Overview
We use our lips, teeth, tongue, palate, and voice to make speech sounds so that people can understand what we say.
Some children have difficulty making speech sounds, putting sounds together, hearing/perceiving speech, or thinking about speech. Some children have difficulty with one or two sounds. Other children have difficulty with many consonants and vowels and are hard for others to understand.
Speech pathologists help children with speech difficulties.
For most children, there is no known cause for their speech difficulties. For some children, known reasons include: hearing loss, cleft palate, or a family member has had speech difficulties.
Some terms used to describe different types of speech difficulties in children include:
- speech sound disorders
- phonological disorders
- articulation disorders
- childhood apraxia of speech
- dysarthria.
See below or download a handout with definitions of common speech pathology words (glossary) (PDF 406.3KB).
| Word | Definition |
|---|---|
| Articles | A word such as a, an, or, the that is used with a noun to show a specific person or thing. |
| Augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) | Using tools or devices to help a person communicate their message. These can be high tech (for example an iPad or Lightwriter) or low tech (an alphabet board or pictures). |
| Auxiliary verbs | Verbs such as have, be, may, shall, can modify the meaning of other verbs in a sentence to show tense or form a question. |
| Aphasia/dysphasia | An acquired difficulty with language, usually after a stroke or brain injury. Aphasia can affect speaking, listening, reading and/or writing. It does not affect intelligence. |
| Articulation | The way the lips, tongue, palate and jaw move to create speech sounds. |
| Binary choice | Giving the choice between two objects, pictures or words. |
| Childhood apraxia of speech (CAS) | Difficulties planning the movements of the lips, tongue, palate and jaw to create speech sounds. |
| Communication | Exchanging messages between two or more people, by talking, writing, reading, gesturing, signing, facial expressions and many other means. |
| Conjunctions | A joining word such as and, because, then, that combines words, phrases or sentences together. |
| Descriptive language | Vivid and colourful language that describes a person, place or thing in a way that formulates a picture in the mind of a reader. |
| Dysarthria | Speech that sounds slurred, and is usually caused by muscle weakness. |
| Dysphagia | Difficulty swallowing, which can include food, drink, and/or saliva. |
| Dysphonia | A different sounding voice, for example hoarse or husky. |
| Dyspraxia | Difficulty planning and coordinating motor movements, including movements of the mouth or hands. |
| Emotion | A feeling, for example love, anger or joy. |
| Expansion | Restate and complete a child’s sentence to how an adult would say the sentence. |
| Expressive language | Using words and sentences to express meaning to others, usually by talking or writing. |
| Focused stimulation | Repeat a word or phrase many times in conversation to increase comprehension and promote language use. |
| Grammar | The rules for the way words are chosen and ordered to form sentences. |
| Language | Can refer to the content of what we say, or the system of how we say it, such as English or Chinese. Language can be verbal (spoken words or sentences), or nonverbal (writing, signing, gestures). |
| Literacy | The skills for reading and writing. |
| Modelling | Demonstrating how to use a word, phrase or sentence. |
| Narrative | A flow of language, spoken or written, for example telling or retelling a story or sequence of events. |
| Negation | A negative statement that might use words such as no, don't and can't. |
| Paediatric feeding | Children’s eating and drinking skills. This includes sucking (breast or bottle) or starting solids. |
| Parallel talk | Describing what children can see, hear or are doing as they do it. |
| Phonological awareness | The ability to hear and manipulate speech sounds within words. |
| Phonological process/pattern | An error pattern featuring replacement of one speech sound or group of speech sounds with another. |
| Pragmatics | The social way in which language is used. Pragmatics includes eye contact, turn taking, how loudly someone talks, how close they stand, the appropriateness of topic, and topic maintenance. |
| Recasting | To give information in a different way. |
| Receptive language | Understanding the words, sentences and gestures of other people. |
| Recount | To retell something that has happened. |
| Requesting | To ask for something. |
| Self talk | An adult talks about what they are doing while a child is observing, for example during cooking, or playing with playdough. |
| Semantics | The content and meaning of a person’s language. |
| Syllables | The beats a word can be broken into. For example, daddy has 2 syllables da-di and hippopotamus has 5 syllables hip-po-po-ta-mus. |
| Verb | Action word or doing word (such as playing or watching). |
| Vocabulary | Words that make up a language. All of the words known and used by a person. |
| Voice | The sound produced by the vocal cords. |
| Vocal quality | The type of sound produced by the vocal cords. For example, hoarse, husky, rough, breathy or strained. |
| Working memory | Ability to be given information, store it and recall it at a later time. For example going to the grocery store without a list and recalling what is needed. |
Ask your speech pathologist (or other health professional) if you want more information.
What is children's speech and how to help
The short video below explains:
- What is speech?
- What should a child know and when?
- How can I help a child with speech difficulties?
Children's speech
Children's speech - What it is and how to help.
What a child should know and when
Children learn to make sounds at different ages.
| Age | Sounds |
|---|---|
| 2 to 3 years | p, b, m, d, n, h, t, k, g, w, ng, f, y |
| 4 years | l, j,ch, s, v, sh, z |
| 5 years | r, zh, th (voiced) |
| 6 years | th (voiceless) |
McLeod, S., & Crowe, K. (2018). Children’s consonant acquisition in 27 languages: A cross-linguistic review. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 27, 1546–1571. doi:10.1044/2018_AJSLP-17-0100. Available from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association.
Download a printable handout (PDF 405.07KB) about the age children learn speech sounds across the world.
Preschool-aged children may still have difficulty producing long words (polysyllables, such as hippopotamus, vegetables) and two consonant sounds together (consonant clusters, such as brick, smart, splash, free). By the end of preschool they should be able to be understood by most people, even strangers.
Children make predictable error patterns as they are learning speech sounds (for example: spaghetti > ghetti, sun > dun, fish > bish, rabbit > wabbit). There are certain ages that most children stop using different error patterns.
Sometimes children might make errors with sounds in words, even though you have heard them say the sounds correctly before. There are many reasons why this may happen. Some words are more complex than others because of the other sounds in the word, or the length of the words (e.g., ambulance). It is also more difficult to say words that are not spoken very often (low frequency words).
Visit the links below for information about children’s speech sound development at different ages:
- Words For Life - Milestones (Select the appropriate age range).
- Speech Pathology Australia - Fact sheets (Download: The Sounds of Speech: 0 to 3 years).
What you can do to help
There are ways that you can help children learn sounds. You can:
Model sounds in your own talking. Give examples of how sounds are used when you talk with children. They do not have to say the sounds after you.
Child: I see a tow!
Adult: Oh, you see the cow? It’s a big cow isn’t it!
Another example is when a child is leaving the end sound off a word and an adult is modelling (showing) how to correct it:
Child: (pointing to nose) “My no”
Adult: “There’s your nose! Here’s my nose! Let’s try to put our end sound on nose”
Praise children if they try to say the word after you. It is okay if they do not copy you.
Avoid practising mistakes. Avoid asking children for repeated attempts at saying words if they are having trouble – they may become frustrated and make it more difficult to learn the correct sound.
Printable handouts
Here are some handouts with practical activities/ideas you can do with children to help their speech sound development.
Download the one-page summary for tips on helping children learn speech sounds (PDF 817.39KB).
Helping children to learn sounds at the start of words
Download the speech sounds (PDF 2.71MB) resource for the complete collection of speech sound handouts (consonants at the start of words). The handouts include suggested rhymes, play-based activities, and books that provide opportunities for children to hear and learn about speech sounds at the start of words.
Sounds by place and manner
These handouts are grouped by where and how sounds are made (for example sounds made with air coming through the nose, sounds made with the tongue up at the back of the mouth) and include information about common error patterns that children make as they are learning sounds.
Some sounds are in more than one handout (for example, ‘s’ is a ‘front sound’ and a ‘long sound’).
- Back sounds (PDF 880.52KB) – sounds made at the back of your mouth (k, g, ng)
- Front sounds (PDF 1.25MB) – sounds made at the front of your mouth (t, d, n, l, s, z)
- Lip sounds (PDF 1.25MB) – sounds made with your lips together (p, b, m, f, v, w)
- Nose sounds (PDF 848.17KB) – sounds made through your nose (m, n, ng)
- Explosive sounds (PDF 816.7KB) – sounds made with an explosion of air (ch, j)
- Liquid sounds (PDF 885.56KB) – (l, r)
- Long sounds (PDF 1.36MB) – sounds made with a long flow of air (f, v, h, s, z, sh, th)
- Short sounds (PDF 1.3MB) – sounds made with a short puff of air (p, b, t, d, k, g)
- End sounds (PDF 683.66KB) – sounds at the end of words
- Friendly sounds (consonant clusters) (PDF 954.58KB) – 2 or 3 consonants together in words
More information
Visit these websites for more information about supporting children’s speech development:
- Dr Caroline Bowen’s website has information for families about encouraging children’s speech development.
- American Speech-Language-Hearing Association has detailed information about speech sound disorders.
- I CAN Children’s Communication Charity (UK) has information about children’s communication development.
Check with your local library for story time or other children’s groups you might join.
Please note: This web page has been developed for families by Western NSW Local Health District and Charles Sturt University, as part of a NSW Health Translational Research Grant titled “Waiting for speech pathology: Device versus advice?”.