REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 02 (2022), pp. 163-182 DOI: 10.18326/rgt.v15i2.163-182 p-ISSN: 1979-8903; e-ISSN: 2503-040X 163 Thematic Contents of Preschool-Aged Children’s Utterances as Media to Shape Their Understanding of the World Titik Sudartinah* Universitas Negeri Yogyakarta, Indonesia *) Corresponding Author Email: titiksudartinah@uny.ac.id DOI: 10.18326/rgt.v15i2.163-182 Submission Track: Received: 07-03-2022 Final Revision: 12-10-20222 Available Online: 01-12-2022 Copyright © 2022 Authors This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Abstract Language ability develops greatly during preschool age. Triggered by the high curiosity that goes hand in hand with the exposures to others around them, preschool-aged children show great efforts in creating a collection of vocabulary to help them learn and use language in real contexts. This research aims to identify the thematic contents of preschool-aged children’s utterances and explain the categories of these thematic contents to shape their understanding of the surrounding world. To answer these objectives, both qualitative and quantitative data were used. The qualitative data were the utterances of preschool-aged children when participating in conversations, while the quantitative data were the frequency of occurrence of each thematic content, which is used to support the qualitative interpretation. The data were collected during classroom sessions in two preschools in Yogyakarta, Indonesia for a one-week period. The participants were 29 preschool-aged children, whose age ranges from 3 to 5. Audiovisual recordings, field notes, datasheets, and ELAN 5.5. and FLEx 8 software were the instruments for data collection and analysis. The results show that there are two main thematic contents expressed by these preschool-aged children, i.e., objects and people. These thematic contents can be detailed into 9 categories of objects and 4 categories of people. These support the overall interpretation revealing the picture of the world as perceived by the children. In general, through the thematic contents of their utterances, preschool-aged children try to build a complete understanding of the world they live in and these thematic contents also serve as the media for understanding the stance of their peers and teachers in a conversation. Keywords: preschool-aged children; thematic contents; utterances mailto:titiksudartinah@uny.ac.id http://dx.doi.org/10.18326/rgt.v14i1.25-42 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ T. Sudartinah 164 REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) INTRODUCTION Preschool age is marked with some vast development in terms of language ability. The discussion on preschool-aged children, especially regarding their language ability, has been of increasing attention especially among those in psychology, early childhood education, and linguistics. In psychology, some studies of preschool-aged children’s language focus on preschool-aged children’s language skills and behavior problems (Davis & Qi, 2020; Goldstein & Naglieri, 2011; Martins et al., 2016), how emotion affects preschool-aged children’s language (Alcock, 2016; Martins et al., 2016) and the relationship between preschool-aged children’s socio- cultural backgrounds with their language skills (Becker et al., 2013; Dolores et al., 2013; Kontopodis et al., 2011). Meanwhile, the discipline of early childhood education mainly investigates the educational aspects of preschool-aged children’s language, such as how to deal with preschool-aged children in classroom settings (Dalgren, 2017; Geary & Berch, 2016; Hornby, 2011; McCabe et al., 2000) and how the curriculum accommodates preschool-aged children’s language development (Dickinson & Porche, 2011; Dwyer & Harbaugh, 2018; Justice et al., 2011). In linguistics, the discussions are quite more various, from language development in general (Becker et al., 2013; Fiano, 2014), to the structural and pragmatic aspects of the development (Carmiol & Vinden, 2013; D. K. Oller et al., 2013; Sorsana et al., 2013; Wasik & Iannone-Campbell, 2013). In terms of their language ability, preschool-aged children start to develop a higher ability in producing utterances, using syntactically more complex constructions and moving closer to that of adults. Some previous studies found that preschool-aged children master up to 1,000 vocabulary items and use around 12,000 words per day (Arnett & Maynard, 2013; Davies, 2011; Owens, 2012). These vocabularies are largely acquired through their verbal interactions with people in their environment, including families, caregivers, and peers. These interactions are sources of whatever the children need to learn, as they provide opportunities for them to recognize, internalize, store, and use the words they hear. Nevertheless, in learning the words, preschool-aged children also learn how to correctly use them according to the grammar of the language they are exposed to (Davis-Kean et al., 2016; Tabors et al., 2001; Weisleder & Fernald, 2014). Participating in such interactions, preschool-aged children start to use specific registers and adapt their Thematic Contents of Preschool-Aged Children’s Utterances … REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) 165 voice and intonation according to the role they played in the interactions. This discursive ability is clearly represented in their utterances. For instance, 3-year-old preschool-aged children are good at imitating adults’ heavy tones during pretend plays with peers (Ervin-Tripp et al., 2005; Stude, 2014), and 4-year-olds start to have the ability to negotiate roles in pretend plays and differentiate imaginary things from the real ones (Stude, 2014). In order to provide a comprehensive picture of preschool-aged children’s language, an investigation on Mean Length of Utterance (MLU) is seen to be more accurate than using age alone as a variable (Behrens, 2009; Foster-Cohen, 2009; Kupisch et al., 2009; McDaniel, 1996). By doing this, researchers can reveal the complexity of preschool-aged children’s language, especially in terms of the vocabularies and grammatical structures of their utterances. Parker & Brorson (2005), for instance, compared Mean Length of Utterance in Morphemes (MLUm) and Mean Length of Utterance in Words (MLUw) and found that MLUw is simpler and easier, yet it yields the same effectiveness in providing a picture of preschool- aged children’s language. In addition, MLUw can be applied to a wider range of languages due to the many differences regarding the concept of morphemes in different languages in the world (Kupisch et al., 2009). Meanwhile, calculating the MLU of preschool-aged children’s utterances is not the only way to map their language ability. Some researchers prefer to investigate the richness of preschool-aged children’s vocabulary, with emphasis on the elements composing their utterances, such as the lexical content, the subject and predicate, and the themes discussed in an interaction. O’Neill et al. (2009) and Ifantidou (2014) mention that the variety of themes brought by preschool-aged children in their utterances is a clue to their pragmatic competence. Themes change dynamically in preschool-aged children’s conversations, enabling relatively short turn-takings and unfinished exchanges of information, representing the here-and-now concept. Therefore, in order to become an active participant in a conversation, preschool-aged children need to actively take turns. However, this task involves a complex communication skill, which requires their sensitivity such as knowing when it is possible for them to take turns and what to do when they get their turns. In fact, children, in general, cannot acquire these communication skills by themselves. They need some exposures from which they can learn about the skills from their surroundings, either from parents and other family members, caregivers, T. Sudartinah 166 REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) other adults (such as teachers in nurseries, daycare centers, and kindergartens) or peers. These people provide some scaffolding for the children through examples in given contexts. As mentioned by Bryant (2009) and Santrock (2011), families, peers, and schools are important for a child’s all-aspect development. They build what Bruner (1983) referred to as Language Acquisition Support System (LASS). Each element in this support system goes hand in hand in creating opportunities for children to learn about the language and how to use it. Family is the first and main environment where children learn all about their life and the life of others. Meanwhile, when children began to get along with people out of their families, school environment is important to acknowledge. In Indonesia, early childhood education institutions are playing more important roles nowadays. More parents put their preschool-aged children under the care of teachers in preschools and kindergartens. As a consequence, there are more opportunities for preschool-aged children to interact with people other than their families, i.e. with both peers and teachers, and therefore, there are more chances that preschool-aged children develop their communication skills in the school environment. Sammons (2010) acknowledges that being involved in preschool interactions is beneficial for preschool-aged children as they can develop their intellectual as well as their social skills and behavior. Especially for those who do not get sufficient exposures from their main environment at home, preschools surely become the medium from which preschool-aged children can learn about being social and gain new experiences and linguistic exposures. In the context of preschool-aged children in Indonesia, some studies of preschool-aged children’s language in preschool settings were already conducted, such as by Iswatiningsih (2016), Prihantoro (2014), Siddiq (2019), and Sukartiningsih (2010). These studies were on the acquisition of Bahasa Indonesia as preschool-aged children’s first language and the structural and pragmatic dimensions of the acquisition. Although they discuss the structural aspects of the acquisition, the discussion was mainly on the syntactic structure of preschool-aged children’s utterances. The thematic contents of the utterances have not gained much attention. Nevertheless, this is an important aspect to discuss within the study of preschool-aged children’s language as it is believed that how they build their understanding of the surrounding world can be seen through the way they employ Thematic Contents of Preschool-Aged Children’s Utterances … REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) 167 lexicons and build themes. With regards to this, this research aims to highlight the thematic contents of preschool-aged children’s utterances in Bahasa Indonesia and the preschool-aged children’s world as represented through the thematic contents of their utterances. RESEARCH METHOD As the research was mixed-method, both qualitative and quantitative data were used. Preschool-aged children’s utterances, when conversing with their peers and teachers, served as the data source. 29 preschool-aged children, ranging from 3 to 5 years old, and 5 teachers from 2 preschools in Yogyakarta, Indonesia became the participants. The instruments were audio-visual recordings and transcripts of the conversations between preschool-aged children and their peers and teachers, fieldnotes, datasheets, and ELAN 5.5. and FieldWorks Language Explorer (FLEx) 8 software, which were employed for data transcription and identification of lexicons’ frequency. Prior to data collection, a pre-research activity of observation was conducted in several preschools in Yogyakarta to determine the research setting. Two preschools were finally selected as the setting due to the fulfilment of some criteria, such as high opportunities of verbal interactions between preschool-aged children and their peers and teachers, the availability of various playthings and learning resources that can be accessed and used by the preschool-aged children, and a smaller number of preschool-aged children under the supervision of a teacher. As this research involved preschool-aged children, in order to fulfill the research ethics, informed consent was distributed to parents prior to any participation of the preschool-aged children in the research, and only the initial of the children’s first names were disclosed. The data were collected by recording the conversations between preschool- aged children and their peers and teachers during classroom sessions. The recordings were done for an hour a day for a week (six days) period, resulting in 11 hours 27 minutes duration of the recording. The next step was transcribing the utterances using ELAN 5.5. When the transcription was completed, the preschool- aged children’s utterances were identified, resulting in 4,198 utterances, and examined using FLEx 8 in order to identify the lexicons that reveal the thematic content of their utterances. T. Sudartinah 168 REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) RESULTS & DISCUSSION The results show that there are 2 main themes shown in the preschool- aged children’s utterances, i.e. objects and people. Objects become the main thematic content delivered by preschool-aged children. Seventy five percent of the thematic contents were about objects, which occur 437 times. Meanwhile, the theme of people is the next thematic content, with 147 occurrences (25%). There are 9 categories of objects and 4 categories of people that are discussed by preschool-aged children, as presented in Table 1. Table 1 shows that preschool-aged children mainly talk about objects when conversing with their peers and teachers in the classroom setting. The discussions on objects are meant to enrich the preschool-aged children’s vocabularies and enhance their understanding of the elements existing in their surrounding world, shown by the nouns representing things around these preschool-aged children. Besides objects, preschool-aged children complete their picture of the world by discussing people – both real people in their life and imaginary characters from movies or stories, and the places where they do their activities. All these thematic contents provide a complete description of the world as understood by the preschool-aged children. Tabel 1. The Thematic Contents of Preschool-Aged Children’s Utterances No Thematic Contents Frequency 1. Objects a. Things around at the moment of speaking 83 b. Food and drink 77 c. Parts of body and accessories 77 d. Houses/buildings/public places 61 e. Abstract concepts/ideas 43 f. Animals 42 g. Nature 25 h. Vehicles 16 i. Occupations/social status 13 Total 437 2. People a. Interlocutors (peers and teachers) 72 b. Family 39 c. Others 30 d. Self-speakers 6 Total 147 Total Sub-themes 584 Thematic Contents of Preschool-Aged Children’s Utterances … REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) 169 As language develops with age, compared with younger children, preschool-aged children are faced with more complex communicative situations. They sometimes need to participate in multi-participant conversations, which of course requires sophisticated communication skills. In order to participate in such conversations, it is necessary to actively take turns and monitor their understanding of what their interlocutors say. In general, preschool-aged children with more advanced communication skills during interactions with a peer are more likable to befriend. The same kind of acceptance by peers also occurs to ones with rich vocabularies (Owens, 2012). Social cognitive ability, therefore, is one of the earliest important abilities that children need to acquire. Preschool age is a period during which lexicons and conceptual meanings are greatly developed by children (Owens, 2012). This implicitly signals the possibility of a high variety of thematic contents discussed in conversations, in which they become participants. However, some studies found that these thematic contents are still closely related to the principle of here-and-now, as in earlier age. As mentioned by Dardjowidjojo (2000) and Ninio (2014), topics in conversations with preschool-aged children are relatively fast-changing, with things familiar to them becoming the main ones to discuss. Due to the dynamic changes in topics, identifying the thematic contents in conversations with preschool-aged children as participants is a complex task. Marvin (1996) and Ifantidou (2011) suggest that the genres or themes discussed by preschool-aged children can be identified by investigating the referents related to time, people, objects, activities, and ideas that are presented in preschool-aged children’s utterances. Therefore, the semantic content of the preschool-aged children’s utterances can be revealed. As mentioned by Simms (2008) and Rowland (2014), nouns and pronouns are clearly the word classes that can resemble the contents of preschool-aged children’s utterances. Thus, in the present study, the identification of thematic contents is based on the investigation of nouns and pronouns in the utterances of 29 preschool-aged children that become the participants in the research, resulting in objects and people as the main thematic contents of their utterances. T. Sudartinah 170 REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) Objects as the main thematic content of preschool-aged children’s utterances Various objects are discussed in preschool-aged children’s utterances, which are discussed 437 times, which accounts for 74.8%. When discussing objects, preschool-aged children mostly talk about familiar things located at the same place at the moment of speaking. There are 9 categories of objects that are discussed: 1) things around, 2) food and drinks, 3) parts of body and accessories, 4) houses/buildings, 5) abstract concepts/ideas, 6) animals, 7) nature, 8) vehicles, and 9) occupation/social status. Table 2 presents some examples of how these thematic contents are presented in preschool-aged children’s utterances. Table 2 shows the categories of objects discussed by preschool-aged children. The main objects to discuss are things that are around them and familiar to them, comprising technology-related items, household things, valuables, stationery, playthings, and unspecific things in a near location which are usually referred to using demonstrative pronouns. In addition, preschool-aged children already have some awareness regarding valuables such as money and gold. Although these nouns only exist in the context of pretend play, it is clear that preschool-aged children have developed a certain level of understanding that some things have more value than others and can be used to buy other things. Table 2. The thematic content of objects in preschool-aged children’s utterances No Object Category Examples 1 Things around at the moment of speaking Technology-related items, household things, valuables, stationery, playthings, unspecific things in a near location 2 Food and drinks Spices, vegetables, fruits, drinks, fast food, cakes, and cooking activities 3 Parts of body and accessories Parts of body, jewelry, outfit, cosmetics/medicine 4 Houses / buildings / places Parts of a house, public places, commercial places 5 Abstract concepts / ideas Temporal concepts, colors, possession, faith 6 Animals Real animals, animals in fantasy/stories, animals in rituals 7 Nature Plants, sky objects, natural phenomena, geographical location 8 Vehicles Kinds of vehicles, parts of vehicles 9 Occupation/social status Kinds of occupation, social status Thematic Contents of Preschool-Aged Children’s Utterances … REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) 171 Meanwhile, although all utterances in the research data are produced in a classroom context, there are not many discussions on stationery and other writing utensils. The same case also occurs when the preschool-aged children are in the playground. There are not many play things that become parts of the discussion. Instead, the preschool-aged children talk about the activity they do with their peers there. This finding implies that preschool-aged children tend to have an interest to discuss the detail of their actions rather than discussing the tools they use to do the activities. It is interesting to note that when discussing the activities, demonstrative pronouns are often used to point to objects that are not familiar to preschool-aged children, either because they do not know the name of the objects or because they have not seen them yet, to point to familiar-but-forgotten objects, and to point to several objects without specifying any of them. The next category of object discussed in conversations involving preschool-aged children as participants is food and drinks. When talking about food and drinks, all aspects in this regard are discussed, from the raw ingredients for making food and drinks, the activities of cooking, to the ready- to-eat one. The preschool-aged children talk about them by describing their appearance, characteristics, taste, what to do with them, benefits of consuming them, and just sharing their experience regarding the food and drink discussed. Comparing the two preschools that become the research setting, it is seen that the discussion about food and drinks occurs only in one preschool, but not in the other. This is due to the difference in classroom arrangement between the two schools. One of the preschools divides its classrooms based on the functions of the rooms, such as Preparation, Role-play, and Nature. The discussions on food and drinks occur in the Role-play room, where the room is set like rooms at home: a living room, kitchen, bathroom, etc. Although when role-playing preschool-aged children have the freedom to talk about anything they like, as the activity and playthings are set exactly like in a real home, the discussion is usually around home activities, such as eating behaviors in the dining room. The availability of thematic playthings in each classroom serves as a means that teachers can use to scaffold their students’ activities in the class. T. Sudartinah 172 REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) Meanwhile, other objects discussed by preschool-aged children in their interactions with peers and teachers are houses, buildings, and places, which can be detailed into parts of a house, public places, and commercial places. When discussing their houses, preschool-aged children tend to use the common noun rumah ‘house’ and other rooms such as tempat bikin roti ‘a place for baking cakes’ or ‘kitchen’ and meja makan ‘dining table.’ In addition, there are also some other buildings to discuss, such as penjara ‘jail’ and kuburan ‘cemetery,’ which are found in the context of pretend plays, masjid ‘mosque,’ and minimarket, as a location where one of the preschool-aged children bought his food. Besides discussing real objects, preschool-aged children also develop their ability to regard abstract objects or ideas. This thematic content is discussed more frequently than that of animals. Several abstract concepts are discussed by preschool-aged children in the two preschools: temporal concepts, colors, possession, and concepts related to faith and rituals. In terms of temporal concepts, preschool-aged children have developed their understanding of day (name of days and 24-hours duration as a day) and time during the day (morning, noon, and evening). In addition, they also understand the differences among colors, although they are still confused about differentiating color gradation. In relation to possession, preschool- aged children understand that some Indonesian suffixes signal possession, such as the suffix -ku ‘my’, -mu ‘your’, and -nya ‘his/her/its’. Meanwhile, preschool-aged children also develop their understanding of faith and other religious/cultural rituals through the learning processes. When teachers explain a topic about nature, for instance, they can provide scaffolding to their students by asking them to answer questions about things that God has created and some religious values about this. Through such scaffolding, preschool-aged children are encouraged to explore and share their experiences with their peers. Therefore, the knowledge becomes shared knowledge. To understand these abstract concepts/ideas, preschool-aged children need to show stronger efforts compared to that understanding concrete objects as their memory is still developing and has not been at its maximum capacity. Besides, processing abstract concepts and their Thematic Contents of Preschool-Aged Children’s Utterances … REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) 173 representations are much more complicated than understanding concrete objects that can be seen and touched (Schneider, 2015; Viau et al., 2010). The next object to discuss by preschool-aged children in their interactions with peers and teachers is animals. Three categories of animals are discussed: 1) sea, land, and air animals, 2) animals in fantasy/stories, and 3) animals in rituals. When talking about animals, preschool-aged children mostly talk about animals that are familiar to them and often seen in daily life, such as fish and cows. However, the discussion of fantasy animals, such as dinosaurs and dragons, is also present, as these toy animals are available in the classroom or brought by the preschool-aged children from home. Discussing them, preschool-aged children compare and share their understanding regarding the physical appearance and characters of these animals as what they saw in movies or read in stories. The last category is animals that are related to a ritual, whether it is a religious ritual or a cultural one. For instance, when sharing about their experience attending the Eid-al- Adha celebration, these preschool-aged children also discuss the common sacrificial animals in the celebration, such as cows and camels. In addition, there are also some discussions on objects that are related to nature, such as plants, celestial bodies, natural phenomena, and geographical conditions. Plants that become a sub-theme in the speech of preschool-aged children are plants that are around them, either at home or at school or in other places they have visited, as well as those related to their playing activities. For example, when asked to describe the situation around her house, B told her friends about the guava tree in her house, and while playing, she said that the dinosaurs' diet was grass. Meanwhile, the sub-theme about celestial bodies appeared in the conversations of preschool-aged children when they were learning about God's creation. Another example was produced by L when she saw M carrying a pair of binoculars. Because she has experience and knowledge about the object, she can tell the function of the object. In addition, there are 2 natural phenomena that are also told in the stories of preschool-aged children, namely earthquakes and rain. The earthquake was told by A as part of God's creation, which at that time became the theme of the lesson. A received exposure to this earthquake from TV, as T. Sudartinah 174 REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) he agreed when asked by the teacher about where he got to know about earthquakes. Experience, either directly or indirectly, is a source of language exposure in early childhood. For instance, when the teacher was conveying the importance of maintaining cleanliness in order to have a healthy body, P suddenly shouted that he had just played in the rain. C responded to this statement, stating that P could have a cold as a result of playing in the rain. The last object category whose frequency of occurrence as a sub-theme in the speech of preschool-aged children is very minor is vehicles, whether land, sea, and air vehicles or their parts, as well as occupations or status. When talking about vehicles, most of them only mention names, for example, kereta bandara 'airport train' and mobil polisi 'police car', while parts of vehicles and other things related to vehicles are not discussed too much, for example, helm 'helmet' and setir 'steering wheel.' This sub-theme about vehicles often appears in context when talking about work. For example, in a pretend play to catch criminals, words related to these activities appear, such as mobil polisi 'police car', penjara ‘jail', and work as a polisi 'policeman'. Several other jobs that are also found in the speech of preschool-aged children include the work that is being played by the child, such as penjual es krim 'ice cream seller' and what he aspires to be, such as dokter 'doctor'. Apart from work, the status during pretend plays is also discussed, such as pangeran 'prince'. This is also the case with the status attached to someone or something that is known to the child, for example, the status of juara 'champion'. People as the second thematic content of preschool-aged children’s utterances The theme of people also gets sufficient attention in the speech of preschool-aged children, as evidenced by the high frequency of occurrence (147 times or 25.2%) in the speech produced by these children. There are several categories of people being discussed, namely peers and teachers (72), family (39), self-speakers (6), and others (30). Thematic Contents of Preschool-Aged Children’s Utterances … REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) 175 Table 3. The thematic content of objects in preschool-aged children’s utterances No People category Examples 1. 1 Interlocutors (peers and teachers) Second personal pronouns, ‘friends’, the address term ‘Ma’am’ 2. 2 Family ‘Father’, ‘mother’, ‘grandparents’, ‘uncle and aunty’, ‘brother’, ‘sister’ 3. 3 Self-speakers First personal pronouns, own name 4. 4 Others Movie characters, ghosts In discussing the interlocutor, be it peers or teachers, mentioning the name of the speech partner is the most important thing to use. Next is the mention using the noun teman-teman 'friends', pronouns for people, for example kalian 'you', kamu 'you', and dirimu 'yourself' to mention peers, and the address term bu ‘Ma’am' to refer to teachers. As all the teachers are females, it is reasonable that the word bu becomes the most frequently used noun by preschoolers, which is used 540 times in 4198 utterances. The role of the teacher in interaction in the classroom with preschool-aged children is indeed quite central, where the teacher is usually the most active party in learning activities in the classroom. Although the pattern of learning carried out is slightly different because it is center based, in the second preschool, the teacher's role in learning activities is also quite basic. Although in the main activity the teacher does not constantly intervene in the activities executed by the children, she still monitors the course of activities and immediately provides feedback if the activities carried out have started to get out of control. Meanwhile, there are quite a number of family members who become sub-themes in the speech of preschool-aged children, especially members of the nuclear family, namely ayah 'father', ibu 'mother', adik perempuan 'sister', and kakak laki-laki 'brother'. In addition, other family members who were also discussed were kakek-nenek 'grandparents' and pakde-bude ‘uncle and aunty’. All of these family members appear as sub-themes in the speech of preschool-aged children, both when the children tell their real experiences and when they are playing roles. Meanwhile, when these preschool-aged children talked about themselves, they mostly used the word aku 'I', followed T. Sudartinah 176 REGISTER JOURNAL – Vol 15, No 2 (2022) by saya 'I', and their names. Of the 29 preschool-aged children who participated in this study, only 3 always used their names to refer to themselves. In addition to the three sub-themes above, there are also several other people or personas that become sub-themes in the speech of preschool-aged children, and are classified into others since each of them occurs with little frequency. Most of them are characters in stories or movies, such as 'zombies', setan 'devils', and Upin dan Ipin 'Upin and Ipin', and general nouns such as orang 'person', bayi 'baby', and perempuan 'woman'. To sum up, it is clearly visible that preschool-aged children already have the ability to participate actively in conversations with their peers and teachers in the preschool setting. They show their cooperation with their interlocutors in building and managing conversational themes. This way, they also complete their understanding of the world they live in, which is captured from the way they use nouns and pronouns in their utterances to refer to objects and people in real life. CONCLUSION Preschool-aged children mostly talk about themes related to the here- and-now principle as well as fictional stories wrapped in pretend play activities when interacting with peers and teachers, with objects dominating the children's conversations, followed by the theme of people. It is interesting to note that family is also discussed even though the setting of all conversations was at preschools. The high use of the types of words with reference (nouns and pronouns) in preschool-aged children's utterances indicates that the semantic content in the form of themes represented through these nouns and pronouns is an important part that contributes to the success of conveying the meaning of speech produced by these children. They help the children to build a complete picture of their surrounding world. Studies on preschool-aged children’s language are important to conduct as they can provide significant contributions to many parties, such as parents, educators, other researchers, and education policymakers. 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