Question
The challenge of learning complex language systems is also illustrated in the developmental stages through which children learn to ask questions.
The way children learn to form questions in English. What is generally the first wh-question word to be used. It is often learned as part of a chunk (whassat?) and it is some time before the child learn that there are variations of the form, such as ‘What is that?’ and ‘What are these?’
‘Where and Who’ emerge very soon. Identifying and locating people and objects are within the child’s understanding of the world. Furthermore, adults tend to ask children just these types of questions in the early days of language learning for example, ‘Where’s mommy?’ ,or ‘Who’s that?’
‘Why’ emerges around the end of the second year and becomes a favorite for the next year or two. Children seem to ask an endless number of question beginning with ‘why’ having discovered how effectively this little word gets adults to engage in conversation, for example, ‘Why that lady has blue hair?’
Finally, when the child has a better understanding of manner and time , ‘how and when’ emerge. In contrast to ‘what ,where and who’ question , children sometime ask the more cognitively difficult ‘why , when and how’ questions without always understanding the answers they get, as the following conversation with a four year old clearly shows: