Table of Contents
BEST IELTS General Reading Test 525
IELTS GENERAL READING TEST 525 – PASSAGE – 3

IELTS GENERAL READING TEST – 525
READING PASSAGE – 3
How Babies Learn Language
During the first year of a child’s life, parents and caregivers are concerned with its physical development; during the second year, they watch the baby’s language development very carefully. It is interesting just how easily children learn language. Children who are just three or four years old, who cannot yet tie their shoelaces, are able to speak in full sentences without any specific language training.
The current view of child language development is that it is an instinct – something as natural as eating or sleeping. According to experts in this area, this language instinct is innate – something each of us is born with. But, this prevailing view has not always enjoyed widespread acceptance.
IELTS General Reading Test
In the middle of the last century, experts of the time, including a renowned professor at Harvard University in the United States, regarded child language development as the process of learning through mere repetition. Language “habit” developed as young children were rewarded for repeating language correctly and ignored or punished when they used incorrect forms of language. Over time, a child, according to this theory, would learn language much like a dog might learn to behave properly through training.
Yet, even though the modern view holds that language is instinctive, experts like Assistant Professor Lise Eliot at Rosalind Franklin University are convinced that the interaction a child has with its parents and caregivers is crucial to its developments. The language of the parents and caregivers act as models for the developing child. In fact, a baby’s day-to-day experience is so important that the child will learn to speak in a manner very similar to the model speakers it hears.
IELTS General Reading Test
Given that the models parents provide are so important, it is interesting to consider the role of a speaker who is trying to exaggerate certain aspects of the language to capture the attention of a young baby.
Dr. Roberta Golinkoff believes that babies benefit from baby talk. Experiments show that immediately after birth, babies respond more to infant-directed talk than they do to adult-directed talk. When using baby talk, people exaggerate their facial expressions, which help the baby to begin to understand what is being communicated. She also notes that the exaggerated nature and repetition of baby talk helps infants to learn the difference between sounds. Since babies have a great deal of information to process, baby talk helps. Although there is concern that baby talk may persist too long, Dr. Golinkoff says that it stops being used as the child gets older, that is, when the child is better able to communicate with parents.
IELTS General Reading Test
Professor Jusczyk has made a particular study of babies’ ability to recognize sounds and says they recognize the sound of their own names as early as four and a half months. Babies know the meaning of “Mommy” and “Daddy” by about six months, which is earlier than was previously believed. By about nine months, babies begin recognizing frequent patterns in language. A baby will listen longer to the sound that occurs frequently, so it is good to frequently call the infant by its name.
An experiment at Johns Hopkins University in the USA, in which researchers went to the homes of 16 nine-month-olds, confirmed this view. The researchers arranged their visits for ten days out of a two-week period. During each visit, the researcher played an audiotape that included the same three stories. The stories included odd words such as “python” or “hornbill,” words that were unlikely to be encountered in the babies’ everyday experience.
After a couple of weeks during which nothing was done, the babies were brought to the research lab, where they listened to two recorded lists of words. The first list included words heard in the story. The second included similar words, but not the exact ones that were used in the stories.
IELTS General Reading Test
Jusczyk found the babies listened longer to the words that had appeared in the stories, which indicated that the babies had extracted individual words from the story. When a control group of 16 nine-month-olds, who had not heard the stories, listened to the two groups of words, they showed no preference for either list.
This does not mean that the babies actually understand the meanings of the words, just the sound patterns. It supports the idea that people are born to speak and have the capacity to learn language from the day they are born. This ability is enhanced if they are involved in conversation: And, significantly, Dr. Eliot reminds parents that babies and toddlers need to feel they are communicating. Clearly, sitting in front of the television is not enough; the baby must be having an interaction with another speaker.
IELTS General Reading Test
Questions 28 – 34
Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR NUMBERS from the passage.
Until a baby is a year old, parents and caretakers pay more attention on baby’s 28……………….. . It has been established that children can speak independently at age 29……………….. years and that this ability is innate. However, the child will also follow the speech patterns and linguistic behaviors of its caregivers and parents who act as 30……………….. . Babies actually benefit from 31……………….. , in which adults 32……………….. both sounds and facial expressions. Babies’ ability to 33……………….. sound patterns rather than words comes earlier than was previously thought. So, it is very important that babies are included in 34………………..
IELTS General Reading Test
Questions 35 – 40
Do the following statements agree with the information given in the passage on the previous page?
In boxes 35–40 on your answer sheet, write:
TRUE if the statement agrees with the information
FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this
35 One of the current views of language development in children is that the ability for a second language as well as their first one is innate like the ability for eating or sleeping.
36. From the time of their birth, humans seem to have an ability to learn language.
37. According to experts, language learning is very similar to the training of animals.
38. Dr. Eliot says that the language development of young children happens when they are rewarded for repeating language correctly.
39. Dr. Golinkoff is concerned that “baby talk” is spoken too much by some parents.
40. When a certain sound pattern is repeated to a baby, they know the meaning of language.
IELTS General Reading Test

IELTS General Reading Test
ANSWERS
28. PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT
29. THREE OR FOUR
30. MODELS
31. BABY TALK
32. EXAGGERATE
33. RECOGNIZE
34. CONVERSATION/INTERACTION
35. FALSE
36. TRUE
37. TRUE
38. NOT GIVEN
39. NOT GIVEN
40. TRUE
IELTS General Reading Test