TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER

PAGE

STUDENT PROFILE..........................................................................................................2

TASK 1 - ESSAY WRITING

Essay Language of human and Animal.................................................................4

TASK 2 READING ALOUD AND COMMENT

Recording tape/VCD...............................................................................................8

comment.................................................................................................................9

REFFERENCE.................................................................................................................12

APPENDICES..................................................................................................................13

MY PROFILE

NAMA: YIZHAR EFENDY GIMIK

UMUR: 22 tahun
JANTINA: LELAKI
KURSUS: PISMP AMBILAN JANUARI 2012
PENGKHUSUSAN: MATEMATIK (sk)
BANGSA: DUSUN RANAU
TARIKH LAHIR : 26 SEPTEMBER 1992
NO. TEL: 014-861-4395

ALAMAT RUMAH: KG. BONGKUD, P.O.BOX 181, 89308 RANAU, SABAH.

MATLAMAT: Mengantarabangsakan Pendidikan di Malaysia Baharulah Menjadi

Task 1:
-Essay Writing-

ESSAY WRITING

LANGUAGE OF HUMAN AND ANIMAL

By: Yizhar Efendy Gimik
PISMP Matematik Jan 2012

Language is the most important aspect in the life of all beings. All of us use language to express
inner thoughts and emotions, make sense of complex and abstract thought, to learn to communicate with
others, to fulfill our wants and needs, as well as to establish rules and maintain our culture. Language can
be defined as verbal, physical, biologically innate, and a basic form of communication. Ormrod,1995
define language as a learned behaviour involving a stimulus and a response . Often times they will refer to
language as verbal behaviour, which is language that includes gestures and body movements as well as
spoken word. (Pierce & Eplin,1999)
Do you know that animal also have their own language? Yes they have it. It is just different from
human language. Most researchers has used the terms animal communication and human language,
which suggests from the outset of researching this question a previously established difference between
species modes of communicative interaction. This essay intends to discuss whether our forms of
communications are actually all that different from those of other animals. The main difference between
the above definitions seems to be regarding the use in language of speech and conventional symbols,
which surely, under different guises, is necessary for the exchanges in any communication.
Like human beings animals also communicate with one another through their communication
systems which are called animal languages such as language of dolphins, and language of bees. Animals
have both discrete and non-discrete systems of communication but their messages as well as symbols
are limited in quantity and dimension. On the other hand, human languages are much more surprisingly
unlimited. In 1960, Hockett identified thirteen design features of language, which were refined by Aitchison
in 1983 to ten. Aitchison specified that four criteria were particular to the human species which is
displacement, semanticist, structure dependence and creativity. These four criteria, in summary, indicate
that humans are capable of talking about things, people and instances, true or false, outside of the hereand-now spatial and temporal environment by using a formalized, abstract set of words, symbols and
4

intonations each of which can have many different meanings when used within different contexts and
between different individuals.
The communication syst ems of most animals are instinctive. They inherit them genetically.
None can separate animals from their inbuilt qualities. On the contrary, human language is non-instinctive.
Human can acquire and learn anything and any language as a result of social interaction. For example, a
baby and a puppy are growing up in the same environment hearing mostly the same thing. But about two
years later the baby will make human noises while the puppy will not. In addition, Mowgli in the Jungle
Book grew up in the animal environment and his communication systems became like animals. In the
other side, all animal cannot be thought to speak or understand other language except for apes. As our
closest relations, a lot of research into animal language has been using apes.

But still apes have very

weak reputation to learn other language. One of the more noted of these studies was conducted by
Savage-Rumbaugh who taught a Bonobo chimpanzee, Kanzi, to use a form of sign language. SavageRumbaugh [1998] claimed that Kanzis language skills using a 256-symbol keyboard were equivalent to
those of a two and a

half year old childs, but as the chimp grew older, his linguistic abilities did not

increase significantly, whereas a human childs linguistic ability grows rapidly after this age. This evidence
suggests that there is a limit to how much a primate can acquire or develop language, partially restricted
by cognitive capacities and partially by anatomical make-up. Areas of the brain such as Brocas, which
seem to have evolved in humans as language areas, in other species the corresponding areas control
actions such as arm and non-verbal mouth movements and the vocal tracts of humans and apes also
differ, affecting the sounds that apes are capable of making (Cooper and Kaye, 2002).
Because of its having arbitrariness, human language is conditioned by geography that is its culture,
social and natural environment. The linguistic sign of the same object may differ from one geographical
region to another. For example, what is called by the English to be dog is called perro by the Spanish,
sobaka by the Russian and inee by the Japanese. On the other hand animal communication is not
conditioned by geography. For instance, the dogs of all countries have the same system of messages and
symbols.
Animal communication is devoid of novelty, creativity and multiplicity to produce apt utterances
according to different situations. Most animals have limited number of messages or symbols they can
send or receive. While human language possesses the qualities. A human being can even in a most
unlikely situation utter a sentence which has never been said before and if can still be understood. Human
language is also extendable and modifiable. The symbol or linguistic sign used in a language a hundred
5

years ago may be extended, changed and even may not be used any more. But animal communication is
opposite to this. For example, the bees and the monkeys use even now-a-days the same communication
system which they used, say, five thousand years ago. Humans produce sounds by the organs of speech,
a rare gift of nature. No other species except apes and monkeys have been endowed with this gift.
So human languages complexity does seem to be the distinguishing factor between human and
non-human animals. It is the facilitatory element by which we came to develop the more obvious
distinguishing features such as, for example, our contemporary global infrastructures. By this token,
language has made human animals very distinct from non-human animals. However it is worth bearing
mind that the precursor to this distinguisher was and is in fact perhaps routed not in the cognitive
capacities of our species, but in the anatomical speech restrictions, as selected or not for through the
course of evolution, of other species and therefore it is not just language that is the crux of this distinction.
The difference may not be in fact to great if taken proportionally. Our availability of things to communicate
with one another about is far greater than that of other animal species. If amount of communication
material available to different species were measured against their communicative levels and all results
standardized, perhaps the actual distinction between human and non-human animals would be less
apparently extreme.

(1075 words)

Task 2:
Reading aloud
and
comment
6

My recording:

Comment:
We evaluated our partners recording essay using a reading rubrics as follows:

EXPRESSION
AND VOLUME

PHRASING :
Reads in
meaningful
chunks or
phrases

Reads in a
quiet voice as
if to get words
out. The
reading does
not sound
natural like
talking to a
friend.

Reads in a
quiet voice.
The reading
sounds natural
in part of the
text, but the
reader does
not always
sound like they
are talking to a
friend.

Reads with
volume and
expression.
However,
sometimes the
reader slips into
expressionless
reading and does
not sound like
they are talking to
a friend.

Reads with varied

volume and
expression.

Reads wordby-word with

frequent
pauses
between
words in a
monotone
voice.

Reads in two
or three word
phrases, not
adhering to
punctuation,
stress and
intonation.

Reads with a
mixture of runons, mid sentence
pauses for breath,
and some
choppiness.
There is
reasonable stress
and intonation.

Reads in larger
meaningful
prhasing with few
word by word
slowdowns for
problem solving;

Phrases and
perhaps 3 and
9

The reader
sounds like they
are talking to a
friend with their
voice matching
the interpretation
of the passage.

4 word
phrases
PAUSING :

Very little
awareness of
punctuation

Some of
awareness
punctuation
and of layout
print

Attention to
punctuation and
layout of print on
the page

Full attention to
punctuation and
layout of print on
the page

Very little
emphasis on
appropriate
words

Some
awareness of
emphasis on
appropriate
words to reflect
the meaning of
the text

Attention to
emphasis on
appropriate words
to reflect the
meaning of the
text

Full attention to
emphasis on all
the appropriate
words to reflect
the meaning of
the text

SMOOTHNESS

Frequently
hesitates
while reading,
sounds out
words, and
repeats words
or phrases.
The reader
makes
multiple
attempts to
read the same
passage.

Reads with
extended
pauses or
hesitations.
The reader has
many rough
spots.

Reads with
occasional breaks
in rhythm. The
reader has
difficulty with
specific words
and/or sentence
structures.

Reads smoothly
with some
breaks, but selfcorrects with
difficult words
and/ or sentence
structures.

PACE :

Reads slowly
and
laboriously.

Reads
moderately
slowly.

Reads fast and

slow throughout
reading.

Very little
variation of
rate

Some variation
of rate to text

Attention to an
appropriate rate to
suit the text

Reads at a
conversational
pace throughout
the reading.

Reflect
punctuation

STRESS :
Places emphasis
on appropriate
words

Reads smoothly
at appropriate rate

10

Full attention to
an appropriate
rate to suit the
text

My essay recording was evaluated by Lisa Ng.

Her comments and overview about my essay can be viewed on the next page.

11

References
Aitchison, J. [1983] The Articulate Mammal, (2nd edn) Oxford, Blackwell.

Cooper, T. and Kaye, H. [2002] Language and meaning in Challenging Psychological Issues, [Cooper, T.
and Roth, I., eds] The Open University, The Bath Press.

Davies, R., [1997] Kinship and social behaviour- signalling systems in non-human animals in Cardwell,
M., Clark, L. and Meldrum, C., [eds] Psychology for A-level, HarperCollins, London.

12

Hockett, C. F. [1960] The origin of speech, Scientific American, vol.203, pp.89-96

McLeod, W.T., [ed] [1991] The New Collins Dictionary, HarperCollins.

Pearce, J., M. [1987] An Introduction to Animal Cognition, Hove, Lawrence Elbaum Associates Ltd.

Pinker S. [1994] The Language Instinct, London , Penguin.

Premack D. [1971] Language in Chimpanzees? Science, vol.172, pp808-22.

Savage-Rumbaugh, E. S. and Lewin, R. [1994] Kanzi: The Ape at the Brink of the Human Mind, London,
Doubleday.

Savage-Rumbaugh, E. S. and Shanker, S. G. and Taylor T. J. [1998] Apes, Language and the Human
Mind, Oxford, Oxford University Press.
Von-Frisch, K., [1950]

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Appendices

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