• Follow directions involving 3 or more steps – “First get some paper, then draw a picture, last give it to mom”
• Use adult-type grammar
• Tell stories with a clear beginning, middle and end
• Talk to try to solve problems with adults and other children
• Demonstrate increasingly complex imaginative play
• Be understood by strangers almost all of the time click here to learn more about speech and sound development.
• Be able to generate simple rhymes – “cat-bat”
• Match some letters with their sounds – letter T says “tuh”

What you can do to help:

• Give your child lots of opportunities to play with other children at the library, the park, the Early Years Centre, and by encouraging one or two friends to come over to your home to play
• Point out words in books and run your finger under words while you read to them
• Talk about the order of events – describe what happens first, next, and last – “First we wash our hands, then we have a snack and last we put our dishes in the sink.”
• Encourage your child to tell his/her own stories – by asking them to tell you about their day, to describe a movie they watched or tell you about a favourite book. Ask questions to encourage him/her to tell you a little more
• Read books with rhyming words – “house/mouse” and point out sounds at the start of words – e.g. “Mommy starts with the ‘mmm’ sound – that’s the letter M.”

If you think your child is not meeting the developmental milestones as expected don’t ‘wait and see’. Contact Us  to make a referral for a speech and language assessment.

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