ABSTRACT

In this chapter I will describe some key aspects of language development and use in early childhood in order to clarify the relationship between a child’s linguistic and intellectual development. The theoretical framework for the description and interpretation derives from systemic-functional linguistics (SFL) as articulated by M.A.K. Halliday (1978, 1994), who views language as a complex interrelated set of options for meaning – a ‘meaning potential’ gradually built up from babyhood. This meaning potential is made actual in the innumerable specific instances of spoken or written text that the person engages in. If we examine actual texts, we can infer the meaning options that lie behind them. Thus, an examination of the spontaneous, spoken conversational texts of a growing child can, from this perspective, provide insights into the changing meaning potential that underlies his or her utterances. This chapter will use data from a longitudinal case study of one learner’s spoken texts during the pre-school years to illuminate particular aspects of the child’s changing meaning potential.