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Developmental milestones for speech and language are markers to determine whether a child has any delays and needs therapy.
They are incorporated into evaluation testing, and let us specifically compare skills with a group of kids who have been used for normative data.
A lot of people do not realize how important speech and language is during infancy.
During that time a child is learning to make eye contact, imitate sounds, and learning vowels, and making "stop" sounds.
By the end of the first year, children should be able to understand what things are called, such as body parts, or where is "mommy" or "daddy" and be able to point.
Once a toddler is 12 to 18 months, they should have 50 words in their vocabulary.
By 2 years of age, a child should have 250 words and be able to put words into sentences, as well as follow simple directions.
At the 3 year mark, a person "unfamiliar" to the child should be able to understand at least 75% of what the child says.
Should be able to say 4 or 5 word sentences without difficulty, and by the time the child enters Kindergarten they should have mastered 90% of grammatical structures and sounds needed through adulthood.
Pediatricians may do a "well child" questionnaire, or "ASQ" to determine if the child has delays. This will tell if the child has passed or failed the initial screening. If they fail the screening, the parent should request a speech evaluation.
If the child is birth to under 3 years of age, the parent can go through the Infant-Toddler (ITS) program, or if the child is 3 to 5 years old they can go through the local preschool program to get a free evaluation.
