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Child Speech And Language Development: From Birth To 6 Years

Your child develops at a different rate to other children in his speech and language development, but must go through the same stages during his language development.

The stages at which your child develops his speech may be quite different and met in a different order.

If your child develops his speech at a different rate it does not necessarily mean he has problems in his language development.

Below are language and speech development milestones of children from birth to 6 years...

Birth to 3 Months

Responds to pleasure with 'cooing' noises.
Smiles when spoken to.
Startles to loud sounds.

4 - 6 Months

Shifts eyes in direction of sounds.
Notices and pays attention to sounds and music.
Makes babbling noises that resemble speech.

7 Months - 1 Year

Produces first words such as bye-bye or mama.
Imitates different speech sounds.
Recognizes basic familiar words such as cup or ball.

1 - 2 Years

Speaks two-word sentences such as more juice or where mummy?.
Identifies pictures by name when directed.
Listens to simple stories.

2 -3 Years

Can name most objects.
Produces three-word sentences.
Understands differences in meaning for basic words (up-down or in-out).

3 - 4 Years

Talks about events.
Speech is understood by most people.
Understands questions.

4 - 5 Years

Speaks clearly.
Tells detailed, ordered stories.
Pays attention and responds to stories and questions.

5 - 6 Years

Exchanges information and asks questions.
Communicates easily with adults and other children.
Uses appropriate grammar in most cases.

Problems in child’s speech development occur when there is a lack of communication between you and your child. This leads to misunderstandings and may affect your child.

Your child is unique in that he communicates with words, with gestures and with body language. Communicating with your child allows social and emotional relationship to flourish therefore minimising problems in his speech and language development.