Correctness of Verb Inflections Coding Aspect and Tense

Used by Five 14 to 44-month-old Filipino Children:

An Exploratory Descriptive Longitudinal Study

Jocelyn Christina B. Marzan

Maryelle Ellaine L. Dy

Mary Seanne A. Angeles

Jessica Francesca P. Arnaldo
Ma. Bettina Clare N. Camacho
Thea Beatriz G. Cruz
Ancellie L. Espino
Johannes C. Ibardaloza
Doris Renee V. Leao
Chef Stan L. Macaraeg
Anna Christen D.L. Magbanua
Grace Camille S. Tan

Submitted to the Faculty of the

Department of Speech Pathology
College of Allied Medical Professions
University of the Philippines Manila

In partial fulfillment of the requirements

for the degree of

Bachelor of Science in
Speech Pathology

April 2014
 ACCEPTANCE PAGE

The undergraduate thesis attached hereto, entitled, Correctness of Verb Inflections

Coding Aspect and Tense Used by Five 14 to 44-month-old Filipino Children: An
Exploratory Descriptive Longitudinal Study, prepared and submitted by Mary Seanne A.
Angeles, Jessica Francesca P. Arnaldo, Ma. Bettina Clare N. Camacho, Thea Beatriz G.
Cruz, Ancellie L. Espino, Johannes C. Ibardaloza, Doris Renee V. Leao, Chef Stan L.
Macaraeg, Anna Christen D.L. Magbanua, and Grace Camille S. Tan in partial fulfilment
of the requirements for the degree of Bachelor of Science in Speech Pathology is hereby
accepted.

JOCELYN CHRISTINA B. MARZAN, PhD, CCC-SLP, CSP-PASP

Research Supervisor

Date Signed

Accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Bachelor of Science
in Speech Pathology.

JENNIFER U. SORIANO, MHPEd, CSP-PASP

Chair
Department of Speech Pathology
College of Allied Medical Professions
University of the Philippines Manila

Date Signed

TERESITA C. MENDOZA, MEd, OTRP

Dean
College of Allied Medical Professions
University of the Philippines Manila

i
 Certificate of Ethical Review

This is to certify that the research proposal for the attached study was reviewed by the
Ethical Review Committee of the College of Allied Medical Professions of the University
of the Philippines Manila and was approved for the implementation pending minor
revisions endorsed to the principal investigator and/or thesis adviser. Review of the final
research report indicates that all ethical issues were appropriately addressed.

Esmerita R. Rotor, MAEd, PTRP

Chairperson
Ethical Review Committee
College of Allied Medical Professions

Ethical issues endorsed to me by the Ethical Review Committee of the College of Allied
Medical Professions of the University of the Philippines Manila were adequately
addressed in the conduct of this study. The management of ethical concerns is effectively
reflected in the research report.

Jocelyn Christina B. Marzan, PhD, CCC-SLP, CSP-PASP

Faculty Supervisor

ii
 Statement of Intellectual Property

This is to acknowledge that the attached research report entitled Correctness of Verb
Inflections Coding Aspect and Tense Used by Five 14 to 44-month-old Filipino Children:
An Exploratory Descriptive Longitudinal Study was completed in fulfillment of the
requirement for SP 200. We are authors of the attached research report for the purposes
of developing the research and technical writing skills that the College of Allied Medical
Professions seeks to hone in its undergraduate students.

Work on this research project was supervised by a faculty adviser, and conducted
utilizing both our personal resources and university resources. In view of this, we
recognize the right of the University of the Philippines and of our faculty adviser over the
intellectual property that this research report represents. This includes but is not limited to
the right to submit for publication a research report based on the attached and/or data
gathered in the course of producing the attached, to conduct further research related to the
attached, and to present the output of this study in conferences or to disseminate findings
by any other means.

We understand that our faculty adviser and the University will endeavor to acknowledge
our contribution to this research work to the extent appropriate. In addition, if our faculty
adviser fulfilled this role in her capacity as Principal Investigator of this study, we
acknowledge that first authorship of the study belongs to her as Principal Investigator.

Should we ourselves intend to carry out further research related to this study and/or
disseminate the results of this study, we will do so only with the explicit consent of the
competent authorities within the UP Manila College of Allied Medical Professions.

____________________________ ______________________________
Mary Seanne A. Angeles Jessica Francesca P. Arnaldo

____________________________ ______________________________
Ma. Bettina Clare N. Camacho Thea Beatriz G. Cruz

____________________________ ______________________________
Ancellie L. Espino Johannes C. Ibardaloza

____________________________ ______________________________
Doris Renee V. Leao Chef Stan L. Macaraeg

____________________________ ______________________________
Anna Christen D.L. Magbanua Grace Camille S. Tan

iii
 Acknowledgements

First of all, we would like to thank God almighty for providing us with strength, and a
sense of purpose which enabled us to accomplish this study.

Also, our sincere appreciation is given to the following people, without whose significant
contributions this inquiry into human development would not have materialized.

To Professor Jocelyn Christina B. Marzan, for investing her time and effort in providing
us with invaluable resources to finish the study while at the same time creating
opportunities to maximize the experience to pass on tools we could use in our constant
effort towards self-improvement.

To Mhawi Rosero, for selflessly imparting his knowledge and expertise in Filipino
linguistics, and in so doing, greatly helped us in understanding how sophisticated and
unique the Filipino language truly is.

To Ivan Paul M. Bondoc, for being an ever accessible source of insights on the Filipino
language which greatly assisted us on expanding our knowledge about the mechanics of
the language.

To Ms. Miel, for helping us integrate the findings to better provide the study's possible
implications for the speech pathology practice.

To Mang Butch who untiringly brought the computers needed to give us access to
research videos as well as constantly assuring that our team would have a decent place to
work in.

To the Arnaldo family, most specially to their head matriarch Mrs. Milagros Arnaldo, for
lovingly and generously opening their doors and letting us use their resources for the
completion of this study

And lastly we would like to thank our families, for understanding our situation, and
constantly being there to provide us with support (be it financial or emotional) throughout
the wild swoops up and down we experienced over the course of finishing our meek,
but hopefully significant, attempt to uncover a little bit of one of the most interesting
phenomena of child development: language acquisition.

iv
 Abstract

Correctness of Verb Inflection Use Coding Aspect and Tense by Five 14 to 44-month-old
Filipino Children: An Exploratory Descriptive Longitudinal Study

JCBMarzan[1], MELDy, MSAAngeles, JFPArnaldo, MBCNCamacho, TBGCruz,

ALEspino, JCIbardolaza, DRVLeao, CSLMacaraeg, ACDLMagbanua, GCSTan
University of the Philippines Manila

RATIONALE. Of the few studies done regarding typically developing Filipino

childrens acquisition of speech-language competence, none has focused on the
childrens correct use of verb inflections. Such data is useful for understanding the
phenomenon of child language development, and hence of cognitive development in
children. It also provides a basis for assessing whether an individual child is developing
language as expected; when a childs language development is delayed, the data provides
basis for setting goals for this aspect of the early development of syntax.

OBJECTIVES. This study aimed to describe (1) the proportion of childs use of an
inflectional form consistent with form and meaning accepted for competent adult
speakers across aspects, (2) the proportion of the childs inflections present when
required across aspects, and (3) the changes in the correctness of specific inflectional
forms across ages. Patterns of error in the childrens use of verb inflections were also
described.

METHOD. Sixty-five videos with corresponding transcripts of five bilingual Filipino

children aged 14-44 months were obtained from the Filipino Early Language and Child
Development Database (FELCDD). Language samples were recorded for each child over
a span of two years with an average of two months between each recording. Verbs were
extracted using CHAT and CLAN programs of the Child Language Data Exchange
System[2]. Verb aspect, tense and the correctness of verb inflections embedding temporal
notions in the verb were analyzed.

RESULTS. The children used uninflected verbs more frequently than inflected verbs. On
the other hand, they used inflections in ways consistent with the form and meaning
accepted for competent adult speakers 95% of the time. They inappropriately omitted
required inflections only 11% of the time. They omitted required inflections more
frequently than they used inappropriate substitutes for obligatory inflections; substitution
of inflections was minimal (only 21 out of 1489 inflectional forms used). These findings
are consistent with those of Brown (1973) for English speaking children and Aljenaie
(2010) for children speaking Arabic.

CONCLUSION. Filipino children tend to use verb inflections correctly. The correctness
of verb inflections in obligatory context is somewhat lower than the correctness of those
inflections actually used. The patterns of correctness of verb inflection use among these
five Filipino children shows patterns similar to those of children in other cultures and
languages.

[1] Author can be reached at jcbmarzan@post.upm.edu.ph or jbmarzan@up.edu.ph

[2] http://childes.psy.cmu.edu/
v
Contents

Abstract ............................................................................................................................................ v
List of Figures and Tables.............................................................................................................. vii
Introduction ...................................................................................................................................... 1
Significance of the Study ............................................................................................................. 6
Objectives of the Study ............................................................................................................... 7
Scope and Delimitation ............................................................................................................... 7
Methodology .................................................................................................................................... 8
Design .......................................................................................................................................... 8
Participants.................................................................................................................................. 8
Procedure ................................................................................................................................... 10
Results............................................................................................................................................ 15
Actual Use of Inflections ........................................................................................................... 16
Use of Inflections in Obligatory Contexts ................................................................................. 18
Error Patterns ............................................................................................................................. 22
Discussion ...................................................................................................................................... 26
Correct use of verb inflections in obligatory contexts ............................................................... 26
Correctness of verb forms actually produced by the children.................................................... 27
Error Patterns ............................................................................................................................. 27
Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 30
Bibliography .................................................................................................................................. 32
Appendices..................................................................................................................................... 34

vii
 List of Figures and Tables

Tables

Table 1 Affixes used for Inflecting Verb Aspect/Tense (Marzan, 2013)

Table2 Childs age in each video 7

Table 3 Participants names, gender, languages used and 10

age range of videos taken

Figures

Figure 1 Proportion of Aspects and Tenses Coded by Each Age Group 15

Over Time

Figure 2 Percentage of Childrens Actual Use of Correct Inflection 16

Coding Aspect throughout the Corpus

Figure 3 Percentage of Childrens Actual Use of Correct Inflection 17

Coding Tense throughout the Corpus

Figure 4 Percentage of Obligatory Contexts across Aspects in which 18

Inflectional Forms were Present when Required

Figure 5 Percentage of Obligatory Contexts across Tenses in which 19

Inflectional Forms were Present when Required

Figure 6 Comparison of Percentages of Correct Use of Tagalog Verb 20

Inflections (A) in Actual Production, and (B) when Required

Figure 7 Proportion of appropriately used, omitted, and inappropriately 22

used verb inflections to code basic forms, aspects,
and tenses across ages

Figure 8 Proportion of Appropriately Produced, Omitted, 24

and Inappropriately Produced Verb Inflection to code
Basic Form, Imperfective Aspect, Contemplative Aspect,
and Perfective Aspect Across Ages

vii
 List of Appendices

Appendix A Brown's Stages of Language Development (1973) 34

Appendix B Use of combo command in CLAN during data extraction 35

Appendix C Sample Verb that Needed Additional Context from Video 36

Appendix D Sample of Unanalyzable Verb Production 37

Appendix E Acceptable Probable Production Sample 38

Appendix F Analysis of Appropriate/Inappropriate Presence 39

or Inappropriate Absence of Verb Inflections

Appendix G Sample of Obligatory Context 40

Appendix H Analysis of Aspect Coded of Verb Inflections 41

Appendix I Sample Computations for Obligatory Context (OC), 42

Actual Use (AU), Percentage of Correctness
Relative to Obligatory Context (POC),
and Percentage of Correctness Relative to Actual Use (PAU)
 Introduction

It is important for young children to develop the correct use of the grammatical

morphemes used to signal the temporal characteristics of an event (Marzan, 2013).

Languages express concepts through lexemes and grammatical morphemes. Lexemes are

the fundamental units of a language that have meaning. Lexemes are open class words

and have pre-specified phonological elements. They may undergo lexical derivation and

inflection but they will never contract or affix (Beard, ~2000). Nouns, verbs and adjective

stems are lexemes. On the other hand, grammatical morphemes are functions of language

that are expressed by using affixes and unaccented particles. There are two types of

grammatical morphemes; the derivational and the inflectional. When attached to a base,

derivational morphemes change the meanings of the base and may also change its part of

speech (e.g. will [noun] vs. willing [modifier]). On the other hand, inflectional

morphemes do not change the meaning of the word but instead, show grammatical

relationships. In addition, grammatical morphemes are required by the syntactic

environment in which a root appears (Beard, ~2000).

Verb inflections are types of inflectional morphemes. These inflections provide

verbs with grammatical signals regarding temporal characteristics, transitivity and

number. The temporal characteristics of verb inflections include tense and aspect. Tense

locates an event or activity according to its temporal relation with the moment of

speaking (Nolasco, 2011). One common tense system is past (i.e. She cooked a burger),

present (She cooks burgers), and future (She will cook burgers). (Payne, 1997). On the

other hand, aspect categorizes an event in relation to whether the activity has begun, is

1
continuing, is about to start or has recently started (personal communication OGrady,

2013).

In Filipino, aspect is inflected through combinations of affixes and reduplications

modifying a verb (Schachter and Otanes, 1983). The perfective aspect denotes when an

activity or action has finished (i.e. He ate an apple, Kumain siya ng mansanas). The

imperfective aspect denotes when an activity or action is ongoing (i.e. He is eating an

apple, Kumakain siya ng mansanas). The contemplated aspect denotes when an activity

or action has not yet begun (i.e. He will eat an apple, Kakain siya ng mansanas). The

infinitive or basic form consists of a base (an uninflected verb) and an inflection that does

not denote aspect or tense. Transitivity dictates how sentence constructions are chosen

over others by taking into account the modality of the action (Nolasco 2011).

Tagalog is described to be an agglutinating language as unchangeable affix

morphemes (i.e. inflectional morphemes) are added to a stem to form the intended words.

This results to verbs that are polysyllabic chains. Therefore, mastering the use of the

various affix morphemes would impact the acquisition of verbs in early child language

development.

As toddlers mature, they gradually learn to use inflectional morphemes correctly.

If children do not master the correct use of inflectional morphemes, what they say is often

misunderstood (Concepcion, 2010).

There has been a mistaken tendency to use data regarding the development of

inflectional forms in English as a basis for assessing Filipino childrens grammatical

mastery. Verb inflections in Filipino clearly differ from those of English. In English, only

eight inflectional affixes are used to modify verbs. English verb inflections mark tense,

2
aspect, number, and possession (Payne, 1997). Filipino has at least 24 verb inflections;

Filipino children use at least 23 of these by four years of age. In Filipino, verb inflections

principally mark aspect and transitivity.

Brown (1973) described how children acquire language by documenting

regularities in the use of grammatical morphemes by three children (Adam, Eve, and

Sarah) learning English as their first language, starting from age 2 to age 4. He

documented changes in their use of grammatical morphemes based on longitudinal

transcripts. The childrens spontaneous speech during conversation at home with their

mothers was tape recorded for at least two hours every month for five years. One member

of the team was in charge of online transcription, while the primary investigator served as

the childs playmate and tended the tape-recorder.

He proposed that stages of language development (see Appendix A) coincided

well with regularities in the childrens use of 14 grammatical morphemes.

Brown also found that grammatical morphemes were obligatory in certain

contexts (Brown, 1973). An obligatory context is a place in the sentence that requires a

specific morpheme to make the sentence grammatically correct (Paul, 2012). Linguistic

context comprises the childs own utterance and its grammatical components. For

example, a native speaker would consider the utterance She write letters

unacceptable whereas as She writes letters would be considered correct; the third

person singular pronoun renders the -s on the verb obligatory for marking number.

Non-linguistic context refers to the environmental and social conditions while the child

participates in communicative exchanges. In the childs utterance I bake cake, the

morpheme am baking became obligatory when the child used the phrase I bake cake

3
to describe the activity she was currently engaged in (i.e. baking a cake). Linguistic prior

context refers to the utterances that were produced before the childs utterances;

regardless of whether they were produced by others or the child. In the childs utterance

I play ball, the morpheme ed became obligatory as the mother said You played ball

yesterday prior to the childs utterance, indicating that the activity had already taken

place. Linguistic subsequent context refers to the utterances produced after the childs

utterance; regardless of whether they were produced by others or the child. In the childs

utterance, I dance, the morpheme d became obligatory as the mother subsequently

expanded the childs utterance saying Yes, you danced last week (Brown, 1973).

Brown (1973) found that children acquire verbal inflections gradually and slowly

rather than abruptly. He stated that:

The production-where-required of specific morphemes remains probabilistic for

certain periods of time contrary to claims of generative grammar. The early
curves of the three childrens use of grammatical morphemes showed wild swoops
up and down.

One of the few studies regarding Filipino childrens acquisition of verb inflections

is that of Marzan (2013) which described the use of verbs and verb inflections by selected

toddlers and pre-school children. The participants in her study were five girls and a boy

(Isabel, Sofia, Anna, Leila, Martha, and Elijah) with ages ranging from 1 year 2 months

to 5 years 0 months and having average overall development based on the Early

Childhood Care and Development (ECCD) checklist developed by the Council for the

Welfare of Children on 2005.

Language samples were recorded for each child over a span of two years with an

average of two months between each recording. Recording sessions were about 1-3 hours

in duration and an attempt was done to record a total of 30-45 minute of actual interaction

4
between the child and his/her family or familiar persons. Recordings were transcribed

and processed using the Child Language Data Exchange System (CHILDES) developed

by MacWhinney et al (2000), i.e. each sample was transcribed and analyzed using the

Codes for the Human Analysis of Transcripts (CHAT). Data were then extracted using

the Computerized Language Analysis (CLAN).

The entire corpus of 78 videos processed by Marzan (2013), consisted of 41.65

hours of data. All the transcripts yielded a total of 18,002 child utterances of which 85%

(15,235) were produce with apparent intent to communicate while 15% were

considered non-propositional (i.e. rote recitation or singing songs from memory, vocal

play, unintelligible productions, etc.). Their use of grammatical morphemes to modify

verb increased from less than 1% of all verb tokens per half hour at 16 months to almost

50% per half hour at 60 months (5 years of age), with the greatest used of verb inflections

being almost 80% of all verb tokens at 50 months of age.

The children coded the infinitive or basic form most frequently; followed by the

perfective, imperfective, progressive and contemplated forms in that order. The infinitive

form of the verb was mostly coded using the suffixes -an (tingnan, 149 times), and -

in (ayusin, 91 times). The contemplative form was coded 332 times in the corpus data.

Imperfective and perfective forms were coded in 187 and 364 verb tokens, respectively.

There was no apparent developmental pattern regarding the childs use of the aspect.

Progressive form -ing was used 159 times. Similar to Tagalog morphemes, use of the

aspect generally appeared at around 2 years of age and came more into use at around 26

months of age. The children used 24 different morphemes to modify a total of 1536 verbs

5
in the transcribed corpus. Marzan (2013) made no evaluation of the correctness of the

childrens verb productions, and hence recommended a study of the childrens correct use

of verb inflections.

Table 3. Affixes used for Inflecting Verb Aspect/Tense (Marzan, 2013)

verb tense/aspect
affix type
basic contemplated imperfective perfective past progressive
1 syllable syllable
reduplication reduplication
reduplication
2 word
reduplication
3 i- i- in- i-
4 ma- ma- ka-
5 mag- mag-
6 magka-
7 maka- maka-
8 mang-
9 na- na-
prefixes 10 nag- nag-
11 nagka-
12 naka- naka-
13 nang- nang-
14 ni-* ni-*
15 pa- pa- pa-
16 paki-
17 pag- pa-
18 -in- -in- -um-
infixes
19 -um- -um-
20 -in -in -an
21 -an -an -an -in
suffixes
22 -ed -ing
23 irregular

Significance of the Study

Few studies have been conducted to describe the acquisition of speech-language

competence in typically developing Filipino children (Marzan, 2008). Data regarding

Filipino childrens correctness of verb inflectional use would expand the foundational

data regarding childrens language acquisition in the Philippine context. Such data is also

6
useful for understanding the phenomenon of child language development in general, and

hence of cognitive development in children. It also provides a basis for assessing whether

an individual child is developing language as expected; when a childs language

development is delayed, the data provides basis for setting goals for this aspect of the

early development of syntax. This data also serves to stimulate future studies regarding

Filipino childrens use of verb inflections.

Objectives of the Study

The study had the following objectives:

1) to describe the proportion of childrens use of inflectional forms consistent with

form and meaning accepted for competent adult speakers across aspects;

2) to describe the proportion of the childrens inflections that were present when

required (in contrast to those that were absent when required) across aspects; and

lastly,

3) to describe changes in the correctness of specific inflectional forms across ages.

The study also described the pattern of errors across aspects.

Scope and Delimitation

This study takes up the recommendation that the correctness of the verb

inflections used by the children in Marzan (2013) be analyzed. We elected to analyze

only the verb inflections of the 5 children with data from the time inflectional morphemes

first emerged. Hence, data from one child (Anna) was excluded, as sampling of her

language began at 2 years 5 months of age when many verb inflections were already in

use.

7
 Methodology

Design

This is an exploratory descriptive longitudinal study which aimed to describe use

of verb inflections in the spoken language of five typically-developing bilingual Filipino

children aged 14 to 44 months.

Participants

This study used secondary data collected from the Filipino Early Language Child

Development Database (FELCDD) developed by Marzan (2013). The data contained 65

longitudinal videos (with corresponding transcripts) of children collected during normal

daily interactions. All videos were recorded with two-month intervals between samples

over a span of two years. Videos were not allowed to be reproduced and were viewed

using only three to five computers in a secure environment in order to protect the

confidentiality of the children and their families.

The participants of the study were five typically-developing Filipino children (one

male and four female children) aged 14 to 44 months. All children were from middle

income families living in Metro Manila. These children were all bilingual, using both

Tagalog and English. Based on parent report, Tagalog was the primary language of three

out of five children, while the remaining two used primarily English.

8
 Table 1.Childs age in each video
Child Elijah Isabel Leila Martha Sofia
Date of Birth 15-Aug-08 17-Jan-08 5-Feb-08 1-Jul-07 29-May-07
Number of transcripts 10 9 10 10 12
Actual age Actual age Actual age Actual age Actual age
Age group (months)
(y:mm.dd) (y:mm.dd) (y:mm.dd) (y:mm.dd) (y:mm.dd)
14 1:02:02 1;2.22
16 1:04:12 1:04:12 1:03:23 1;4.3
18 1:06.06 1:06.24 1:06.05 1:05.23 1;6.3
20 1:08.09 1:07.26 1:07.21 1:07.23 1;7.28
22 1:09.27 1:09.16 1:09.23 1:09.25 1;9.23
24 2:00.00 2:00.00 2:00.09 2:00.10
26 2:02.05 2:02.09 2:02.14 2:01.20 2;2.13
28 2:04.08 2:03.27 2:04.06 2:04.01 2;4.17
30 2:06.12 2:05.30 2:05.24 2:06.17 2;6.5
32 2:08.01 2:08.09 2:07.21 2:07.30 2;8.4
34 2:10.03 2:10.12 2:09.19 2:08.22 2;9.25
36 2:11.28 2:11.26 3:00.04 3;0.4
38 3:02:01 3:01:08 3;1.17
40 3:03:25
42 3:06:04
44

Table 2. Participants names, gender, languages used and age range of videos taken
Date of Mothers Fathers Language
Child Sex
Birth Occupation Occupation Environment
Elijah 15-Aug-08 Male Research Assistant *Tagalog,
Associate Professor English
Leila 17-Jan-08 Female HR Assistant Medical *Tagalog,
Representative English
Isabel 05-Feb-08 Female Lawyer; Operates Executive *English,
a Manning Officer in a Tagalog,
Company University
Sofia 01-Jul-07 Female Pediatrician Surgeon *English,
Tagalog
Martha 29-May-07 Female Librarian Electrical *Tagalog,
Engineer English
(*) indicates the childs primary language

9
Procedure

Transcription: The data for this study was extracted using the Child Language Data

Exchange System (CHILDES). The CHILDES is an international database organized for

the study of first and second language acquisition (MacWhinney, 2000). It has three

components, two of which were utilized in this study Computerized Language Analysis

(CLAN) and Codes for Human Analysis of Transcripts (CHAT).

Transcripts included initial morphosyntatctic analysis (e.g. word class, verb

aspect) indicated on a dependent tier (marked %mor) for each of the childs utterances

using the following CHAT protocol:

211 *CHI: kinain na niya [%act: claps] .

212 %mor: v|kain&in&PERF ptl|na pro|niya .
213 *MOT: nakuha ba niya ?
214 *MOT: nasa ilalim ng spoon e.

Data Extraction: Verbs were extracted and analyzed by the researchers. All ten

researchers are native speakers of Tagalog. Native speakers of a language are persons

who have spoken that language since birth (Saniei, 2011). The researchers were grouped

into 5 pairs for data extraction and analysis.

In preparation for data extraction, the researchers attended a workshop regarding

the use of CHAT and CLAN facilitated by an experienced CLAN user. CLAN was used

to analyze CHAT-formatted transcripts by running specific commands. The combo

command was used to extract the childs utterances containing verbs. Sample use of the

combo command may be seen in Appendix B.

10
Data Organization: The researchers organized the data using the table below:

Line Childs Verb Acceptable form of probable

Remarks
Number Production Produced target verb

50 Binubusan binuksan binuksan

[: binubuksan]

122 Tapos sabi nila sabi Sabi

150 O tago mo tago Tago

Data Analysis: Inter-rater Reliability for the acceptable probable verb production was

also developed prior to data analysis. Five pairs of researchers each analyzed a common

training transcript (ann30213). After extracting and organizing the data using the

aforementioned table, each pair proceeded to identify the acceptable form of probable

target verb by analyzing the linguistic and non-linguistic contexts of the verb annotated in

the transcript. In cases where the acceptable form of verb could not be determined based

on information from the transcript alone, the pertinent segment of the relevant videos

were viewed to analyse additional contexts that were not annotated in the transcript but

served to clarify the childs intended message. A sample can be found in Appendix C.

If both members of the pair agreed that the verbs probable form could not be

identified even after having watched the video segment where verb was used, the verb

was considered unanalyzable. A sample can be found in Appendix D.

If after identifying more than one possible target verb, the pair did not reach an

agreement regarding the more probable target, the opinion of a third researcher was

sought. After all five pairs had finished analyzing the training transcript, answers were

11
compared across pairs. Inter-rater agreement on a verb was considered to exist if all five

pairs provided the same acceptable form for the target verb. If at least one group differed,

inter-rater agreement for that verb was not considered to exist and all possible answers

were recorded and discussed. After repeating this process using two separate videos, the

five teams achieved inter-rater agreement on 92.6% of all verbs in a transcript. To further

increase reliability, the videos of any one child were distributed equally among the five

pairs of researchers. .

The acceptable probable verb production, correctness of verb inflections used and

aspect coded were determined using the researchers intuition. A native speakers

intuition is his capability to make a judgment on the correctness of grammatical structure

in his language instinctively (Chomsky, 1965). When the judgment of a native speaker

did not suffice to allow judgment of grammaticality, Schachter and Otanes (1972) was

used as a supplemental reference. The acceptable probable target verb production refers

to the inflected [or non-inflected] form of the verb that would make the sentence

grammatically correct. A sample may be seen in Appendix E.

Verb inflections used were classified as Appropriately Present (AP),

Inappropriately Present (IP), and Inappropriately Absent (IA) based on linguistic and

non-linguistic context. An inflectional form was considered AP if the child was able to

use the verb correctly. An inflectional form was considered IP if it was used when not

needed. While an inflectional form was considered IA if it was absent when it fact it was

required. Respective aspects and tenses of each verb were also determined. Exemplars

that were analysed as AP, IP and IA can be found in Appendix F.

12
 Percentages of correctness of verb inflections relative to Obligatory Context

(POC) and Actual Use (PAU) were then obtained. An obligatory context is a place in the

sentence that requires a specific morpheme to make the sentence grammatically correct

(Paul, 2012). It comprises the grammatical components of the childs utterance, non-

linguistic context, linguistic prior context, and linguistic subsequent context (Brown,

1973). (Refer to Appendix G for a sample of obligatory contexts). The number of

obligatory contexts (OC) per inflectional form was calculated as the sum of the number

of instances when that inflectional form was appropriately present and inappropriately

absent.

( ) ( )
( )

On the other hand, the total number of actual uses of an inflectional form (AU)

was calculated as the sum of the number of instances when that inflectional form was

appropriately present and inappropriately absent.

( ) ( )
( )

The Percentage of Correctness relative to Actual Use (PAU) refers to the

proportion of the childs use of an inflectional form that were consistent with form and

meaning accepted for competent adult speakers. This was calculated using the formula:

( )
( )

( )

13
 The Percentage of Correctness relative to Obligatory Context (POC) refers to the

proportion of the childs inflections that were present when required (in contrast to

those that were absent when required). This was calculated using the formula:

( )
( )

( )

Refer to Appendix I for sample computations.

14
 Results

The corpus from our 65 video samples contained a total of 3377 verb tokens. Of

these, 1059 were inflected while 2318 were coded in base form (uninflected roots or

stems). A total of 1331 verb inflections were used, or an average of 1.26 for every

inflected verb.

The proportion of inflected verbs and uninflected verbs produced by the children

can be seen in Figure 1. Uninflected verbs occurred more frequently than inflected verbs

all throughout the corpus. While the childrens use of verb inflections increased over

time, the use of uninflected verbs remained more frequent than the inflected. The

proportion of inflected verbs began to match that of uninflected verbs at 30 months.

100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
Age Groups (Months)
Base Basic Contemplated
Imperfective Perfective Past
Present Progressive Future

Figure 1.Proportion of aspects and tenses coded by each age group across time

15
Actual Use of Inflections

The children began using verb inflections as early as 16 months when inflections

coding past tense (-ed) first emerged; by 32 months, inflections coding all other verb

aspects and verb tenses were in use by the children. Across ages, the most frequently

coded inflected form was the basic (or infinitive) form. In coding this form the most

frequently used inflection was an (e.g. tingnan), which occurred in 91 of all 259

inflections used by the children to construct the infinitive.

1
Percentage of Acutal Use of Correct Inflections

0.9
0.8
0.7
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
Age Groups (Months)

Perfective Imperfective Contemplative Infinitive

Figure 2.Percentage of childrens actual use of correct inflection coding aspect throughout
the corpus

Whenever the children actually did use verb inflections to code verb aspect, their

use was consistent with the form and meaning accepted for competent adult speakers

almost all of the time. This trend was seen across all verb aspects. In 95% of the total

number of instances, the children used verb inflections appropriately (1261 out of

16
1331 instances). There were only 70 instances in which children used verb inflections

inappropriately.

The childrens actual use of inflections coding the infinitive and contemplative

aspects was correct in 90 to 100% of all instances. Verb inflections coding imperfective

and perfective aspect were not as consistently correct when used; only 75% to 100% of

the instances produced by the children were correct.

100%
Percentage of Actual Use of Correct Inflections

90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
Age Groups (Months)

Progressive Present Past

Figure 3.Percentage of childrens actual use of correct inflection coding tense

throughout the corpus

When the children used inflections in English to code past tense or present tense,

their use was also correct 100% of the time except at 36 months when one of the children

used inflection -s/es (for present tense) inappropriately in one instance (It comes from

my crackers which should have been It came from my crackers); the remaining 13

exemplars were correctly used.

17
Use of Inflections in Obligatory Contexts

Percentage of Obligatory Contexts 100%

90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
Age Groups (Months)

Perfective Imperfective Contemplative Basic Form

Figure 4.Percentage of Obligatory Contexts across Aspects in which Inflectional

Forms were Present when Required

In general, the children gradually improved in their use of inflections in

obligatory contexts over time. They correctly used inflections in fewer than 50% of

required contexts at 16 -18 months. In the succeeding months, the children appeared to

gradually develop correct use of required inflections, achieving correct use in 50-80% of

required contexts at approximately 30 months of age. At 44 months, the children used

inflections for all aspects correctly in approximately 70 to 100% of all required contexts.

18
 1

Percentage of Obligatory Contexts

0.9
0.8
0.7
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
Age Groups (Months)

Progressive Present Past

Figure 5.Percentage of Obligatory Contexts across Tenses in which Inflectional Forms were
Present when Required

Fluctuating patterns were noted across English verb tenses. The drastic decrease

of childrens correct use of verb inflections in terms of obligatory context may have been

caused by the limited number of obligatory contexts present. For example, at 20 months,

the total number of obligatory contexts was only three. In two out of the three instances,

the children did not use an inflectional form when needed in the context.

19
 Figure 6. Comparison of proportions of correct use of Tagalog verb inflections
(A) in actual production, and (B) when required
(1) BASIC Form - Percentage of Actual Use in Comparison to Obligatory Context
1 1
basic_i 0.9 0.9
basic_mag- 0.8 0.8
0.7 0.7
basic_magka-
0.6 0.6
basic_maka-
0.5 0.5
basic_pa- 0.4 0.4
basic_paki- 0.3 0.3
0.2 0.2
basic_in
0.1 0.1
basic_um 0 0
basic_in 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
Age Groups (Months) Age Groups (Months)

A B
(2)CONTEMPLATIVE Aspect - Percentage of Actual Use in Comparison to Obligatory Context
contemplated_SR 1 1
contemplated_WR 0.9 0.9
contemplated_i 0.8 0.8
0.7 0.7
contemplated_ma
0.6 0.6
contemplated_mag
0.5 0.5
contemplated_maka 0.4 0.4
contemplated_mang 0.3 0.3
contemplated_pa 0.2 0.2
contemplated_pag 0.1 0.1
0 0
contemplated_in
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
contemplated_an Age Groups (Months) Age Groups (Months)

20
(3)IMPERFECTIVE Aspect - Percentage of Actual Use in Comparison to Obligatory Context

imperfective_SR 1 1
imperfective_WR 0.9 0.9
imperfective_in- 0.8 0.8
imperfective_na 0.7 0.7
0.6 0.6
imperfective_nag
0.5 0.5
imperfective_naka 0.4 0.4
imperfective_nang 0.3 0.3
imperfective_ni 0.2 0.2
0.1 0.1
imperfective_-in-
0 0
imperfective_pa
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
imperfective_um
Age Groups (Months) Age Groups (Months)
imperfective_an

A B
(4)PERFECTIVE Aspect - Percentage of Actual Use in Comparison to Obligatory Context

perfective_WR 1 1
perfective_na 0.9 0.9
perfective_nag 0.8 0.8
perfective_nagka 0.7
0.7
perfective_naka 0.6
0.6
perfective_pa 0.5
0.5
perfective_um 0.4
0.4
perfective_an 0.3
0.3
perfective_in 0.2
0.2
perfective_ni 0.1
0.1
perfective_in 0
0
perfective_WR 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
perfective_ka Age Groups (Months)
Age Groups (Months)
perfective_nang
A B

21
 Both the Percentage of correctness relative to Actual Use (PAU) and Percentage

of correctness relative to Obligatory Context (POC) of all specific inflectional forms

appear to show fluctuating patterns. The proportion of verb inflections produced and used

correctly by the children (i.e. PAU) appeared consistently higher than the proportion of

obligatory contexts in which they produced the correct verb (i.e. POC). Although the

POC for Tagalog increased as the children grow older, it remained somewhat inconsistent

throughout the study. This pattern can be seen more clearly in the description below of

the childrens verb inflection error patterns. Note, however, that a pattern for English

inflections could not be explicitly determined as there were few exemplars noted across

all videos.

Error Patterns

100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44

Appropriate Use Substitutions Omissions

Figure 7: Proportion of appropriately used, omitted and inappropriately used

verb inflections to code basic forms, aspects, and tenses across ages

22
 Omission is producing an uninflected form when required to use an inflection to

code infinitive, aspect or tense. On the other hand, substitution is the use of an

inflectional form in the place of the specific form required in by the context (i.e. using an

inflectional form appropriate to the imperfective aspect when the correct verb form would

be the perfective).The children used inflections appropriately in 975 out of 1051 inflected

verbs (92%). Substitution errors were minimal (21 out of 1489 inflectional forms or

1.4%). The children omitted inflections in 29% of the obligatory contexts in the corpus

(or 438 out of the 1489 inflectional forms required by linguistic or nonlinguistic context).

Most omission errors occurred during the early ages (16-26 months) while substitution

errors occurred during the older ages (40-44 months).

23
 Figure 8. Proportion of appropriately produced, omitted, and inappropriately produced verb inflection to
code basic form, imperfective aspect, contemplated aspect, and perfective aspect across ages

Imperfective Aspect Basic Form

100%
100%
90%
80% 80%
70%
60% 60%
50%
40%
40%
30% 20%
20%
10% 0%
0% 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 Age Groups (Months)
Age Groups (Months)

Contemplated Aspect Perfective Aspect

100% 100%
90%
80% 80%
70%
60% 60%
50%
40% 40%
30%
20% 20%
10%
0%
0%
14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42 44
Age Groups (Months) Age Groups (Months)

% of Appropriate Uses % of substitution % of Omission

24
 As shown in Figure 8, children generally used verb inflections correctly most of

the time across all verb aspects. The children tended to omit than to substitute most of the

time when they were younger. Their omission decreased as the children aged, gradually

reaching 0% at 44 months of age. The childrens substitution errors on the other hand

increased as the children matured.

The children had less difficulty in coding the basic form than any of the other

aspects. On the other hand, they committed the most omission errors (108 out of 218

instances) and substitution errors when coding the imperfective aspect.

25
 Discussion

Correct use of verb inflections in obligatory contexts

Correctness of use of verb inflections when required (in contrast to those

that were absent when required) gradually increases from less than 50% to almost

100%. These findings agree with Browns (1973) study. He stated that even

though there is some variation between children, all of children improve in their

use of inflectional morphemes over time. Brown (1973) stated that the number of

obligatory context is generally smaller in the earlier samples than the later

samples based on the syntactic competence of the child and the demands from the

environment (e.g. parents); our data was consistent with this observation. This

suggests that, as children mature, they develop syntactical competence which

allows them to recognize the need to use specific inflections as the context

requires.

This possible implication is further supported by Penke (2012) in her

study about the acquisition of verb inflections in German1. She proposed three

stages in the acquisition of an inflectional marker. During the first stage, children

have little awareness of verb inflections and merely produce them based on the

way they were produced by an adult speaker. During the second stage, even

though children can already identify verb inflections and use them productively to

build new verb forms, as long as the child does not recognize the obligatory

context, the child does not produce the inflections required. The last stage is when

1
German, like Tagalog, is also agglutinating

26
the child both identifies the inflection and supplies it to its obligatory context with

90% accuracy.

Correctness of verb forms actually produced by the children

Whenever children actually did use verb inflections to code aspect, their

use was consistent with the form and meaning accepted for competent adult

speakers for about 95% of the time. This finding complements that of Aljenaie

(2010), who described three childrens use of imperfective and perfective verbal

inflections in the acquisition of the Kuwaiti Arabic2 language when these children

were 1year 8months to 3years 1 month of age. The children in her study used

verbal inflections correctly 89-97% of the time.

Error Patterns

Across all ages, children committed omission errors (25%) more

frequently than substitution errors (2%). This is consistent with the findings of

Omar (1973; as cited by Aljenaie, 2010) who investigated the use of verb

inflections in Egyptian Arabic which, like Tagalog, is an agglutinating language.

He found that omission errors appeared to be more frequent than substitution

errors. Wexler and Rice (1996) also concluded that when children made errors

with these tense morphemes, they tend to omit them rather than change the form.

Wexler and Rice (1996) theorized that typically-developing children undergo a

stage during which they tend to optionally use an uninflected form in place of a

fully inflected one.

2
Kuwaiti Arabic, like German and Tagalog, is also agglutinative.

27
 Our study found that as the children matured, correctness of verb

inflection use continually increased while errors decreased. Yet omission errors

slowly decreased as substitution errors increased. This may be because as children

inflect more verbs, thus decreasing instances of omission, the probability of

supplying inappropriate inflections increases.

Despite the diversity of the languages used by all the children in this study

and that of the other studies mentioned - some agglutinating (i.e. Tagalog,

German and Kuwaiti Arabic), and some that are non-agglutinating such as

English in general, similar patterns of verb inflection use across time were

found. Once the children inflect the verbs, it appears they do so correctly almost

all the time. Error patterns were also similar. During the early stages of

development, most errors are of omission errors and only few are of substitution.

This appears to support that similar patterns of language development are present

in children across languages and across cultures.

The findings gathered in this study add to the current foundational data

documenting the speech and language competence of Filipino children. These

findings may be used as foundation for future norms for typically developing

Filipino children and hence a basis for evaluating the verb inflection skills of

children from similar language backgrounds. This data might be of use to speech

pathologists as it would provide basis for speech and language evaluation and

intervention. The findings may also provide relevant data to the Department of

Education as they develop curricula for the Mother Tongue Based Multilingual

28
Education (MTB-MLE), as basis for prioritizing aspects or inflections to be taught

in school.

29
 Conclusion

Our overall findings suggest that there is a perceived pattern of language

development in children across languages and across cultures. Patterns detected for this

study are consistent with patterns seen in children who speak other languages (e.g.

Kuwaiti Arabic, German, English).This tells us that there may be a possible universal

trend in the acquisition of verb inflections.

Correctness of use of verb inflections when required (in contrast to those that

were absent when required) gradually increased from less than 50% to almost 100%. This

suggests that, as children mature, they develop syntactic competence which allows them

to recognize the need to use specific inflections as the context requires.

Whenever children actually did use verb inflections to code aspect, their use was

consistent with the form and meaning accepted for competent adult speakers about 95%

of the time.

The children in our study committed omission errors (25%) more frequently than

substitution errors (2%). Omission errors slowly decreased as substitution errors

increased. This may imply that as the child develops syntactic competency, an increase in

occurrence of use of inflections occurs. This decrease in omissions, however, increases

the probability of supplying inappropriate inflections.

This data adds to the current foundational data documenting the speech and

language competence of Filipino children. It may be used as tentative norms for typically

developing Filipino children and basis for evaluating the verb inflection skills of children

from similar language backgrounds. This data might be of some use to speech

30
pathologists and to the Department of Education as they develop curricula for the Mother

Tongue Based Multilingual Education (MTB-MLE), as a basis for prioritizing aspects or

inflections to be taught.

Our study evaluated correctness but not mastery of use, which is defined by

Brown (1973) as correct use in obligatory contexts across consecutive longitudinal

samples. We therefore recommend the study of syntactic competence of children older

than 44 months to possibly determine the age of mastery of verb inflections across

different verb aspects.

We also suggest the study of correctness of use of verb inflections to signal

transitivity and voice among Filipino children. A study exploring the correctness of

childrens use of other grammatical morphemes such as articles, pronouns, or clitics is

also suggested. These will provide further knowledge on Filipino childrens syntactic

competence and lead to a firmer basis for describing and evaluating acquisition and

development of the Filipino childs speech and language competence.

31
Bibliography

Aljenaie, K. (2010). Verbal inflection in the acquisition of Kuwaiti-Arabic.

Journal of Child Language, 841-863.

Beard, R (~2000). Lexeme-Morpheme Base Morphology (LMBM) accessed at

http://www.facstaff.bucknell.edu/RBEARD/homepage.html#lexmorph on
April 6, 2014

Chomsky, N. (2005, Winter). Three factors in language design. Linguistic

Inquiry, 36(1).Retrieved from
http://www.biolinguistics.uqam.ca/Chomsky_05.pdf

Concepcion, C.C. (2010). The impact of inflectional awareness on the fast

mapping of novel in Filipino, English, and Chavacano by 46 -81-month-
old Filipino English and Chavacano-English-speaking children. Paper
presented at the 1st Philippine Conference-Workshop on Mother Tongue-
Based Multilingual Education February 18, 19, and 20, 2010, Capitol
University, Cagayan de Oro City, Philippines.

Marzan, J. (2007). The Bilingual Language Learning Environment in the

Philippines: An Exploratory Study Utilizing a Focus Group Discussion.
Quezon City: (Unpublished manuscript).

Marzan, J. (2013). Spoken Language Patterns of Selected Filipino Toddlers and

Preschool Children. Quezon City: (Unpublished Doctoral Dissertation).

MacWhinney, B. (2000). The CHILDES Project: Tools for Analyzing Talk. 3rd
Edition. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Retrieved April 6,
2014 from http://childes.psy.cmu.edu/manuals.

Nagelhout, E. (2007, January 15). Module 1 Concepts: Inflectional Morpheme.

University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Retrieved April 6, 2014from
https://faculty.unlv.edu/nagelhout/ENG411Bs12C/mod1concept2.html.

Nolasco, RM (2010) Grammar notes on the national language. Manuscript, Dept.

of Linguistics, University of the Philippines Diliman.

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OGrady, W. (2013, April 7). Email interview.

Paul, R. (2001). Language Disorders from Infancy through Adolescence:

Assessment and Intervention (2nd ed.). St. Louis: Mosby-Year Book1.

Payne, T. (1997). Describing Morphosyntax. United Kingdom: Cambridge

University Press.

Penke, M. (2012, May). The Acquisition of Inflectional Morphology. Germany:

University of Cologne.

Rice, Mabel L., and Kenneth Wexler (1996). Toward tense as a clinical marker
of Specific Language Impairment in English-speaking children. Journal of
Speech and Hearing Research. 39:1239-1257.

Saniei, A. (2011). Who Is An Ideal Native Speaker?!. International Proceedings

of Economics Development and Research (IPEDR), 26, 74-78.

Schachter, P. & Otanes, F. (1983). Tagalog Reference Grammar. Los Angeles,

California: University of California Press.

33
 Appendices
APPENDIX A

Brown's Stages of Language Development (1973)

Brown's Age in Mean MLUm Morphological

Stage months MLUm range Structure
Stage I 15-30 1.75 1.5-2.0 Stage I sentence types
(1) Present progressive
Stage II 28-36 2.25 2.0-2.5
(-ing endings on verbs)
(2) in
(3) on
(4) -s plurals
(regular plurals)
Stage III 36-42 2.75 2.5-3.0 (5) Irregular past tense
(6) -s possessives
(7) Uncontractible copula
(the full form of the verb 'to be'
when it is the only verb in a
sentence)
Stage IV 40-46 3.50 3.0-3.7 (8) Articles
(9) Regular past tense (-ed endings
on verbs)
(10) Third person regular present
tense
Stage V 42-52+ 4.00 3.7-4.5 (11) Third person irregular
(12) Uncontractible auxiliary (the
full form of the verb 'to be' when it
is an auxiliary verb in a sentence)
(13) Contractible copula
(the shortened form of the verb 'to
be' when it is the only verb in a
sentence)
(14) Contractible auxiliary
(the shortened form of the verb 'to
be' when it is an auxiliary verb in a
sentence)

34
 APPENDIX B

Use of combo command in CLAN during data extraction

35
 APPENDIX C

Sample verb that needed additional context from video

*Verb being analyzed was suklay. Given the transcript, it was hard to determine
whether the child was pertaining to an object or an action without viewing the relevant
video to evaluate non-linguistic context.

36
 APPENDIX D

Sample of Unanalyzable Verb Production

Line Childs Verb Acceptable form of

Remarks
Number Production Produced probable target verb

Verb might be
mixing or
890 mis [: mix] mix UNANALYZABLE
magmimix or
imimix

37
 APPENDIX E

Acceptable Probable Production Sample

Line Childs Verb Acceptable form of probable

Remarks
Number Production Produced target verb

736 kami ni daddy jack Nag-kain Kumain

tapos si mommy
nag-kain

38
 APPENDIX F

Analysis of Appropriate/Inappropriate Presence or Inappropriate Absence

of Verb Inflections

(1) Appropriately Present (AP) Verb Inflection Analysis

Acceptable Basic
Verb
Probable
Produced ma_ _in _an
Production

Buksan buksan AP

Patayin patayin AP

(2) Inappropriately Present (IP) Verb Inflection Analysis

Acceptable Contemplated
Verb
Probable
Produced mag_ pa_ pag_
Production

magbibili bibili IP

magpasalamin magsasalamin IP

(3) Inappropriately Absent (IA) Verb Inflection Analysis

Acceptable Imperfective
Verb
Probable Syllable
Produced mag_ pa_
Production repetition

umikot umiikot IA

laro maglalaro IA IA

39
 APPENDIX G

Sample of Obligatory Context

Line Childs Verb Acceptable form of probable

Remarks
Number Production Produced target verb

602 Ito higop higop Hihigupin

40
 APPENDIX H

Analysis of Aspect Coded of Verb Inflections

Acceptable
Verb Change in
Probable Aspect Coded Correct Aspect
Produced Aspect
Production

fixing fixing Progressive Progressive none

Uninflected to
huli hulihin Uninflected Infinitive
Infinitive

41
 APPENDIX I

Sample Computations for Obligatory Context (OC), Actual Use (AU), Percentage of
correctness relative to Obligatory Context (POC), and Percentage of correctness
relative to Actual Use (PAU)

(1) Sample computation of Obligatory Context (OC)

Appropriate present (AP) + Inappropriately absent (IA) = Obligatory context (OC)

For example, the table below shows the OC of the verb mag_.

Appropriately present Inappropriately absent Obligatory context

2 2 4

(2) Sample computation of Actual Use (AU)

Appropriately present (AU) + Inappropriate present (IP) = Actual use

For example, the table below summarizes the tally for the inflection _in_

Appropriately present Inappropriately present Actual use

3 5 8

(3) Sample computation of Percentage of Correctness relative to Obligatory Context

(POC)

Appropriate present (AP) x 100= Percentage of correctness relative to obligatory context (POC)
Obligatory Context (OC)

For example, the table below shows the POC of the verb mag_.

Appropriately Obligatory Percentage of Correctness relative to

present Context obligatory context

2 4 50%

42
(4) Sample computation of Percentage of Correctness relative to Actual Use (PAU)

Appropriate present (AP) x 100= Percentage of correctness relative to actual use

(PAU)
Actual use (AU)

For example, the table below shows the PAU of the verb inflection _in_.

Appropriately present Actual use Percentage of Correctness relative to actual use

3 8 37.5%

43