SPEECH DEVELOPMENT BY AGE

  • By age 3 your child’s speech should be 75% understandable, and by age 4 at or near 100% understandable.

  • Between ages 3 and 4 your child should be able to say the following speech sounds in words and phrases : /p/, /b/, /m/, /n/, /t/,/d/, /k/, /g/, /f/, /s/, /y/, /h/.

  • Between ages 5-6 your child should be able to say the following speech sounds in words and sentences: /p/, /b/, /m/, /n/, /t/,/d/, /k/, /g/, /f/, /s/, /y/, /h/, “sh”, “ch”, “j”, /z/, /L/, and /v/.

  • Your child should be able to say the /r/ and /th/ sounds in conversation.

  • Your child should be proficient in all speech sounds at the conversational speech level.

When to schedule a speech therapy evaluation

  • Your child is not developing speech sounds expected for their age.

  • Your child is frustrated when communicating. They become upset when you can’t understand them or ask them to repeat themself

  • Your child is unable to clearly communicate their wants, needs and ideas

  • Your child is having difficulty communicating with adults and other children in the community

  • Your child has a history of hearing loss/ chronic ear infection and is not developing speech sounds at the expected rate for their age

  • If you have a family history of speech, language and/or reading difficulty, your child may be at an increased risk for a speech or language delay.

  • Your school age child is having difficulty learning letter sounds, and having difficulty sounding out words for reading and spelling

  • Difficulty telling stories, either made up or real may indicate a language delay. Does your child have a hard time explaining what they did over the weekend? Can they make up a pretend story? Can they retell the plot of a book or a movie? Difficulty with these skills may indicate need for a language evaluation