Posted: Mar 21, 2014 4:30 pm
That's interesting, as one characteristic of children's writing, and maybe speech as well, is a chain of 'ands'. For example, 'and then we went to the beach, and then we had an ice-cream, and then dad feel asleep, and then mum took his photo, and then he was annoyed'.
This is interesting because it's not so much about the actual meanings of words, but constructing a discourse, or a spoken text, or whatever you want to call it. So this is a rather naive discourse, just a chain of events, whereas a more sophisticated discourse would bring in 'because', and 'therefore', and stuff like that; semi-colons are very sophisticated!
I don't know if anybody has researched this in kids, but it's very likely, as it's important in education, not only to acquire the meanings of words, but also the ability to construct discourse/texts. I used to teach engineers report-writing, and some students have a knack for it, and some really don't.
This is interesting because it's not so much about the actual meanings of words, but constructing a discourse, or a spoken text, or whatever you want to call it. So this is a rather naive discourse, just a chain of events, whereas a more sophisticated discourse would bring in 'because', and 'therefore', and stuff like that; semi-colons are very sophisticated!
I don't know if anybody has researched this in kids, but it's very likely, as it's important in education, not only to acquire the meanings of words, but also the ability to construct discourse/texts. I used to teach engineers report-writing, and some students have a knack for it, and some really don't.