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# From CHAT to Coded CoNLL-U: A Reproducible Pipeline for the Syntactic Annotation and Querying of Child Language Data

**Authors:** Achim Stein · **Year:** 2026 · **Venue:** Proceedings of the Fifteenth Language Resources and Evaluation Conference (LREC 2026) **Link:** [aclanthology.org/2026.lrec-1.901](https://aclanthology.org/2026.lrec-1.901/) · **Licence:** [CC BY-NC 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) (ELRA, LREC proceedings) — summary only

[**0** citations](https://openalex.org/works?filter=cites:W7160034492) openalex-snapshot · 2026-10-14[Proceedings of the Fifteenth Language Resources and Evaluation Conference](https://aclanthology.org/volumes/2026.lrec-1/)[licence](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/)

- [Publisher's page](https://aclanthology.org/2026.lrec-1.901/)
- [PDF](https://aclanthology.org/2026.lrec-1.901.pdf)
- [DOI 10.63317/498zo5heasd5](https://doi.org/10.63317/498zo5heasd5)
- [OpenAlex](https://openalex.org/W7160034492)

**Authors (1)**

1. [Stein, Achim](https://openalex.org/A5040760480) [ORCID](https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8848-1977) · h 6 · 174 citations · 108 works

Citations and author metrics from openalex-snapshot (2026-10-14); authors with the same name are not always told apart.

## What it is about

Stein presents an open pipeline that converts CHILDES transcripts in the CHAT format into CSV tables and CoNLL-U. The script childes.py tokenises, optionally tags with TreeTagger, parses with the UDPipe web API, and can apply Grew rewriting rules to fix systematic parser errors. A second script, dql.py, runs Grew graph queries over the parsed CoNLL-U and writes user-defined codings into the metadata and the CSV. The pipeline is shown on the French CHILDES corpus for the production of object clitics. The result is a developmental curve: the share of dative clitics in child speech starts near 9% against about 26% in adult input and rises toward the adult level.

## Ideas

- I1. `en/src/convert.rs` and `en/src/tok.rs`: a CHAT reader for English CHILDES that keeps the speaker, age and utterance IDs, checked by a round trip (utterance count and token count equal to the source, per corpus).
- I2. A query layer in Rust over the `mova` dialect: named patterns (for example a do-support or particle-verb pattern) that write codings into MISC, measured by match counts per 1k sentences on EWT test (test only, licence permitting).
- I3. `en` tagger and parser as the parser of the pipeline: the Grew-style rewrite rules of this paper, re-expressed as `en/seeds` rules, measured by the change in LAS on CHILDES test after each rule.

## For Mova

The paper is a pipeline for corpora, not a model, so the useful parts are the coding layer and the CHAT reader. Mova already has the converters in `en/src/convert.rs`. The coding layer belongs next to `prag` and `treeagree`. Relevant chapters are `languages/en/37-register-and-variation` and `22-phrases`. Measure first: the round-trip counts on one CHILDES corpus before any parser change.

Topics: [Universal Dependencies](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/papers/topics/universal-dependencies/)

## Cite

The paper itself, not this card. BibTeX from the library's record of the work. [DOI 10.63317/498zo5heasd5](https://doi.org/10.63317/498zo5heasd5)

```
@inproceedings{stein2026chat,
  title = {{From CHAT to Coded CoNLL-U: A Reproducible Pipeline for the Syntactic Annotation and Querying of Child Language Data}},
  author = {Stein, Achim},
  booktitle = {Proceedings of the Fifteenth Language Resources and Evaluation Conference},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.63317/498zo5heasd5},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.63317/498zo5heasd5}
}
```

- [← previous Annotation Scheme for English Argument Structure Constructions Treebank](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/papers/bank-2024-sung-annotation-scheme-english-argument-structure/)
- [next → On the syntax of object pronouns in Old English and Early Middle English](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/papers/bastiani-2020-syntax-object-pronouns-old-english/)
- [↑ back to English](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/papers/en/)

## References

26 references, 1 of them with a card of ours. ↗ leads to the work, «find» searches for one we have no id for yet.

1. Anne Abeillé and Lionel Clément. 2006. Manuel d’annotation pour les corpus du projet PERCEO. [https://repository.ortolang.fr/api/content/perceo-/1/Manuel-annotation.pdf](https://repository.ortolang.fr/api/content/perceo-/1/Manuel-annotation.pdf). [↗](https://repository.ortolang.fr/api/content/perceo-/1/Manuel-annotation.pdf)
2. Anna Cardinaletti, Sara Cerutti, and Francesca Volpato. 2021. On the acquisition of third person dative clitic pronouns in Italian. Lingue e linguaggio, (2):311–341. [↗](https://doi.org/10.1418/102817)
3. Hélène Delage, Stephanie Durrleman, and Ulrich H. Frauenfelder. 2016. Disentangling sources of difficulty associated with the acquisition of accusative clitics in French. Lingua, 180:1–24. [↗](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lingua.2016.03.005)
4. Gaël Guibon, Marine Courtin, Kim Gerdes, and Bruno Guillaume. 2020. When Collaborative Treebank Curation Meets Graph Grammars. In LREC 2020 - 12th Language Resources and Evaluation Conference, Marseille, France. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Ga%C3%ABl+Guibon%2C+Marine+Courtin%2C+Kim+Gerdes%2C+and+Bruno+Guillaume%2E+2020%2E+When+Collaborative+Treebank+Curation+Meets+Graph+Grammars%2E+In+LREC+2020+%2D+12th+Language+Resources+and+Evaluation+Conference%2C+Marseil)
5. Bruno Guillaume. 2019. Graph matching for corpora exploration. In JLC 2019 - 10èmes Journées Internationales de La Linguistique de Corpus, Grenoble, France. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Bruno+Guillaume%2E+2019%2E+Graph+matching+for+corpora+exploration%2E+In+JLC+2019+%2D+10%C3%A8mes+Journ%C3%A9es+Internationales+de+La+Linguistique+de+Corpus%2C+Grenoble%2C+France%2E)
6. Brian MacWhinney. 2000. The Childes Project. 1: Transcription Format and Programs. Erlbaum, Mahwah. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Brian+MacWhinney%2E+2000%2E+The+Childes+Project%2E+1%3A+Transcription+Format+and+Programs%2E+Erlbaum%2C+Mahwah%2E)
7. Brian MacWhinney. 2019. CHAT Manual. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Brian+MacWhinney%2E+2019%2E+CHAT+Manual%2E)
8. Mihaela Pirvulescu and Nelleke Strik. 2014. The acquisition of object clitic features in French: A comprehension study. Lingua, 144:58–71. [↗](https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lingua.2013.12.006)
9. Beth Randall, Anthony Kroch, and Beatrice Santorini. 2004. CorpusSearch 2 users guide. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Beth+Randall%2C+Anthony+Kroch%2C+and+Beatrice+Santorini%2E+2004%2E+CorpusSearch+2+users+guide%2E)
10. Kenji Sagae, Eric Davis, Alon Lavie, Brian MacWhinney, and Shuly Wintner. 2007. High-accuracy annotation and parsing of CHILDES transcripts. In Proceedings of the Workshop on Cognitive Aspects of Computational Language Acquisition, pages 25–32, Prague, Czech Republic. Association for Computational Linguistics. [↗](https://doi.org/10.3115/1629795.1629799)
11. Helmut Schmid. 1994. Probabilistic Part-of-Speech Tagging using Decision Trees. Stuttgart. Institut für maschinelle Sprachverarbeitung. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Helmut+Schmid%2E+1994%2E+Probabilistic+Part%2Dof%2DSpeech+Tagging+using+Decision+Trees%2E+Stuttgart%2E+Institut+f%C3%BCr+maschinelle+Sprachverarbeitung%2E)
12. Milan Straka. 2018. UDPipe 2.0 prototype at CoNLL 2018 UD shared task. In Proceedings of the CoNLL 2018 Shared Task: Multilingual Parsing from Raw Text to Universal Dependencies, pages 197–207, Brussels, Belgium. Association for Computational Linguistics. 8. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Milan+Straka%2E+2018%2E+UDPipe+2%2E0+prototype+at+CoNLL+2018+UD+shared+task%2E+In+Proceedings+of+the+CoNLL+2018+Shared+Task%3A+Multilingual+Parsing+from+Raw+Text+to+Universal+Dependencies%2C+pages+197%E2%80%93207%2C+Brusse) [our card](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/docs/papers/ud-2018-straka-udpipe-2-0-prototype-conll/)
13. Language Resource References Bassano, Dominique. 2005. CHILDES French Pauline Corpus. TalkBank. PID https://doi.org/10.21415/T5VS3W. [↗](https://doi.org/10.21415/t5vs3w)
14. Champaud, Christian. 2004. CHILDES French Champaud Corpus. TalkBank. PID https://doi.org/10.21415/T5M88F. [↗](https://doi.org/10.21415/t5m88f)
15. Guillaume, Bruno. 2025. Grew. Graph Rewriting for NLP. PID [https://grew.fr](https://grew.fr). [↗](https://grew.fr)
16. Jisa, Harriet. 2004. PhonBank French Lyon Corpus. TalkBank. PID https://doi.org/10.21415/T5M02D. [↗](https://doi.org/10.21415/t5m02d)
17. Le Normand, Marie-Thérèse. 2014. CHILDES French MTLN Corpus. TalkBank. PID https://doi.org/10.21415/T58S3M. [↗](https://doi.org/10.21415/t58s3m)
18. Leveillé, Madeleine. 2004. CHILDES French Leveillé Corpus. TalkBank. PID https://doi.org/10.21415/T5RK5N. [↗](https://doi.org/10.21415/t5rk5n)
19. Morgenstern, Aliyah and Parisse, Christophe. 2009. PhonBank French Paris Corpus. TalkBank. PID https://doi.org/10.21415/T5PS3B. [↗](https://doi.org/10.21415/t5ps3b)
20. Palasis, Katerina. 2020. CHILDES French Palasis Corpus. TalkBank. PID https://doi.org/10.21415/T5SW4P. [↗](https://doi.org/10.21415/t5sw4p)
21. Plunkett, Bernadette. 2004. CHILDES French York Corpus. TalkBank. PID https://doi.org/10.21415/T5NK63. [↗](https://doi.org/10.21415/t5nk63)
22. Rasetti, Lucienne. 2004. CHILDES French Geneva Corpus. TalkBank. PID https://doi.org/10.21415/T5F898. Schmid, Helmut. TreeTaggger. PID https://cis.uni-muenchen.de/ schmid/tools/TreeTagger/. [↗](https://doi.org/10.21415/t5f898)
23. Stein, Achim. 2026. French CHILDES Pipeline, version 3.0. GitHub. PID [https://github.com/michaniets/french-childes](https://github.com/michaniets/french-childes). [↗](https://github.com/michaniets/french-childes)
24. Straka, Milan. 2023. UDPipe, version 2.1.0. PID [https://github.com/ufal/udpipe](https://github.com/ufal/udpipe). [↗](https://github.com/ufal/udpipe)
25. Vion, Monique. 2004. CHILDES French Vion/Colas Corpus. TalkBank. PID https://doi.org/10.21415/T5N300. [↗](https://doi.org/10.21415/t5n300)
26. Yamaguchi, Naomi. 2015. PhonBank French Yamaguchi Corpus. TalkBank. PID https://doi.org/10.21415/T5ZP45. [↗](https://doi.org/10.21415/t5zp45)