By Ellie Williams
Once children begin to learn the meanings of words, especially gradable adjectives, they have to be able to use them in the right context. It can be hard for them to grasp the context that an adjective like "tall" can describe two different things that can be completely different heights. Children will learn the difference of this reasonable easy as they will see different things that are tall like people and mountains and they will learn the difference relatively easy.
However when the children have to acquire extra linguistic knowledge on the subject this could become a little trickier. For example it could be said that; a group of seven year olds built a tall tower and Gustave Eiffel built a tall tower. Now both of these towers would be tall but only in their own context, to understand the difference you would have to have extra knowledge on the participants involved. Like the fact that Gustave Eiffel built the Eiffel tower, one of the most famous towers in the world and that a seven year old may build a tower out of building blocks about a metre high but still be a tall tower to be built by a seven year old.
As always with practice, children will understand how the gradable adjectives can be used for two different objects that are completely different. However it may be harder for them to cope with the concept that two objects can be the same but have different adjectives. A good example of this is in a pdf. file written by Kristen Syrett, Rutgers University, Christopher Kennedy, University of Chicago and Jeffrey Lidz, University of Maryland in 2009, called Meaning and Context in Children's Understanding of Gradable Adjectives. They use the example of:
a. Anna is tall.
b. Anna is tall for a gymnast.
c. Anna is tall for a woman.
It all comes down to value judgements; unless you clarify in what context Anna is tall, someone may think that she is 6"3' when really she is only 4"5' and only considered tall for a gymnast. As gymnasts are mostly short, she may be short compared to other people but compared to gymnasts she would be tall. This also applies with height between men and women, unless the context is known, the meaning can be misunderstood. For example a woman and a man may be the same height but the woman may be considered tall and the man may be considered short. This is dependent on value judgements and unless the context is known people may not be able to depict the correct information from the statement.
Children would see this as another challenging concept to understand, they know the meaning of the word, but trying to learn how the adjective can be used in different contexts would be another step in acquisition of language. As children grow older they will begin to know how to use words and know what they mean but whilst growing up gradable adjectives can be a very hard concept for children to acquire.
http://semantics.uchicago.edu/kennedy/docs/skl-meaning+context.pdf
Once children begin to learn the meanings of words, especially gradable adjectives, they have to be able to use them in the right context. It can be hard for them to grasp the context that an adjective like "tall" can describe two different things that can be completely different heights. Children will learn the difference of this reasonable easy as they will see different things that are tall like people and mountains and they will learn the difference relatively easy.
However when the children have to acquire extra linguistic knowledge on the subject this could become a little trickier. For example it could be said that; a group of seven year olds built a tall tower and Gustave Eiffel built a tall tower. Now both of these towers would be tall but only in their own context, to understand the difference you would have to have extra knowledge on the participants involved. Like the fact that Gustave Eiffel built the Eiffel tower, one of the most famous towers in the world and that a seven year old may build a tower out of building blocks about a metre high but still be a tall tower to be built by a seven year old.
As always with practice, children will understand how the gradable adjectives can be used for two different objects that are completely different. However it may be harder for them to cope with the concept that two objects can be the same but have different adjectives. A good example of this is in a pdf. file written by Kristen Syrett, Rutgers University, Christopher Kennedy, University of Chicago and Jeffrey Lidz, University of Maryland in 2009, called Meaning and Context in Children's Understanding of Gradable Adjectives. They use the example of:
a. Anna is tall.
b. Anna is tall for a gymnast.
c. Anna is tall for a woman.
It all comes down to value judgements; unless you clarify in what context Anna is tall, someone may think that she is 6"3' when really she is only 4"5' and only considered tall for a gymnast. As gymnasts are mostly short, she may be short compared to other people but compared to gymnasts she would be tall. This also applies with height between men and women, unless the context is known, the meaning can be misunderstood. For example a woman and a man may be the same height but the woman may be considered tall and the man may be considered short. This is dependent on value judgements and unless the context is known people may not be able to depict the correct information from the statement.
Children would see this as another challenging concept to understand, they know the meaning of the word, but trying to learn how the adjective can be used in different contexts would be another step in acquisition of language. As children grow older they will begin to know how to use words and know what they mean but whilst growing up gradable adjectives can be a very hard concept for children to acquire.
http://semantics.uchicago.edu/kennedy/docs/skl-meaning+context.pdf
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