According to the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, “The first 3 years of life, when the brain is developing and maturing, is the most intensive period for acquiring speech and language skills.”[1] During this time, it’s important to monitor your child’s speech and language development so that any disorders can be diagnosed promptly and you can seek interventions. One factor that can interfere with normal speech development is hearing loss. Let’s review some important speech and language milestones for the first three years of life to help you identify potential hearing or speech development issues.
Birth to Three Months
Your child should:
- React to loud sounds
- Calm down or smile at you when you speak to them
- Recognize your voice and be soothed by it
- Start or stop feeding in response to sound
- Make coos and other noises
- Have different ways of crying based on their needs
Four to Six Months
Your child should:
- Follow sound sources with their gaze
- Respond to changes in your tone of voice
- Notice toys that play songs or make other noise
- Babble in a speech-like way, using many different sounds, especially when happy or excited
- Laugh
- Gurgle when playing alone or with you
Seven Months to One Year
Your child should:
- Enjoy playing games like peek-a-boo and pat-a-cake
- Turn to look in the direction of sounds
- Listen when you speak to them
- Understand commonly used words
- Obey or respond to your requests
- Babble using both short and long groups of sounds
- Babble to get or keep your attention
- Communicate using gestures
- Imitate various speech sounds
- Say one or two words
One to Two Years
Your child should:
- Know and be able to identify various parts of the body
- Follow simple commands
- Understand simple questions
- Enjoy stories, songs and rhymes
- Point to pictures in books
- Acquire new words regularly
- Ask one- or two-word questions
- Put two or more words together
Two to Three Years
Your child should:
- Say many words
- Use two- to three-word phrases to communicate
- Produce many consonant sounds
- Speak in a way that is understandable to those closest to them
- Name objects to ask for them or draw attention to them
When to See a Specialist
If you notice your child isn’t meeting most of these speech-language milestones, it’s important to have their hearing and speech evaluated by experts.
Contact a specialist at Augusta – Aiken ENT & Allergy today to learn more or to schedule an appointment.
[1] National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders. (n.d.). Speech and language developmental milestones. National Institutes of Health. https://www.nidcd.nih.gov/health/speech-and-language