Language Acquisition Article

Language is a vital part of how a child is able to express feeling and meaning. As a new parent many questions will arise for example ‘When is it normal for my child to start making sounds?’… “When will my child stop cooing/babbling and start saying words?”. This general guide should help to put your child’s development into perspective and remember that all children learn at different speeds and that it is good for them to make steady process as children are all unique. Learning language should be fun and exciting! How much time you dedicate to reading stories, playing games contributes hugely to the rate of your child’s language development.

0-18 months

When a child starts to vocalise it can often be a hilarious task of decoding what the baby is saying through the cooing and later babbling that takes place. By the age of eighteen months your child may start to form connections between words and objects. Around this time it is likely that your child is able to produce single words (known as holophrases) and start to develop them. Attention and nurturing at this time is important, commonly children will miss letters or syllables out for example cat may be vocalised as ‘ca’, banana may come out as ‘nana’, on occasions children might substitute tricky sounds with easier ones for example chimney may become ‘timney’. Gently prompting your child to add the correct letters and sounds back into these words is key. During the age of 12-18 months your child may also begin to understand two part instructions such as “Don’t touch” (useful when you don’t have to physically remove the child from certain dangers!) and “Where’s your belly?” (always a fun game!).

18-24 months

This stage between 18 -24 months is a time for some interesting word formation and by the time the child reaches 24 months the child is likely to have some two word phrases sussed in the correct order i.e. ‘see shoe’, ‘no play’.

30 months


30 months should provide you with an interesting and exciting time! In this phase these two word phrases become what is known as telegraphic phrases your child might say ‘she build house’. Your child has started to form sentences! The sentences are broken down to the smallest units possible at this stage and are built upon from here.

46 months

Your child is able to form comprehensive sentences around this age, which connect the words together. This is a complex process where your child will learn verbs (for example is and was), word endings such as ‘ing’ and even abbreviations.

It is important to take these milestones as general and if your child is not doing exactly as expected there is no panic! Remember each child has their own developmental rate be it sooner or later than the phases highlighted. Don’t forget you won’t be able to get a word in edgeways when they’ve grasped the art of speaking! [/justify]