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As a parent, the first few years of your child's life is filled with constant change. Just when you feel like you get in a routine, they grow some more and you learn to adapt to their new developmental needs. With each change, there are milestones you are looking for your child to meet. Babbling, crawling, walking, waving, potty training, knowing colors, counting, speaking in sentences, writing their name...and the list goes on.
In this post, I will focus on the "milestones" related to the sounds children should be able to say clearly and at what age. There is NEW research (published in November 2018) to help guide parents, educators, physicians, and Speech Language Pathologists in knowing "what sounds should my child be able to say?".
Some of these sounds are self explanatory, but others are a little complicated. So here are some example words with each of the sounds:
p: puppy
b: bunny
m: mom
d: dad
n: no
h: hat
t: tummy
k: cat, cake (there is no "c" sound, when you see a "c" in a word it makes either a s or k sound)
g: goat
w: window
ng: swing
f: fish
y: yuck
l: lion
j: jump
ch: chair
s: snake
v: vase
sh: shoe
z: buzz
r: rose
zh: garage
th (voiced): the
th (voiceless): earth
If you have any concerns that your child isn't able to say the sounds at their age level, bring it up to their pediatrician or seek out a Speech Language Pathologist in your area for an evaluation. Don't agree to wait if your child is not able to clearly say certain sounds. I am a BIG advocate for early intervention! Not only because research has shown it is more effective but also think of how many times your child will practice saying a sound the incorrect way EACH DAY if they go without intervention.
If while reading this list you are thinking that your child can say the sounds, but always seems to leave off the ends of words or can't say the sounds in longer words like "banana" or "butterfly". Difficulties with sounds in particular words and word shapes is related to articulation but are called Phonological Process Errors. I will write on that in a separate post very soon! Stay tuned.
Thanks for stopping by!
-Courtney Floersch, M.S., CCC-SLP
Sources:
McLeod, S. & Crowe, K. (2018). Children’s consonant acquisition in 27 languages: A cross-linguistic review. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology. doi:10.1044/2018_AJSLP-17-0100. Available from: https://ajslp.pubs.asha.org/article.aspx?articleid=2701897