Signs Your Child May Need Speech Therapy
As a child develops, we often find differences in how they are progressing their speech and language development. It is extremely important to remember that every child develops differently and at their own pace. In the first 3 years of a child’s life, we see the largest growth of language development, from cooing and gooing, to babbling, to first words, to phrases, sentences, and conversations with peers and adults.
During these early years, it can be worrisome and concerning when we see children at the same age at different points in their language development. Knowing if and when a child might need speech and/or language therapy is difficult to determine if not familiar with what development looks like. At different points in development we have basic skills we are specialized to look for. When these milestones are not met, it can hinder the child’s overall language development. These delays can cause difficulty upon entering school, communicating with peers, or communicating their wants and/or needs in their everyday life. Speech therapy can help bridge those gaps in development, and the earlier we target these skills, the less of a gap we have to bridge.
Know the Milestones
Determining if they need to see a speech language pathologist for speech therapy can often be daunting. Knowing the milestones at all ages can help determine a need for therapy. A delay or disorder in language skills can turn into difficulties following directions and difficulties with learning how to read. These difficulties can interfere with school aged skills, reading, writing, math, science, and building relationships with their peers and teachers. These relationships allow for positive experiences in overall social, speech, and language development. Identifying if your child is meeting these milestones will allow for overall success and benefit your child.
Birth – 3 Month Speech/Language Milestones
- Turns head to sounds, responds to voices
- Watches a speaker’s face
- Social smiles emerge by 2 months
- Vowel sounds and cooing emerges around 2 months
3-6 Month Speech/Language Milestones
- Enjoys social games and playful interactions with caregiver
- Takes turns vocalizing
- Makes eye contact with people talking to them
- Cooing, vowel sounds, yelling, squealing, and shrieking
- Consonant – Vowel syllable shapes with /p, b, m/ sounds (e.g., puh, boo, ma)
6-9 Month Speech/Language Milestones
- Reduplicated babbling (e.g., mamama)
- Understands a few words and phrases
- Imitates some simple actions and sounds
- Joint attention emerges
- Responds to name when called
- Communicates with vocalizations and eye contact, may use some early gestures (e.g., reaching for items/pushing items away)
9-12 Months Speech/Language Milestones
- Babbling with a variety of consonant and vowel sounds
- Pointing and using other gestures like waving and clapping
- Understands ~50 words and phrases
- Imitates simple actions with nursery rhymes
- Says one word by 12 months
12-15 Month Speech/Language Milestones
- Says 5-10 words
- Babbles in sentence-like strands with adult intonation
- Uses 10 or more gestures
- Imitates sounds in play
- Follows 1-step directions with adult help and prompts
15-18 Month Speech/Language Milestones
- Says 20-50 words
- Speech is ~25% intelligible
- Imitates simple words
- Points to identify common vocabulary including body parts
- Follows 1-step directions independently
18-24 Month Speech/Language Milestones
- Says 50-200 words
- Speech is 25-50% intelligible
- Answers simple questions and selects an item when given a choice of 2
- Combines words for phrases
- Uses more words than gestures to communicate
- Follows simple 2-step directions
24-36 Month Speech/Language Milestones
- Uses words and sentences that are 2-4 words long, on average
- Robust spoken vocabulary with many nouns, verbs, descriptive words, and words for simple context, speech is 50-75% intelligible
- Asks and answers simple questions (e.g., “who, what, where, what … doing?”)
- Understands increasingly complex directions that include concepts like “on, off, big, little, under” etc.
If you’re concerned that your child is not meeting their speech/language milestones, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us here at Kids Place Pediatric Therapy. We have 4 speech therapy clinics in Arizona ready to help you and your child!
