Speech-language milestones help pediatric audiologists identify potential audiological problems by assessing a young child’s communicational development.
Navigating Communication Milestones What Parents Need to Know
These communication guidelines aren’t just useful for doctors; they’re a helpful tool for parents as well. A basic understanding of speech-language milestones will allow you to assess whether your child’s language development is normal or irregular. Irregular communicational development doesn’t always indicate an auditory impairment; however, any child who shows signs of slow development should get a hearing assessment as soon as possible.
Communication Guidelines for Infants and Toddlers
Some of the most important speech-language milestones for infants and toddlers are listed below. Normally developing children should be able to perform the tasks described by the end of the milestone’s specified age range.
Age 0 - 1
SPEECH: Infants begin producing basic sounds like babbling early in their first year. By their first birthday, they string different multi-tonal sounds together and repeat familiar sounds like mama, "dada" or "baba".
HEARING: Infants should respond to loud, familiar or surprising sounds (e.g. music, bangs or thuds, dog barking, their name, whistling, etc.) through actions like movement, eye contact and speech.
Age 1 - 2
SPEECH: Within the span of a year, a child’s language production should transform from incoherent babbling to recognizable speech. By age two, most children can produce about 50 words and are able to form basic two- or three-word phrases.
HEARING: During this year, children gain an understanding of the names of familiar objects as well as basic commands. By 24 months, children can typically understand and perform commands with two parts (e.g. touch your ear and wiggle your toes).
Age 3 - 4
SPEECH: By four, a child’s speech should be complicated and understandable, even to strangers. Children of this age ask questions, use pronouns and tell stories that are a few sentences long.
HEARING: At this age, children recognize and respond when their name is called from another room and display a solid understanding of basic language. Your child should also be able to hear TV, movies, games and music at the same volume as adults with normal hearing.
