Developmental Stages in the Acquisition of Interrogatives by Children Native Speakers of Bedouin of Hijaz Dialect
Author
Al-Majnoni, Rehab Mohammad
Abstract
Abstract The present study discusses the developmental stages in the acquisition of interrogatives by children native speakers of Bedouin of Hijazi dialect. The research aims to answer the following questions: 1- Which kind of interrogatives is acquired first and which is acquired last? 2- What is the chronological order of the acquisition of wh-words? The study is based on audio-recorded data collected from six children native speakers of Bedouin of Hijazi dialect whose ages range from one year and five months to six years and seven months. The kind of data used in this study is children's spontaneous speech. About five sessions were recorded for each child. Each session lasted between seven and twenty seven minute. The recorded data were typically transcribed into a written form. In order to find out the correct structure of interrogative in Bedouin of Hijazi dialect, a special type of questionnaire was designed for this purpose. The study found out the following two points: - Children native speakers of Bedouin of Hijaz dialect acquire the types of interrogatives in the following order: I) Yes/No Questions. II) Wh-Questions. III) Negative Questions. IV) Tag Questions. V) Alternative Questions. - Children native speakers of Bedouin of Hijaz dialect acquire wh-words in the following order: I) - /mien/ (who) and /?iaʃ -?iah/ (what).6 II)- /wain/ (where). III)- /laih/ (why), /kaif/ (how), and /mita/ (when). IV)- /kam/ (how many). The findings of the research support previous findings which indicate that children are moving in successive steps in the acquisition of interrogat
