Language Development Milestones for Toddlers
Worrying about whether or not your toddler is meeting language development milestones?
This post covers all things toddler communication. We’re going to walk you through the milestones, what they mean, and what to expect step-by-step. Essentially, it’s everything you need to know, do, and watch for from age 1 to age 3.
We’re Katie and Carly, speech therapists and moms of 6 kids between us. We’d love to help you make sense of the language development milestones for toddlers!
Track Your Toddler’s Language Development
If you think your toddler may need speech therapy, the first step you should take is to review the language development milestones and start to track which ones your toddler is meeting—or not meeting.
We make reviewing and tracking these milestones really easy with our free toddler language milestones checklist. We recommend grabbing your copy and having it handy as you read the rest of this post.
What Are Toddler Language Development Milestones?
What is a speech milestone? And how is it different from an average? If you’re new to the world of language development, chances are you’re hearing both words a lot! So we want to give you clarity on what they mean.
Milestone: A skill or behavior that 90% of children typically demonstrate within a specific age range.
Average: A skill or behavior that nearly half of kids typically demonstrate.
There’s a big range of what’s considered typical when it comes to toddler language development. For example, a child at 24 months saying anywhere between 50-300 words would be considered to be on track with their development.
This is why it’s so important not to compare your child to other kids. Instead, look at them as an individual and refer to evidence-based milestones and averages from trusted sources (like this one) when determining if your toddler’s language development is on track.
Why Language Milestones Matter
Milestones matter because they can help us understand exactly what children need support with while giving us a complete picture of the language skills they’ll need to have before they can speak and communicate.
Many parents we work with are very focused on talking (which is made up of “expressive language” milestones), but understanding language (“receptive language”) is just as important. In fact, it’s essential for reciprocal communication!
If you notice your child isn’t meeting milestones, get them support as early as you can. Early intervention is key to helping our children catch up or make progress.
Remember to download our toddler development milestones checklist so you can follow along with your child’s development!
If, at any point along the way, you start to get concerned about your child’s development, know that it’s not your fault and that there is support available. (We can help you through our online courses, and you can also seek out speech and language therapy!)
Speech & Language Milestones at Age 1
The main speech and language milestones we’d expect a typically-developing child to demonstrate at age one are babbling, gesturing to get and keeping your attention, imitating you or others, and even saying their first words. (Such an exciting time!)
Babbling
Children at this age are still babbling a lot and making a variety of sounds, like mimi, upup, babababa, or their own little combinations. Encourage your little one to be NOISY by acknowledging their sounds and even repeating their babbling sounds back to them.
Related: How To Encourage Babbling
First Words
First words tend to appear by age 12 months. Wondering if things like animal sounds, signs, and exclamations like “Uh Oh!” count? Check out our complete guide to first words.
Gestures
Make sure your one-year-old is using sounds and gestures to get and keep your attention, especially by pointing to things. Look for all the ways they’re communicating with you that don’t include words, like reaching to be picked up, shaking their head for no, and waving goodbye. These are such great skills that lead to eventually saying more words!
Imitation
Children’s imitation skills begin to improve a lot at age one as they start to move from imitating your gestures and movements to imitating your speech. Encourage your little one to copy you in a fun way. Remember, the words they copy don’t need to be pronounced correctly to “count”.
Speech & Language Milestones at Age 18 Months
18 months of age is an exciting time in language development. It’s pretty amazing to watch their vocabulary start to grow! It can feel like they’re adding a new word everyday.
Vocabulary
The speech and language milestones you can expect your child to meet at age 18 months are BIG increases in vocabulary. They are learning new words every day! Typically, you’ll start to see this major increase in words between 18 and 24 months.
When To Seek Support
According to the CDC, you should seek support if at 18 months, your toddler:
Doesn’t point to show things to others
Can’t walk
Doesn’t know what familiar things are for
Doesn’t copy others
Doesn’t gain new words
Doesn’t have at least 6 words
Doesn’t notice or mind when a caregiver leaves or returns
Loses skills they once had
Speech & Language Milestones at Age 2
At age 2, your child has likely met so many speech and language milestones that you won’t be able to believe that there’s still more to come. They understand so much, they’re starting to combine words into 2-word “sentences”, and they’re vocabulary is booming!
Vocabulary
By age 2, toddlers are typically saying about 200-300 words, on average.
Again, these words do not need to be pronounced perfectly. Toddlers typically do things like leaving off the last syllable of a word (“ba” for ball), and that’s completely normal. Focus more on the meaning of the words they’re conveying to you, and look for correct pronunciation of the sounds p, b, m, h, and w.
2-Word Combinations
You’ll likely notice your toddler using more and more words all. the. time! They’ll label pictures in books, and ask questions like, “what’s that?” or “where’s kitty?” They’ll also be saying two-word phrases such as “daddy book”, “more milk”, and “no car.”
Remember that with development, there is always an age range when skills develop. The milestone is combining two words to make short phrases, but by age two, many toddlers can combine several words together. (This is when the comparison can really creep in. It’s also why we tell you to focus on the milestones, not what other children can do.)
Comprehension
Toddlers are understanding a LOT more at this age. They enjoy listening to songs and stories (our Songs + Stories membership is perfect to start at this age). They can also point to a few basic body parts, follow simple directions like, “Get the cup”, and point to pictures in books. And, they understand simple questions.
Speech & Language Milestones at Age 3
By age three, toddlers have a word for almost everything and they can talk about things that aren’t in the room, like a birthday party they attended or a store they went to. They’re also using phrases made up of two or three words (or more) to talk about and ask for things. And, they begin to ask more complex questions, like 1.5 million “why?” questions 😂
Stuttering
It’s still pretty typical for a child at age three to repeat sounds and words, almost as if they’re stuttering. If that’s a concern of yours, know that it’s a very common phase, and often something they grow out of.
Related: Help! I Think My Child Has Started Stuttering
Intelligibility
It’s also very common and totally okay if you can’t understand everything your three-year-old is saying. As long as you can understand about 75% of their speech, they’re on track!
Up to about 2 years, you can expect to understand about 50% or less of what you child has to say. From 2-3, expect that to grow to being able to understand about 75%. By age 5, you should be able to understand nearly everything your child is saying.
One reason it can be hard to understand what our toddlers say is that different speech sounds develop at different times. So while they might have words like “puppy” and “hat” down pat, words with more complex sounds like “think” and “shopping” won’t come easily to them until much later. That’s because the “sh” sound usually doesn’t develop until around age 4, and the “th” sound starts to develop around ages 5 and 6.
Worried At 3? Don’t Wait & See!
See how things are already getting so complex and rich with their language by age 3? That’s why we tell parents not to “wait and see” when it comes to developing language. The skills build upon each other, so we want to make sure our children are getting the support they need as soon as they need it.
Free Checklist: Language Development Milestones for Toddlers
We created a detailed language development milestones checklist for toddlers that you can print out and check off as your toddler grows and learns!
When you download it, you’ll also receive insight into the skills that your toddler learns before age one. These are called “pretalking” skills, and although they’re a critical part of language development, they’re often overlooked.