When I was young, I was told that to count syllables in a word, you could clap them. One clap for each syllable.
You would say it aloud like this: cu-shion.
I was not taught rules about how to pick out each syllable from a word. I just figured it out.
The funky thing with this is that syllables have no defined length, and some words are only one syllable while others are a few.
Learning how to count syllables is unlike math because in math, one can't do something until they have learned all the rules for how it should be done properly. I was never taught rules like this for counting syllables, I just figured it out.
My question: how do humans learn this skill without being taught? Is it like learning to walk?