames and a lack of passive verb morphology in the middle frame (is eaten). Additionally, there is a missing ‘by’ required for the prep phrase in the middle frame. 

Semantics: There is limited evidence on which to base assumptions about underlying meaning. Because this informant is at a low level of proficiency, the lack of vocabulary items and details is to be expected. The basic terms, fish, cat, swim, eat are appropriate. Grammatical words, e.g. the, are used appropriately. At this stage, additional vocabulary would not necessarily be expected. 

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EXERCISE:

Phonology:  

Morphology: 

Syntax: 

Semantics (lexical):