Tuesdays & Thursdays, 2:00-3:20pm in PCB 1100
Professor: Lisa Pearl, Department of Cognitive Sciences, SBSG 2314
Office hours: Tuesday 10:00am - 11:30am
Email is the best way to reach her to schedule an appointment not during these times. 
Teaching Assistant:
Lawrence Phillips, Department of Cognitive Sciences
Location for office hours: SBSG 2221
Office hours: W, Th 9:30am-11:00am
Email is the best way to reach him to schedule an appointment not during these times.
Announcements:
- 5/8/14: There has been an update to question
#2 on HW3. Please work on the updated version of
HW3, which is now posted.
- 4/23/14: Lawrence won't be able to hold office
hours from 4/24/14 through 5/1/14, since he'll be out of
the country. However, he will be able to answer you
via email after 5/1/14, and certainly before the
midterm.
In addition, an updated version of the Lecture 7 lecture notes (WordSeg2) have been posted on the website. Please download the latest version.
- 4/3/14: An updated version of HW1 has been
released to correct an error. If you are working
from a previously downloaded copy, please use the
updated version.
- 4/1/14: Welcome to the class webpage!
Note: All assignments, all lecture notes, and most reference readings can be found by clicking on the relevant link in the schedule section. In addition, any reference readings that are password protected can be accessed by using the username and password found in the first set of lecture notes (Introduction to Language Acquisition), which can be downloaded from the schedule section. Please note also that the first set of review questions (for the introductory material) is available to be downloaded and the first homework is accessible on EEE using the links on the schedule page.The material for the class that you are responsible for is covered completely in the course lecture notes, available (sometimes with accompanying podcasts) for download through the schedule section. However, reference materials are often helpful for understanding the material in the lecture notes, and will come primarily from the coursebook, websites, and occasionally short articles. These can all be found on the readings section and the schedule section.
Language is an incredibly complex system of knowledge. Not only are there multiple levels of representation -- sounds and words and phrases and meanings -- but within a given level, even simple output forms can be derived from multiple interacting pieces of knowledge. Yet as speakers of any given language, we are often blissfully unaware of how much we need to know in order to be able to communicate with language.
Nonetheless, this is precisely the knowledge children must acquire. And their task is not simple. The patterns of knowledge can be difficult to discern from the available input and, to top it off, the data children learn from is often ambiguous and full of exceptions anyway. Yet despite all this, all typically-developing children learn their native language nearly effortlessly, generalizing from noisy input in very specific ways. The degree of proficiency attained by very young children in their native language is almost never achieved by adults who are far more cognitively developed. How is this possible?
In this class, we delve into the process of language acquisition, exploring the way in which infants and very young children unconsciously uncover the rich systematic knowledge of their native language. We focus on both experimental methods and computational studies that quantitatively investigate the "how" of language acquisition.