SPEECH, LANGUAGE & COMMUNICATION

Every baby is born with over 100 billion brain cells and only 15% are connected up at birth. Experiences and interactions are what make brain connections and every child is born with the same huge potential.

Speech, language and communication are central life skills. They are linked to social and emotional development, learning, attainment, behaviour, as well as mental health and wellbeing. Speech refers to saying sounds accurately and in the right places in words. Language refers to understanding and making sense of what people say and communication refers to how we interact with others.

CREATING A POSITIVE HOME LEARNING ENVIRONMENT can be developed using three simple concepts:

Chat: encourage talking but crucially, reciprocal communication

Play: language thrives when children interact and explore in a playful and creative manner

Read: sharing books, parents and children talking together

Age Milestone Caregiving behaviours that support the milestone

(information taken from Department of Health Home Learning Table).

Below you will find behaviours associated with your child’s age, along with recommendations for healthy development.

It should be noted that development in young children is not linear, the age-range stated here is indicative of when a child should reach a milestone and we recognise that not all children develop typically.

Speech, Language and Communication Stage:

At around 15 weeks gestation your baby will start to hear – they may hear muted sounds from the outside world and any noises your digestive system makes, as well as the sound of your voice and heart.

Recommendation:

Talk and sing to your baby, knowing he or she can hear you.

From birth to 1 month

Speech, Language and Communication Stage:

Babies can recognise and turn their head towards their parent’s voice. Makes pre-speech lip and tongue movements in response to talk41. Demonstrates a strong preference for human faces.

Recommendation:

Spend time together face-to-face – see if baby can copy your tongue sticking out, blink your eyes, make lip sounds. Talk to your baby about anything and everything in a gentle, even voice when your baby is awake and try to make eye contact. Feeding and cleaning provide particularly good opportunities to start a ‘conversation’.

Speech, Language and Communication Stage:

Vocalises delightedly in response to chat or enjoyable play Recognises the difference between happy and sad faces and can copy simple facial movements. Responds to positive touch and can see, hear and smell. Can discern whether a person’s gaze is towards/away from them or if people are behaving in a socially contingent way.

Recommendation:

Talk to them in an animated, tuneful voice with lots of smiles, laughter and facial expressions. Respond to baby’s movements and communication – copy the noises they make. Interpret their sounds and say what they are trying to tell you. Sing songs and rhymes with actions or lots of repetition. Play with your baby following predictable routines, but also contain an element of surprise. ‘Body’ or ‘lap’ games that include tickling or tactile stimulation, such as ‘mousie creep’ or ‘koochy-koo’ are especially liked by babies during the first few months of life.

Speech, Language and Communication Stage:

Babies can recognise own name. Expresses a range of emotions such as pleasure, fear and excitement through facial expressions, vocalisations and body language. Begins to engage in babbling that replicates the pitch and tone of adult speech. Shows clear like, dislike, acceptance and rejection of experiences42. Can track the gaze of others and share attention towards an object, such as a household item or a toy.

Recommendation:

Continue to do the above, and chat with your baby (without distraction), look at them. Respond to infant babbling as if they are initiating a conversation. Describe your baby’s emotions as you speak to them. Use daily activities as an opportunity to stimulate your baby’s learning (e.g. go outside and smell a flower).

Speech, Language and Communication Stage:

Babies will start to respond when others are chatting to them. Canonical/reduplicative babbling begins – babies tunefully using repetitive sounds in a sing-song tone. Babies start to understand routines, simple words and activities. Looks around the environment at people, objects and things that are happening. Responds when name is called.

Recommendation:

Talk and sing while rocking them, walking with them and doing actions with them, e.g. ‘round and round the garden’, ‘heads, shoulders, knees and toes’. Point out pictures in books and things of interest in the environment around you. Make lots of actions and gestures along with speech – use gestures and actions to help your child understand what you say, e.g. saying “bye bye” and waving. Respond when your baby tries to communicate. Take the time to have “conversations” with your baby with each of you taking turns. Use every day experiences such as shopping or going to the park as a chance to point things out and name things. Use books with textures that your baby can feel.

Speech, Language and Communication Stage:

Gesturing and joint attention – baby looks to where another person points.

Recommendation:

Gain your child’s attention and talk to them about things as they happen gesturing to increase their understanding. Object play – using every day objects, infants understand they can communicate and share information. Joins in with give-and-take games. Makes requests by pointing. Imitates playful vocalisations and actions, e.g. cough, smacking lips. Shows understanding of a few every day object words and words embedded in familiar routines, e.g. bedtime. Baby’s first words. Understands “no” and “bye bye”. Join in play activities with your child, let them lead the play using objects and toys they are interested in. Talk about the things they explore or look at. Use words and simple phrases and lots of repetition. Tell your child the name of things when they point to them. Play ‘people games’ like ‘Row, Row, Row Your Boat’ and get other family members to join in. Let baby turn the pages in books.

Speech, Language and Communication Stage:

At around 18 months, children will know around 50 words and can say about 20. Children use sounds to represent meaning, e.g. “moo” for a cow. Starting to form sentences – combining two words, e.g. “doggy gone”. Can follow simple commands in context, e.g. “come here”, “give it to me”. Follows two-part instructions.

Recommendation:

Building on the ideas above, chat and play with the things that interest your child. Ask them what they want to sing, play with or read. Play, sing and read together. Name objects and offer choices to build vocabulary. When you are playing, ask your child to hand you items you ask for, e.g. teddy, book, ball. Talk about what you are doing together – use words for actions as well as things. Use short simple sentences. Encourage use of and play with sounds. Introduce more songs and rhymes using gestures and objects to reinforce key words. Share picture books with your child and help them to name the pictures. Ask them to find familiar objects in books.

Speech, Language and Communication Stage:

Understanding of words and phrases grows quickly during this time. Children of this age understand between 200-500 words. Uses “no” or “not” in phrases. Refers to past/future events. Asks questions, e.g. “What’s that?” Can pick out objects by function, e.g. which one do we drink from? Uses pronouns “I”, “me” and “you”. Uses descriptive concepts, e.g. big/little.

Recommendation:

Continue doing the activities above and build on children’s talk, e.g. Child: “Dog!”, adult: “Yes, a big dog”. Tap out the beat to songs and rhymes. When playing with your child, give a running commentary on what they are doing, using action words, describing words, position words and feelings as well as object words. Engage in conversations about feelings and important memories. Encourage the child to talk about the future and anticipate events.

Speech, Language and Communication Stage:

Ability to form multi clause questions and narrative skills develop. Phonological awareness grows. Can listen to stories with increasing attention and recall. Joins in with repeated refrains and anticipates key events and phrases in rhymes and stories. Understands sentences of three to four information-carrying words (at 4 years). Uses pronouns “he”, “she” and “they” (36-40 months). Asks questions – “Why?” (36-42 months). Uses language to pretend (42-48 months).

Recommendation:

Tell your child about your day. Ask your child questions about what happened in their day, helping them to use memory and to talk about things that happened in the past. Play make-believe games together or games which use opposites such as on or off, big or little. Reverse roles when you are playing together so your child gives you instructions, e.g. brush teddy’s hair, wash dolly’s feet. Play rhyming games – can your child come up with a word that rhymes with “cat”?

Further information

Children’s Aided Language Tools CHAT

Download visual cards to aid with communication (The communication Resource Centre)

What to do if your child is struggling to understand (liaise with speech therapist for this section)