ABSTRACT
Linguists in general consider the answer to the question posed in the title of this paper to be an unqualified no. Children acquire language naturally, without any need to be taught it as we are taught geography or arithmetic. Educators, on the other hand, especially elementary school teachers, are in general, equally unanimous in declaring that parents do teach their children to talk. Parents’ responses are probably more diverse—some feel very strongly that their own role is a didactic one, whereas others feel that children don’t need much direct help from adults, that development “just happens.” Which of these answers is correct, and what explains the diversity of feeling on this topic?
