Speech and Language Milestones By Age

Symptoms Change, But Underlying Causes Do Not

Most symptoms of a speech and language delay disappear by elementary age. However, the processing glitch that causes these delays can remain as an impediment to future learning absent treatment or therapy. And so recognizing the signs of delay are important. Here are speech and language milestones by age.

And so, if your child is not clearly meeting the markers below, consider taking action. Our program provides added listening and processing practice, the equivalent of hearing millions of words in a just a few weeks.

These speech milestones are a guide only. Compare your child to peers to get an impression of whether speech and language development is progressing at a normal rate.

Kindergarten Speech & Language

By the end of kindergarten your child should be able to follow simple directions, understand age-appropriate stories read aloud and follow a simple conversations.

With respect to speaking skills, he should be understood by most people, be able to answer simple questions, relate a story and take part in a conversation.

First Grade Speech & Language

Going into first grade you should expect your child to be able to recall information and follow 2-3 step instructions. His speaking should be easy to understand, he should be able to tell stories and express ideas using a series of sentences, have reasonable grammar, respond to open-ended questions and stay on topic when talking.

Second Grade Speech & Language

Heading into 3rd grade your child should be able to follow more complex directions and understand direction words, such as location and time.

Speaking should be clear, and sentences, questions and answers should be more complex. He should be able to persuade and possibly entertain, and use eye contact.

Third Grade Speech & Language

Heading into 4th grade your child should be listening attentively in a group. Speaking improvements are mainly around the ability to explain information and to tell a story.

Fourth Grade Speech & Language

Heading into 5th grade your child should be able to form opinions based on evidence and listen for a specific purpose. He should be starting to understand figurative language, summarizing ideas and paraphrasing.

Fifth Grade Speech & Language

Heading into 6th grade your child should be able to make planned oral presentations, summarize main points and report back on information collected in a group.

Although language development in children is quite consistent, there are a lot of variables such as your child’s inborn ability to learn language, learning skills, the amount and kind of language the child hears. This makes it difficult to say with certainty where any young child’s speech and language development will be in 3 months, or 1 year.
Specific language impairment details

Your Next Step

Our Fast ForWord program is a learning-acceleration program that starts by targeting speech and language delays. It is widely used by audiologists and speech and language pathologists as a speech therapy program and to improve receptive language skills.

Fast ForWord is suitable for children aged 5 and older. To find out if we can help your child, call for a free consult. Or if you have a question email us here.

The Reading Link
Because reading is a language skill, children with speech and language delays are at-risk readers. For that reason alone, parents are advised to be proactive in seeking help for speech and language problems.
Language to literacy link