Preschool Language Competence

The main task of the preschool children's development is the formation of speech competence including the formation of speech activity. Speech competence is the ability to use language in practice (to express thoughts, intentions, requests), to use both verbal and non-verbal communication (facial expressions, gestures, movements) (Kravchenko, 2009, 39). According to Berk (1999, 358), there are several components of the language, such as that phonology, grammar, semantics and pragmatics.
The first element is phonology that refers to the correct pronunciation of words, developing listening skills, possession of intonational patterns. Sometimes adults do not focus on the correct pronunciation of their children, they rather try to catch the content of the conversation. For example, a five years old boy comes back home from the camp, he tells different stories and shares his feeling with the grandmother, at that moment she pays attention not to the phonology, but for the content (Linse, 2005,12). Bogysh and Gavrish (2008, 251) state that five years’ children should have well-developed phonological hearing and perception of information. Since the formation of the speech sounds in the future affects the mastery of reading and writing. …show more content…
The vocabulary of preschoolers is limited. In addition to limitation, there is still a narrowing of the semantic structure of the word, the lack of various types of meanings (synonyms, antonyms, figurative meaning of the word and others) (Berk, 1999, 358). For example a boy of 4.5 year shares his impression: "Daddy bought a fresh car", so we see that “fresh” does not mean the same meaning for adults (Aksarina, 1997). Thus, to build a versatile vocabulary, preschoolers must refine the meanings of thousands of words and connect them into elaborate networks of related items” (Berk, 1999,