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0-2 months
Minimal meaningful vocalizations (vegetative sounds) -
2-4 months
Laughs, coos, smiles begin -
4-6 months
Begins to babble and make sounds, such as “pa” or “ba” -
8-10 momths
Longer babbles, such as “ba ba ba”; more meaningful intonation as language emerges -
10-12 months
First words and additional communication attempts emerge (gesturing to request an item, pushing away an item of disinterest) -
1-2 year
Follows concise directions
First words
Emergence of basic (who, what, where, when, why, and how) questions
Starts to combine words to make short phrases -
2-3 year
Follows 2-step directions
Pleasantries: words like, “please” and “thank you,” are emerging
Object permanence: shows an understanding that objects exist, even if the object is not in their vicinity
Prepositions: begins using words such as “in,” “on,” and “under”
Longer phrases/sentences: starts combining more words to produce longer sentences (3 to 4 words)
Begins to ask a lot of “why” questions -
3-4 year
Colors and shapes: beginning to understanding shape and color words
Familial terms: words like “grandma”, “aunt”, and “brother”
Rhyming: begin to produce/play around with short rhyming words, like “cat” and “hat”
Complex wh- questions: beginning to understand and responding to a wider variety of wh- question like “why” and “how”
Pronouns: beginning to expand pronoun use to identify self and others; such as “me”, “you”, “they”, etc. -
4-5 year
Temporal concepts: words like “today”, “yesterday”, and “tomorrow” are understood
Sequences: are familiar with routines and sequence words such as: first, next, then, last
Clearer speech: the child should be understood by individuals almost 100% of the time
Letters and numbers: the child is understanding letters and numbers
Retelling events: narratives and storytelling is increasing in sentence complexity and in duration
Code switching: the child understands “indoor voice” and outdoor voice”