I sometimes feel like my 3-year-old daughter is not as talkative as my friends’ kids. How do I know if my child is talking enough or when I need to consult a speech therapist?
A large part of my job is reassuring parents that their children are developing normally. There is such a wide spectrum of normal when it comes to language acquisition and development. A good rule of thumb is that by three years of age, a child should be stringing three words together into a sentence, and their speech should be 75% understandable to an observer. One child who may be able to tell stories in detail and paint imaginative pictures with their prose may be just as cognitively capable as another who is not as wordy. By the time they both reach kindergarten, it may be impossible to tell who has had the earlier start in speaking. The brain’s synaptic connections continue to form during this time. For some, it may be a slow, steady process of acquiring new words and developing more complex sentences and storytelling, while for others, the change can be as dramatic as a light switch flicking on.
If your child is in school or group classes, reach out to your child’s teacher to receive feedback on how they are doing. Your child’s educators should have their fingers on the pulse of their progress. They may also have strategies to improve language development and offer resources and recommendations, including whether a speech therapy evaluation may be appropriate. Many children may be slow to talk in public or shy around others. Carving out small group play dates or one-on-one activities with a peer may allow guards to come down and lead to an increase in verbal expression.
Reading, singing, narrating the day, and limiting screen time are all ways we can help a child’s language bloom. Studies show the more spoken words a child is exposed to by a caregiver at home, the higher the verbal IQ and development.
