Relative clauses in French children's narrative texts

This study investigates the use of relative clauses in French children's na rrative monologues. Narrative texts were collected from French-speaking mon olinguals in four age groups (five, seven, ten years and adults). Twenty su bjects from each group were asked to tell a story based on a picture book c onsisting of twenty-four images without text (Frog, Where are you). Relativ e constructions were coded following the categories defined by Dasinger & T oupin (1994) into two main functional classes: general discourse and narrat ive functions. The results show that the use of relative clauses in general discourse functions precedes their use in more specific narrative function s. An analysis of textual connectivity (Berman & Slobin, 1994) in one episo de reveals that children and adults differ in their choice of preferred str uctures. The results also show that children use fewer transitive predicate s in relative clauses than do adults. Transitive verbs are essential for ad vancing the narrative plot (Hopper & Thompson, 1980). While subject relativ e clauses are acquired early and used frequently, the development of their multifunctional use in diverse narrative functions extends well beyond chil dhood.