Speech and Language Development

3 - 3 ½ years

Articulation/Speech:

• Pronounces final consonants of words most of the time
• Consonants mastered: m, n, ing, w, h, p, b, t, d, k, g, f
• Is approximately 80% intelligible

Receptive Language:

• Comprehends approximately 1,200 words
• Knows “in front of” and “behind” when object with a logical front and back are used
• Identifies hard/soft, rough/smooth
• Identifies circle and square
• Responds to commands involving two actions or objects
• Can match colors
• Knows night and day

Expressive Language:

• Uses/says approximately 800 words
• Responds appropriately to simple “how” questions
• Can answer two-three questions, “what do you do when you are hungry/sleepy/cold?”
• Beginning of question asking stage, mainly asks “what” and “who” questions
• Names 8 to 10 pictures
• States actions “I ran”
• Supplies the last word of a line, “the apple is on the…(tree)”
• Counts three objects, pointing to each
• Average sentence length is four to five words
• Follows basic commands with prepositional phrases “Put the block under the chair”
  

Grammar/Syntax:

• Begins to use “is” at the beginning of a question
• Third-person singular present tense is emerging “he runs”
• Uses contracted forms of modals (won’t, can’t)
• Irregular plural forms emerging (child/children)
• Uses “are” with plural nouns (boys are running)
• Uses “and” as conjunction
• Regular plural forms are consistent
• Uses is, are and am in sentences

Play:

• Begins to play cooperatively with other children
• Organizes doll furniture accurately and begins to use genuinely imaginative play
• Reenacts experienced events such as a birthday party, baking cookies
• Uses one object to represent another (stick = phone or sword)
• Assumes the role of another person (parent, doctor, teacher)
• Requests permission
• Begins using language for fantasies, jokes, teasing
• Corrects self, repairs conversation when others do not understand
• Corrects others
• Early story telling emerges