<![CDATA[This study aims to examine semantic acquisition patterns in three-year-old children through the integration of syntactic structures and meaning functions in the context of natural interactions. The study used a mixed methods approach that combines quantitative and qualitative analysis to obtain a comprehensive picture of children’s language development. Data were obtained from 84 spontaneous utterances of a three-year-old boy through naturalistic observations for 1.5 months using the listening and speaking technique. Data validity was guaranteed through triangulation with linguistic experts, while analysis was carried out using sentence pattern frequency counts, Mean Length of Utterance (MLU), and analysis based on functional grammar and developmental psycholinguistic theory. The results showed an MLU value of 4.3 morphemes with a dominance of S+P+O (28.6%) and S+P+K (21.4%) sentence patterns. From the semantic aspect, children have been able to construct more complex meaning categories, including causal negation, temporal interrogatives, specific-locatives, and affective attributions, which demonstrates the integration between syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic development in everyday communication. These findings confirm that early language acquisition is usage-based and emergent, with language skills developing through intense language exposure, social interaction experiences, and ongoing communication needs. Theoretically, this research reinforces the contemporary developmental psycholinguistic paradigm, while practically it provides implications for the development of more contextual child language assessment instruments and strength-based mentoring strategies to support children’s communication development, particularly in bilingual environments in Indonesia.]]>
