Developmental Trends: Language Skills at Different Age Levels

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Infancy (Birth–2)

What You Might Observe:

• Interest in listening to the human voice and in exchanging vocalizations with adults
• Repetition of vowel sounds (cooing) at age 1–2 months and consonant-vowel syllables (babbling) at about 6 months
• Understanding of some common words at about 8 months
• Use of single words at about 12 months
• Use of two-word combinations at about 18 months
• Rapid increase in vocabulary in the second year

Diversity:

• In the latter half of the first year, babbling increasingly reflects phonemes of the native language.
• Temperament may influence the development of expressive language; more cautious children may wait a bit before beginning to speak.
• Chronic ear infections can interfere with early language development.
• Infants with severe hearing impairments babble, but the quality of their babbling changes little over time. Spoken language progresses no further unless intensive training is provided.

Implications:

• Engage young infants in “conversations,” using simplified and animated speech (i.e., infant-directed speech) and responding when they vocalize.
• Label and describe the objects and events children encounter.
• Teach simple hand signs that preverbal infants can use to communicate.
• Ask simple questions (e.g., “Is your diaper wet?” “What does a cow say?”).
• Repeat and expand on children’s early “sentences” (e.g., follow “Kitty eat” with “Yes, the kitty is eating”).

Early Childhood (2–6)

What You Might Observe:

• Rapid advances in vocabulary and syntax
• Incomplete understandings of many simple words (e.g., undergeneralization, overgeneralization, confusion between simple comparatives such as more vs. less)
• Overregularization (e.g., foots, gooder, goed)
• Overdependence on word order and context (instead of syntax) when interpreting messages
• Superficial understanding of what “good listening” is
• Difficulty pronouncing some phonemes and blends (e.g., r, th, sl, dr)
• Increasing ability to construct narratives

Diversity:

• Children raised in bilingual environments may show slight delays in language development, but any delays are short-lived and usually not a cause for concern.
• Major speech and communication disorders (e.g., abnormal syntactic constructions) reveal themselves in the preschool years.

Implications:

• Read age-appropriate storybooks as a way of enhancing vocabulary.
• Give children corrective feedback when their use of words indicates inaccurate understanding.
• Work on simple listening skills (e.g., sitting quietly, paying attention).
• Ask follow-up questions to make sure that children accurately understand important messages.
• Ask children to construct narratives about recent events (e.g., “Tell me about your camping trip last weekend”).

Middle Childhood (6–10)

What You Might Observe:

• Increasing understanding of temporal words (e.g., before, after) and comparatives (e.g., bigger, as big as)
• Incomplete knowledge of irregular word forms
• Literal interpretation of messages (especially before age 9)
• Pronunciation mastered by age 8
• Consideration of a listener’s knowledge and perspective when speaking
• Sustained conversations about concrete topics
• Construction of narratives with plots and cause-effect relationships
• Linguistic creativity and wordplay (e.g., rhymes, word games)

Diversity:

• Some minor speech and communication disorders (e.g., persistent articulation problems) become evident and can be addressed by specialists.
• African Americans often show advanced ability to use figurative language (e.g., metaphor, hyperbole).
• Bilingual children are apt to show advanced metalinguistic awareness.

Implications:

• Teach irregular word forms (e.g., the superlative form of bad is worst, the past tense of bring is brought).
• Use group discussions as a way to explore academic subject matter.
• Have children develop short stories that they present orally or in writing.
• Encourage jokes and rhymes that capitalize on double meanings and homonyms (sound-alike words).
• When articulation problems are evident in the upper elementary grades, consult with a speech-language pathologist.

Early Adolescence (10–14)

What You Might Observe:

• Increasing awareness of the terminology used in various academic disciplines
• Ability to understand complex, multiclause sentences
• Emerging ability to look beyond literal interpretations; comprehension of simple proverbs
• Emerging ability to carry on lengthy conversations about abstract topics
• Significant growth in metalinguistic awareness

Diversity:

• Frequent readers tend to have larger vocabularies.
• Girls are more likely than boys to converse about intimate and confidential matters.
• African American teens may bandy insults back and forth in a playful manner.
• Adolescents may prefer to use their native dialects even if they have mastered Standard English (see discussion in “Ethnic Differences” section).

Implications:

• Begin to use the terminology used by experts in various academic disciplines (e.g., simile in language arts, theory in science).
• Use classroom debates to explore controversial issues.
• Present proverbs and ask children to consider possible underlying meanings.
• Explore the nature of words and language as entities in and of themselves.