Grampy Lash

Several months ago, Claudia and I took Rachel on a shopping trip to Wal-Mart. There was a purpose; to find a certain toy that had captured Rachel’s fancy. Unfortunately the toy was not in stock, but we did find an acceptable alternative. As we were standing at the checkout while the attendant, Mary (or someone wearing Mary’s name tag), scanned our items, Rachel turned to Mary and said in her sweet little three-and-one-half-year-old voice, “Hi.”

“Hi sweetie,” replied Mary. “Are you doing some shopping today?”

Still leaning somewhat awkwardly, almost upside down, over the back of the shopping cart child seat Rachel answered, “Yes, my grandpa bought me a new toy!”

It was a cute, short conversation that was soon forgotten by Mary I’m sure, and it had faded from my memory as well – until recently when it suddenly resurfaced as I was reading a book authored by cognitive scientist Steven Pinker, The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature. The Wal-Mart conversation was mindfully resurrected in a flash while reading that …Babies are born into the world not knowing a word of the language being spoken around them. Yet in just three years, without the benefit of lessons, most of them will be talking a blue streak, with a vocabulary of thousands of words, a command of the grammar of the spoken vernacular, and a proficiency with the sound pattern. Children deploy the code of syntax unswervingly… A few pages over, Mr. Pinker tells me that Language itself is not a single system but a contraption with many components. To understand how children learn a language, it’s helpful to focus on one of these components… the component that organizes words into sentences and determines what they mean… syntax.

Oh, the things we take for granted. I doubt that Mary, the Wal-Mart girl knew about this. I certainly had never given it any thought.

Over the past four years we have accumulated quite a few children’s books, from infants to now, beginning readers. One of the favorites has been Clap Your Hands, a little Sesame Street book that has a built-in Elmo (who is also three-and-a-half) finger puppet. The reader can stick his fingers in Elmo’s little arms and make them clap while singing “If you’re happy and you know it, clap your hands!” Recently as I was slightly preoccupied with something in my office, three year old Alyvia loudly announced while descending the stairway behind me, “Yook pa-pa! I have the crapping book!”

“The crapping book?”

“Yes,” continued Alyvia as she wiggled Elmo’s little arms, “Elmo is crapping!”

Great syntax… needs a little work on the letter ‘L’.

Even little one-and-a-half-year-old Alizabeth has entered the syntax game, “Hi pa-paw… how are you?”

“I’m fine Ali, but my knees are a little weak just now, thank you.”

Thanks now to Steven Pinker, my throat constricts, my eyes water, and my nose starts running whenever I hear these bits of toddler genius. No, the word, genius, is not being lightly used. Mr. Pinker told me in another of his books, The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language that The three-year-old, then, is a grammatical genius – master of most constructions, obeying rules far more often than flouting them, respecting language universals, erring in sensible, adult-like ways, and avoiding many kinds of errors altogether.

They listen, they analyze, and they put the words together – right before our ears.

As I was paying for our new Wal-Mart merchandise, Rachel turned to Mary once more and said, “I love my grandpa!”

I’m not a genius, I’m not quite sure even what a cognitive scientist is, but I do know perfect syntax when I hear it.