Typical Language Development for the Young Child. Do I have reason to be concerned?

Typical Development 6 months – 2 Years

Typical Development By 6 Months

  • Understands phrases like “wave bye bye
  • Recognises names of familiar objects and people – looks around if he hears them mentioned
  • Understands emotional tones of speech
  • Babbles with long strings of repeated sounds
  • Begins to appreciate the effect of his vocalisations on others – intentionality
  • Enjoys games like “peek a boo”

By 12 Months

  • Understands own name
  • Understands words like bye bye/up
  • Says sounds like baba, go go
  • Laughs and tries to copy you

By 18 Months

    • Understands words and points to part of body like nose/ear
    • Will look for things when asked to, like “get your hat”
    • Says words
    • Makes gestures and asks for “more”/”again”

By 21 Months

    • Points to a picture or sign when asked e.g. Where’s McDonald’s
    • Pretends to feed/ bathe doll
    • Has a vocabulary of about 50 words and may be beginning to join words
    • Follows directions such as “drink your juice” or “sit down”
    • Says “what’s that?”
    • Can select one object from a group e.g. a sock

When to Seek Professional Advice

By 18 months

    • Never takes turns with you in making sounds to each other
    • Does not babble with lots of sounds, sounding almost as if he is talking
    • Says no words / is not using at least 20 single words
    • Doesn’t point to things of interest as if to say “Look at that!” and then look right at you
    • Doesn’t understand and respond to words like “no” and “up”
    • Doesn’t respond by looking in the right direction to little questions like “Where’s your coat?”
    • Doesn’t point to objects or pictures when asked “Where’s the …?”
    • Is not interested in starting lots of games with you, e.g. Pat-a-cake
    • Never concentrates on anything for more than a few seconds
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Typical Development 2-3 Years

By 2 to 3 years

  • Uses sentences like “me do it”, “Daddy have that one”
  • Follows simple directions like “Put the Teddy Bear to bed”
  • Understands instructions involving “in”, “on” and “Under”
  • Has a conversation with family members or familiars
  • Listens to stories and answer simple questions
  • Adds endings to words such as running, toys

When to Seek Professional Advice

By 2.5 years

  • Says fewer than 300 words
  • Still mainly uses single words rather than 2 together
  • Isn’t using action words like “run” “eat” “fall”
  • Isn’t using some adult grammar, such as “2 babies”, “doggy sleeping”
  • You often can’t understand what she has said
  • Doesn’t seem to understand what you say to her unless you make it very simple
  • Her attention span is still very short most of the time
  • She doesn’t seem to want you to play with her
  • She doesn’t show any pretend or imaginative play
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Typical Development 3 – 5 Years

By 3 to 4 years

  • Uses sentences with 4 to 6 words
  • Gives directions like “fix this for me”
  • Asks questions like What, Where or Why
  • Tells about things he has done
  • Talks to himself and his toys
  • Tells a story or sings a song
  • Tells you when he is tired

By 5 years

  • Uses sentences that sound almost like an adult
  • Able to say most speech sounds correctly
  • Explains what familiar words mean
  • Uses sentences to describe objects and events
  • Explains how to solve a simple problem
  • Follows related directions such as “ Get your scissors, cut out the picture and stick it on the page”

When to Seek Professional Advice

By 3 years

  • Frequently doesn’t seem to understand what you have said
  • Often shows that he is not aware of what other people know already, e.g. he may start talking to a stranger about “Luke” (his baby brother) and not realise that the person he is talking to has no idea who Luke is
  • Never asks any questions
  • Isn’t using sentences / still uses “sentences” of only 2-3 words
  • Doesn’t use any little grammatical markers like an “s” to mark a plural
  • Shows no interest in stories
  • Show no interest in playing with other children
  • People outside the family find him difficult to understand
  • Still has a very short attention span

By 4 years

  • Often looks puzzled, as if she doesn’t understand what you have said, or doesn’t do what you have asked her to do
  • Doesn’t concentrate on anything for more than a few minutes
  • Doesn’t often use grammatical markers such as verb endings and plurals
  • Isn’t able to tell a simple story
  • Can’t give you a clear account of something that happened when you were not present
  • Doesn’t ask lots of questions
  • Doesn’t want to play with other children
  • Speech is difficult to understand: by age 4, a child should be 100% intelligible to a stranger
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