The process of language acquisition has some basic requirements:
Interaction with other language-user
exposure and learning from a language-using environment
physical ability to send and receive sound signals
Input: The language that an acquirer/ learner is exposed to, in contrast to output.
Caregiver Speech (Also called Motherese, child-directed speech): Speech addressed to young children by the adult(s) or older children who are looking after them.
-> A style of communication used by caregivers when speaking with young children or infants.
Characteristics of Caregiver Speech:
The frequent use of questions
Exaggerated intonation
Extra loudness
Slow tempo
Longer pauses
treating actions and vocalizations as conversational
Simple sentence structure
A lot or of repetition