ChildEx is a step-by-step guide for your first corpus-based project on language acquisition. ChildEx was developed as part of an undergraduate introductory course taught by Dr. Chigusa Kurumada at the University of Rochester (BCS 259: Language Development). Using the Language Development (5th Edition) textbook and journal articles, the course walks you through stages of children language acquisition and development. The course brings to light how children acquire such incredibly complex language systems from phonemes to pragmatics, and investigates the role of a child’s innate abilities and their environment in this development.
One of the foci of the course is to introduce students to conducting research, surveying basics of 1) hypotheses testing, 2) experimental design, 3) analyses, and 4) research presentation using the CHILDES database. ChildEx guides you through these four steps, providing tips and useful information along the way to aid you in conducting your first corpus-based experiment! Problem-sets and homework assignments are also available to help generate new research ideas and build your basic skills while using CHILDES.
Doing your own research is so much fun! Getting experience in what it takes to conduct a research experiment, helps a reader better understand the work presented in research articles, bringing you to a new level of understanding of the frontline research in the field. Let’s begin!