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course the danger that the grammarian is carried away by his inventiveness. Bolinger has not always escaped that danger. This has been shown by reviewers of other books by him (see Huddleston, 1975, & Johansson, 1975). This weakness also affects the volume under review. I have picked out some twenty sentences at various places in the book and submitted them to three native speakers (one of whom from the U.S.A.). By way of example, the following four sentences are OK according to Bolinger but wrong according to my informants: ‘Do you want that one either?’ (28), ‘There were spirited away quite a number of very valuable jewels.’ (103), ‘You are deceived to think that.’ (143‘) and ‘That looks like an ice-plant, isn’t it (154). Conversely, of the following three sentences, Bolinger has queried the first two and starred the third; my informants regard all three as OK: ‘It’s too hard to read - there’s no lamp anywhere around here.’ (55), ‘It was unnecessary of Mary to say that.’ (138) and ‘Do stay two hours.’ (193).

In conclusion, this is an interesting book which should be read with some caution.

Department of English University of Lund Helgonabacken 14 S-223 62 Lund Sweden

Lars Hermeren

REFERENCES

BORKIN, Ann, ‘To be and not to be’, Papers from the Ninth Regional Meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society, April 13-15, 1973, Chicago, 1973, pp. 44-56. HUDDLESTON, Rodney, Review of Degree Words by Dwight Bolinger, The Hague: Mouton, 1972, (Janua linguarum, series maior, 53) and That’s That by Dwight Bolinger, The Hague: Mouton, 1972, (Janua linguarum, series minor, 155), Journal of Linguistics, 11, 1975, pp. 316-9. JOHNANSSON, Stig, Review of The Phrasal Verb in English by Dwight Bolinger, Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1971, Linguistics, 152, 1975, pp. 78-90. SCHIBSBYE, Knud, A Modern English Grammar, London: Oxford University Press, 1970,2nd ed.

COURTMAN-DAVIES, Mary, Your Deaf Child’s Speech and Language. London: The Bodley Head Ltd, 1979,319 pp. f7.50 Net In U.K. only

Parents of handicapped children often feel profoundly grieved and resentful. Some, especially mothers, feel deep guilt over ‘not even being able to make a baby properly’. Mary Courtman-Davies urges parents not to be ashamed of such feelings: they are perfectly natural. In fact, grief openly acknowledged is far better than an attempt to deny the extent of the child’s disability. The important thing is to face reality. That is what puts parents on the road to finding help.

Help for parents of hearing-impaired children abounds in this book. In Chapter 1 parents learn what can be expected of a normal child during the early months and years, and what there is in a hearing child’s experience that gives him his start on language development. By the age of five, a hearing child has had approximately 5,000 hours of practice in listening to

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speech. Courtman-Davies immediately shows what this fact should mean to parents of a deaf child. ‘Instead of receiving less, as he often does, the hearing-impaired child must receive more listening hours.’ (18) Parents must speak to him throughout his waking hours, staying close by so he can pick up all the sound he can . Moreover, talking to the child must not be treated as a boring task. What the child needs is to see animated faces, and to be rewarded by love and enthusiasm for his efforts to understand. This is crucial because - in the great majority of cases - the hearing-impaired child has a perfectly normal brain (sometimes even a superior one) and any normal brain is capable of organising into meaningful patterns the messages it receives from the outside world. That puts the matter squarely up to the parents, who must somehow arrange for messages to reach the brain of their hearing-impaired child.

Because, somehow, sounds must be made to reach the child’s brain, the hearing loss must be detected early, and the child should be fitted with the right hearing aid with ,a11 possible speed.

Chapter 2 explains certain effects of hearing loss upon the child’s mental development: retarded growth of imagination, slower acquisition of vocabulary and genera1 knowledge, slower maturation of judgement and social skills. The hearing-impaired child’s social immaturity may become embarrassing when, having at last acquired some speech, he has still to learn when not to express his thoughts. This point, like many throughout the book, is illuminated by a Courtman-Davies story:

Eight-year-old Eliza, who had little spoken language but was learning fast, seemed, once she had acquired words, to say whatever came into her head. Luckily, her family was broad-minded, but even they were embarrassed when she announced loudly at tea-time in the presence of an elderly aunt, ‘I can see Aunt Jane’s pink knickers.’ . . . . (25)

In Chapter 3 there is a sympathetic discussion of the effects of hearing loss upon the child’s family - parents, siblings, grandparents. Parents who feel ‘furious and resentful at the burdens placed upon them’ are reminded that ‘many parents of normal children have also wished on occasion that they had remained childless - indeed that they had never married, even never been born themselves!’ (36).

Human touches like these keep the reader going through some of the less easy-to-read passages (e.g., Chapter 4, Diagnosis and Audiometry, and Chapter 6, which describes the articulation of the speech sounds). Pages dealing with technical aspects of speech therapy are relatively few, and some parents will find them helpful in interpreting what therapists and other specialists tell them, since the Courtman-Davies explanations are phrased as simply as possible.

Repeatedly the author warns parents they must also serve as teachers, and the teaching will involve hard work. What will make it easier for many parents is the very detailed, specific and sensible advice provided here. Chapter 9 is called How to work with a hearing-impaired child, but in one way or another all the other chapters also tell how to go about it.

In the nineteen chapters and the six appendices, one can find lists of words needing to be taught first (starting with nouns, and going on to action words, descriptive words and other parts of a sentence); there are clear descriptions of games for vocabulary learning, and

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ways to use pictures and stories; there are useful lists showing sources of such materials, for younger children and older ones as well. For the author does not limit her suggestions to the first stages of language learning; she stresses the need for parents to move the child on beyond the rudiments of speech, and describes ways to help the child master grammatical structures which are difficult because the child cannot hear the relational words involved (the prepositions, conjunctions, pronouns, auxiliaries, etc. - all of which are usually spoken softly and fast in normal conversation).

By this point in the review, readers who are teaching English as a Foreign (or Second) Language will already have perceived how useful this book can be to them. It is, in fact, a treasure-trove of ideas and information for EFL teachers, especially those working with young pupils. Here are just a few of the author’s suggestions which are as applicable to EFL teaching as to the teaching of the hearing-impaired:

- When the child uses gestures to compensate for lack of words, teach him the words he needs;

- Use natural (not exaggerated) lip-movements;

- Having said something to the child, keep still whilst he is trying to absorb what you have said;

- Constantly watch for opportunities to introduce new words and sentences. Don’t keep on indefinitely with the same ones just because they seem easier;

- When the child has said a word (e.g., ‘Duck’) repeat his word in a shorf sentence (‘Throw bread to the duck’ or ‘The duck can swim.‘)

- For vocabulary teaching, buy a large file with hard back, metal rings, loose leaves and reinforcers. Gradually fill it with pictures of things familiar to the child. Have him place a coloured counter on each picture he can name.

- Use a separate section of the vocabulary picture book for each category (one for garden words, one for things in a bedroom . . .) to help develop awareness of generalisations and bases of definitions like ‘A tiger is an animal . . .’

- When working with a (published) picture book, use only a few pages at a time, and fasten the remaining pages together with a bull-dog clip; otherwise the child will look ahead and grow visually tired of the picture’s before you can use them for teaching.

- When teaching action verbs, act them out. Engage another adult in dramatic play to act out social situations and descriptive words like angry, sad, surprised.

- Introduce games slowly; let an interval elapse before a new game is introduced. Stop a game before the child tires of it.

- Train the child to ‘perform courtesies’ like saying Thank you, I’m sorry. (Like the hearing-impaired child, the child with limited English often has to be ‘nicer than most people’ in this unfair world!)

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- Make every effort to motivate the learner, yes; but don’t lead him to expect that all learning can be pleasant and interesting. Firm discipline will sometimes be necessary, and kinder than indulgence in the long run.

In addition to points useful to remember in any language-learning context, there are many of particular significance to parents of the hearing-impaired. Here are a few to show the range:

- As with the hearing baby, play games likepat-a-cake, waving goodbye, and peep-bo (peek-a-boo to American readers. *)

- When involving the young child in play with hearing children, arrange for outdoor play (e.g., a trip to a park) not requiring verbal interaction.

- Don’t rush to send your hearing-impaired child to nursery school. Better keep him at home, for constant interaction with Mummy - except perhaps for 2-hour periods three times a week.

- Help the very young child form pleasant associations with his hearing aid. For instance, have him wear it while sitting on Daddy’s lap, looking at pictures.

- Expose the child to all kinds of noises: outdoor, indoor, housecleaning, etc.

- When told by school authorities that the child is ‘doing well, ask: ‘Just how well? How far is he behind normal children of his age?’

- Even though his language development will lag behing that of others in his age group, don’t let him behave younger than he should. (He should learn to dress himself, play independently, not interrupt adults.)

- Don’t unnecessarily involve the child in situations where tantrums are likely to occur (e.g., long shopping trips where goods on display must not be touched).

- When tantrums do occur, don’t touch the child unless the behaviour is so violent as to require restraint. Sit quietly near him until the storm subsides. (As the child’s communication improves, frustrations will be relieved without tantrums.)

- Provide the most loving care you can manage, but don’t sacrifice the corporate life of your family whilst caring for your handicapped child.

Beyond such wise admonitions, Courtman-Davies gives parents useful information about the pros and cons of lip-reading and of having the hearing-impaired child attend school in the mainstream with the others of his age. The book is carefully indexed, and about thirty other texts are listed for parents who want to read further on their own.

*American readers will be interested to find the following items included in the list of 400 Basic Nouns: duver, fridge, hedgehog, ladybird, loo, lorry, mat, plaster, pram, roundabout, sellotape, smartie, and -of course-tap. The Verb list, however, will look quite familiar to American readers.

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Most readers would wonder why they should read beyond these pages. It is gratifying to find a ‘how-to’ book that conveys so readably the information derived from long experience. Mrs. Courtman-Davies, a Fellow of the College of Speech Therapists, writes from experience extending over some thirty years; she has run a clinic for children with speech and language disorders for the past fifteen years. But she is a parent, too, with a warm understanding of parents’ feelings, problems, limitations and needs. Her book has much to say to parents of deaf children - and to many other readers as well.

350 Ponca Place Boulder, CO 80303 USA

Virginia French Allen

MOSKOWITZ, Gertrude, Caring and Sharing in the Foreign Language Class. A Sourcebook on Humanistic Techniques. Rowley, Mass.: Newbury House Publishers, 1978, 343 pp.

Although a great deal may have been said by FL teaching methodologists in favour of a humanistically, learner-centered pedagogy, the truth of the matter is that a book such as the present one has long been needed so as to make hitherto predominantly theoretical explorations be systematically translated into techniques for classroom interaction. Practicality is, in fact, the main virtue of this extremely useful book, designed according to Moskowitz ‘for teachers of any foreign or second language’ (41) who would like to ‘weave humanistic strategies into their already existing curricular materials’ (1).

To turn now to a description of CSFLC’s organization: in a truly humanistic fashion, the author uses 2-page Acknowledgments to tell readers how much support and constructive feedback she had from colleagues in the fields of FL teaching and psychology. Moskowitz thanks ‘the people whose ideas for humanistic exercises have been used or adapted for use’ and clarifies that accordingly, names of contributors are identified ‘where the exercises appear’ (v).

There follows a very detailed &page Table of Contents which will help the user of this book’s technique repertoire to immediately locate what he/she needs. The 4-page Introduction expresses Moskowitz’ philosophy of foreign language education - ‘Now is the time . . . for FL teachers to foster also the study and growth of the human race’ (1) - and describes the book’s 15year-old multiple origins. We learn, for example, that ‘the exercises often evolved from course work in group dynamics, from people I’ve had contact with, . . . from ideas tried out in teacher-training classes. . . .’ (2) We are also told that ‘all the techniques included in this book have been tested in the classroom’ (3), a fact tha’. while not necessarily assuring successguaranteed oryour humanistic investment back is certainly positive enough to encourage potential users to try out many of the ideas while at the same time integrating insights resulting from personal classroom experience.

It is then time for the reader to take a humanistic journey through 5 chapters, 8 Appendices, a 2-part Bibliography and an Author and Subject Index. A very pleasant trip because of the