Context and strategy in acquiring temporal connectives

There has been considerable debate over the role of comprehension strategies in the acquisition of temporal connectives. This study examined the role of caluse logic and interpretational strategies in the acquisition of temporal words; age-related changes were also considered. Thirty-two children between 3 and 5 years of age served as subjects. Sentences with a variety of temporal words were used to tap children's comprehension of before, after, when, while, just before that, and and after that. Clause logic was found to significantly improve the understanding of these sentences. However, the order of mention and main clause first strategies were used infrequently. Apparently, when children respond to sentences that describe information in a way that is consistent with that they normally hear, these strategies are seldom applied.I wish to express my thanks to Janice Bogen, who assisted in data collection, and to Erika Hoff-Ginsberg, who assisted in some of the data analysis.