The Talking Eighteen Month Old
Communication Milestones For Early Speech and Language Skills
A Specialist Paediatric Speech-Language Pathologist outlines the early language and communication skills to expect at 18 months of age and provides tips.
By 18 months of age toddlers are attempting to vocalise to music, have learnt how to say “no” and hopefully have about twenty words in their vocabulary. They usually know and use their own name, talk to themselves using made-up words and start to imitate two-word phrases.
Communication and Early Language Skills of Eighteen Month Old
- Says up to twenty words
- Understands most nouns
- Participates in nursery rhymes and songs
- Talks in jargon
- Says "no"
- Uses their own name
- Imitates the last word of phrases heard
- Uses words to help have their needs met (e.g. “more”)
- Imitates sounds
- Imitates two word phrases
- Tries to sing and hum the words of songs
- Can hear and discriminate different sounds
- Acknowledges familiar faces in photos
- Starts to identify body parts by pointing
- Can turn pages of a book
- Able to follow simple instructions
How to Encourage Early Communication and Language Skills in an Eighteen Month Old
Parents are inundated with all kinds of suggestions regarding how to raise a child. Often this may make people feel that unless children have the latest gadgets, their development is going to be delayed. It’s important to remember that for non-fussy toddlers there are plenty of inexpensive play-based ideas to encourage language development.
- Talk to toddlers and include them in family conversations
- Don't allow older siblings to constantly talk for younger children
- Emphasise and repeat single words for toddlers to imitate
- Simplify language when talking to toddlers, as this helps them to imitate adults
- Make opportunities to use language in everyday activities
- Use books to teach new words so as to help build language and literacy skills
- Look at simple rip-proof books together (cardboard, fabric or plastic pages), verbally labeling objects on pages
- Make your own books with a simple word and picture on each page (involve toddlers by allowing them to put paste on the back of pictures)
- Model two-word phrases that include words that are already in the toddlers vocabulary
- Sing with toddlers, as music assists language development
- Imitate sounds, actions & words that toddlers make
- Initiate sound play (e.g. farm animal noises, transport noises)
- Provide inexpensive early development toys (blocks, books, stacking cups, cause-and-effect toys, cars, balls, crayons, farm animals, stuffed toys)
Children develop at their own pace. The expected milestones listed above are considered to reflect where most toddlers are developmentally by eighteen months, however, not all children will have all of these skills, and some will be further ahead. If concerns arise regarding a child's speech and language development, it is best to make an appointment with a speech and language therapist/speech pathologist as soon as possible. Early intervention can make an enormous difference to language delays when identified in the younger years.
