Language Grows Brains Episode 1

Added: 2026-05-28

[00:00:05]waiting five seconds.

[00:00:09]Hi.

[00:00:10]>> So, hello to everybody that's out there in our audience. And uh this is a podcast that Bonnie thought about and said we ought to do. And so, we're here to have a conversation about language and how language grows brains. So, Bonnie, maybe we ought to introduce ourselves to our audience a little bit.

[00:00:29]tell us something about yourself in terms of your expertise about language growing brains.

[00:00:34]>> Yeah. Um, so I've been a public school teacher for the last 30 years, which yeah, I started in the fall of 95, which I was thinking about like, wow, I just finished my 30th year.

[00:00:44]>> I know.

[00:00:45]>> Um, and mostly centered in the first and second grade um, age band. Um, in 2016, I completed my doctoral work with Dr. Arward as my doctoral chair um with a um specialty in neuro education which we'll talk about later what that means and but particularly in the acquisition of um uh language and how that relates to literacy in the classroom and so that's been my focus and in the meantime I've done you know adjunct work and pres presenting over the last 10 years we've presented many times in the last years we've known each other I actually met Dr. Arwood or Ellen. Um, in the fall of 2000, I was working on my master's degree. I needed a elective and one of my friends like, "Take this class from Dr. Arwood." So, we I met her for the first time and she was a professor at University of Portland and uh took my first class in 2000. So, that's been 26 years.

[00:01:41]>> Yeah. A long time.

[00:01:42]>> And uh so, yeah, from then on I've changed my practice and got my doctorate and yeah, I've been working with kids and >> your doc your doctor's in language too.

[00:01:51]Your dissertation was in language.

[00:01:53]>> Yeah, my dissertation is really focused on what is language, how do we acquire it, how does it show up in the classroom, and what does it do, how does that connect to learning in the brain and that's part of that neuroeducation work is I'm trying to get that neuroscience in because there's an absolute connection between the two.

[00:02:09]>> Yeah, that sounds great.

[00:02:10]>> Yeah. So, what about you? Tell us a little bit in case you don't know Dr. Arwood. Ellen.

[00:02:14]>> Yeah.

[00:02:16]>> Yeah. I go by Ellen Lucas Arwood professionally and um I've been a licensed speech and language pathologist for 55 years and um in that time I've had a chance to work with a lot of different populations because I am a practitioner at heart. In fact, we both are and you know so one foot's always been in that practice. The other piece has always been working with adults and helping adults and their families of kids that had problems helping them understand learning language and behavior. So that's the focus has always been though centered around that language how it is we acquire language.

[00:02:48]So credentially you know is it's the old saying of you know here are my credentials. I got a doctorate at the University of Georgia in speech engineering science and my masters is from Washington State University in communication disorders. Sorry we have a visitor.

[00:03:03]>> There's a couple cats in the house. So >> you might see a few hop up but we'll scoot them away.

[00:03:07]>> Yeah. and then and my bachelor's is from the University of Oregon in speech and hearing sciences. Um, but I think the thing that has attributed to or contributed to my understanding of language the best has been the chance to actually study language in lots of different ways. And not everybody in education gets a chance to do that. Not everybody in other professions like psychology or anthropology also get a chance to do that. So, we're on the podcast today because we have this unique background that um comes from understanding language in in multiple ways. And we want to bring that into practice and and perhaps leave you with nuggets each time that we put on a podcast, drop a podcast. We want you to basically um think about something and we'll give it to you and have you think about it and then join us again the next time to see what what your questions might be and what you might want to ask us about it.

[00:04:05]>> Something to consider each time.

[00:04:06]Hopefully, you'll come. And you know, it's something I noted too is that in my dissertation, I looked at all the teacher prep programs in the greater Portland area and Vancouver and not a single teacher preparation program has any focus on language acquisition versus development or anything about neuroscience and what does that mean for learning.

[00:04:26]>> Absolutely.

[00:04:27]>> There really is a gap out there in teacher education programs.

[00:04:30]>> Absolutely. And just for our audience, um, this is being filmed or, um, in Vancouver, Washington, Portland, Oregon, just so you know, >> the great Pacific Northwest. Yes, that's where we're heading.

[00:04:45]>> Pacific Northwest. That's that's where we're located. Anyway, so um, Bonnie mentioned something about connections >> and there is that connection between the neuroscience and the brain and the connection between that and language and how we acquire language. What I think that we probably don't really understand really well is how much of that is external and how much of that is internal. And what I mean by that is that there's a connection between us and the language that we use to connect the environment to us. Okay? And then there's this connection that takes place between what happens when that environment gives us meaning and then we have to do something with it with our brains. So, you know, I back way back when back in the early 1970s, there was a lot of discussion about whether or not people could even have language that was actually um biologically created. In other words, it was thought that maybe language was actually taught, that everybody had to imitate language to have language because after all, if you grow up in a French-speaking home, you speak French. You grow up in an English-speaking home, you speak English.

[00:05:55]>> And so, there was this idea that maybe you could teach language to everybody. Okay, that was kind of we well to be honest that came through the BF Skinner verbal behavior and some of that >> input output that you teach it and you give it back and you've learned it.

[00:06:13]>> Yeah. Right.

[00:06:13]>> And so it was thought that kids all imitated >> but and that set off a whole lot of research in the 1970s about well what is childhood language? and they found that gee kids actually say things that haven't been imitated. So maybe that's not quite true. But then there were all the primate studies that were being done too because after all primates could lend language. But wait a minute, >> the language wasn't exactly like human language either. So there was that debate and it was it was contentious enough that people would get up and walk out of classes. they'd get it and walk out of special lectures and that type of thing because it was really divided between language being biological in nature and neurobiological and language being taught or learned. So you know when you mention connection in the brain and neuroscience it doesn't surprise me that you know until we started to getting some of the research during the decade of the brain in the 1990s. It doesn't surprise me that we didn't make that connection between well gee you've got these kids that are producing sentences utterances ideas that they haven't been taught. Okay. So there's something unique about learning language but we also aren't born with it.

[00:07:25]>> Right. And then there's some kids who never >> acquire it.

[00:07:28]>> They never acquire language and even though all around them the adults are interacting with them and showing them the things and talking to them and they never learn to speak. And so who was the who was the guy in the 70s that was uh was kind of driven out of the >> Lennenberg >> Lennenberg who said who said hey there has to be a biological connection here because I see this whole you know institution full of children that are not learning to speak and there's really should be no reason for it if if those theories are correct that hearing language means you speak right and he was the first one way before there were brain scans and before we had you know puler and other people we'll talk about um that said there's got to be a biological connection here and they were like stay in your lane. You're not a bi, you know, who do you think you are? You can't talk about this stuff. You're a biologist or whatever, right? So that's it's it's been this like pushpull of >> how does this how does this actually happen? How do we acquire language?

[00:08:19]Notice we keep saying acquire, >> right? Because it's not the same as developing language. No.

[00:08:24]>> Um that and then how does that what does that look like in the brain? And yes, fortunately in the last 1015 years, we're getting a lot more brain scans and Yeah. and and um data that really really smart uh neuroscientists are collecting.

[00:08:39]>> Absolutely.

[00:08:40]>> That is starting to prove what Lennenberg said back in the 70s. Yeah.

[00:08:43]Which is great.

[00:08:44]>> Well, and and Eric Lennenberg, one of the things that that well, he used a lot of data. A lot of people said, "Well, no, it wasn't the right kind of data."

[00:08:51]But he used data.

[00:08:52]>> His data had to do with two different populations. One population was the military and he said, "Gee, you know, you you go into the military with a biological brain that is functioning okay, as healthy, this type of thing.

[00:09:07]You have an injury to that brain and then all of a sudden you don't have language the same way you had before."

[00:09:13]>> And then the other population he used was the one that you mentioned, which is that you have these kids that don't have language. And that was that was my population that I worked with a lot were the kids that didn't have language. And it basically looking at what they could do versus what they couldn't do told me two things. One is that educationally what we were being taught about how kids just unfold developmentally with language didn't match with what I saw that there had to be this acquisition process. There had to be some type of connection between what was coming in.

[00:09:47]Okay. That had to be there. Otherwise, you had these feral kids that were found. And I did get a chance to work with a couple of those kids. Really?

[00:09:54]Yeah. Yeah. That's a fascinating subset of children who were basically abandoned and somehow survived >> or they were severely abused and not given any any locked up and then what happened to them? Could they acquire language if they didn't hear it or interact with it before the age of say 12 or 13. It's >> fascinating. We had a guy that I got had a chance to work with um in Georgia that was in his 20s when they found him. Wow.

[00:10:20]>> And he had no language at all. He had never used any utensils. He had never heard music. He had never um as far as we could tell, he had never really been around people who spoke, that type of thing. And and that was fascinating to be able to work with him because the question about critical periods and acquisition and did you come with a blank slate that just unfolded developmentally, all of that was that question at the time, >> right? And then the idea being that if language is innate, which who said that?

[00:10:48]Who said the innate? Was that Chsky? No.

[00:10:51]Well, there's a number of people that if language just is this part of your brain that just grows automatically, then that means that you wouldn't need anyone around you and you would just come out this talking person that could interact with the world. So, >> and that doesn't happen.

[00:11:05]>> That doesn't happen. There's like so many examples of that not happening.

[00:11:09]What happens when children are neglected or abused or don't get the information they need. So then it goes keeps leading us back to there has to be a connection absolutely between >> what's happening outside the child, right, and what's happening inside the child.

[00:11:24]>> Well, and that Yeah. And that kind of takes us back into that education realm, which is we need to start looking maybe at our educational paradigm and looking at our classrooms and looking at our families even in terms of are they giving what the kids need to acquire language and the way in which the kids need the language to be able to do things like problem solve and critical thinking >> and and I hope we address that at some point. I hope we get to the point where we can talk a little bit about that.

[00:11:53]>> You know, the developmental piece. It's interesting too is that we now have aging population that we have a lot of medical records and science for that.

[00:12:03]And I was I was reading an article this morning. It was kind of interesting about how certain medications actually um help a person not go into the dementia decline. Okay. Yeah. And then when I looked at it, it said, "Well, no, it has to do with lifestyle. It has to do, you know, you're given that medication because of the type of lifestyle and it controls what the problem is and therefore your brain doesn't deteriorate. But let's think about that a minute because when the brain deteriorates, what happens? You also lose your language.

[00:12:31]>> So you've got acquisition and then you've got the decline from an unhealthy brain at the other end. Both are neurobiological bases to language, >> you know. So at one end you have kids acquiring and what does that brain look like between zero and seven you know and it's on fire trying to make those connections because everything is coming in so there's got to be this external setup okay which could be a classroom it could be a home it could be the community the marketplace it could be the playground but there's something on the outside that we need to understand in order to set up their environment so that's right for kids to acquire language >> but the neurolog olog neurobiological system which includes the brain and and all the connections from the brain back down into all the eyes, ears, nose, the receptors, all of that has to also be in place too.

[00:13:21]>> Yes.

[00:13:22]>> Because we have enough evidence of what happens when it deteriorates. We have enough evidence of what happens when it's damaged. Military car accidents, that kind of thing. Strokes, I've worked with stroke patients. what happens when you know the health conditions um deteriorate the brain that type of thing is that we've got that and then we've got the kids like you said that don't acquire the language at the beginning for some reason even though they have a brain okay all right so obviously you know all the data that we've collected since the 90s 1990s till now and you know I think you said 25 years well I think we're probably looking more like 35 years at this point has really accumul accumulated to the point where we should be able to make some of those um connections and have a have some 20 minute podcast discussions about how it is that we should look at the connections. What do the kids need for learning? What can we do to set that up?

[00:14:18]Okay. Are we doing that? Okay. Yeah.

[00:14:21]>> And and then I think we're here because we're seeing evidence that maybe it's not being done as well as it could be.

[00:14:27]>> Right. Right. And it's partly knowledge.

[00:14:29]>> Absolutely.

[00:14:30]>> Right. We just don't know. First of all, like what is that? What does that look like in a classroom? How do we help? Or as a parent, what can we do more? Yeah.

[00:14:38]Um it's just it just kind of like blows my mind that there's so much evidence that language is based in the brain, right? And yet >> we're not learning about how that mechanism works. We're not learning about that brain and the, you know, synergistic whole brain that's firing up when you're solving a problem or explaining your thinking and how that singing, singing a song or composing or whoever, >> reading your favorite novel.

[00:15:06]>> Oh, yeah. That, you know, all those mechanisms are just the brain's just lighting up which shows us that, yeah, all that thinking is housed in the brain. So then why aren't we learning about this? That's the part that what I'm really hoping for is that it gets us all hopefully if you're listening and watching that it's gets you considering like okay then what am I missing here because some of us are out in the field and we're doing everything we know like we care so much about these kids and we're just every day we're trying to help them and I think sometimes we don't have all the tools we need because we just don't know. They say you just don't know what you don't know. Um, so that's kind of what I'm hoping for here is that we can add another layer of knowledge to whoever's out there working with kids or adults or whoever you're working with.

[00:15:51]>> And you know, I want to make sure that our audience also understands that neither one of us is really saying, hey, we've been doing things wrong. You know, it's it is a matter of knowledge, but it's also a matter of understanding that everything that we know about language and the and the importance of language doesn't come from education.

[00:16:09]>> Okay? it actually is coming from other fields, >> right?

[00:16:11]>> Other disciplines. And that's really important to understand because it means we also haven't had opportunity >> and you know I you know if you go to class and you're taught methods and those methods are matched then in the field and those methods follow what the cooperating teacher will do. Okay? And they match with what you're being taught at school and nobody says oh by the way have you read Bruner or have you read Votssky? you know, the original, not some secondary paper. Have you read that? You know, then you really haven't had opportunity. You don't know it's there, but you also haven't had been put in a position where you had the opportunity to to read, >> right? And I just in case you don't know, um, Ellen actually spent 40 years in higher ed in teacher prep programs and all of that. So, she kind of knows the ins and outs of what's happening in those programs as well. So, and you've also seen that there weren't there just aren't classes in it. It's not it's not a core. It's not a requirement. People could take it if they were maybe they took an ESL class or something like that. They might touch on language as a function, but it's not kind of the >> in the general knowledge base.

[00:17:18]>> Even in my field of speech and language, we typically have about one class and maybe a diagnostics class or practicum.

[00:17:24]We required to work with individuals with language, but we don't necessarily have a lot of in-depth multiple classes of language, right, that allow us to really learn about it because we haven't quite figured out that language >> underlies a whole lot of things like problem solving, critical thinking. But it also mediates things like reading and writing >> and being able to to just go to your job to your employment and understand the instructions that somebody has given you and then follow them and make a plan and organize >> to know what's appropriate in different situations. Like we don't act the same on our living room couch as we do on the carpet at school, right? There's like that's all language based.

[00:18:04]>> Absolutely. Absolutely. So, um we kind of want to wrap this up. It's the first podcast and we hope that you've enjoyed it. And we kind of have an idea of of what it is that we want to do. And with that, I'd like to say keep your language going because we want to make sure that you grow your brain.

[00:18:25]>> All right. See you next time. I hope come on back. Yeah.