• Avoid asking the child to say something ‘properly’.
• Concentrate on what the child is saying, rather than how. Instead of correcting, give the child good ‘speech models’. For example, if the child comes up to you and says ‘I drawed a tat’, accept it by saying ‘That’s a nice cat’, ‘It’s a fluffy cat’, emphasising the word ‘cat’.
• Show the child you are listening to them by presenting him/her with the correct ‘speech model’.
• Stop and wait – give the child the space to have a go, and see if they repeat it on their own. Many children will, but it’s important that they do not feel forced to repeat the word.
• If you have difficulties understanding what a child is saying, ask the child to ‘show you’ what s/he is talking about, encouraging him/her to point or gesture alongside what s/he says.

Speech Sound Development Chart

Speech and sound awareness

Between the ages of 0-6 months babies experiment with a variety of vocalizations including squeals, growls, yells, and the production of “raspberries”.

At around 6 months your baby will start to babble using the same sound e.g., ba ba ba, ma ma ma, da da da. Babies then go on to babbling using a mix of different sounds and also use adult- like intonation so that their utterances sound like real questions or exclamations.

Activity sheet

Speech and sound awareness

Around this age your child will start to say their first words. These early words may not become ‘distinct’ (clear) for some time. At the earliest stages, words and sounds are simple, usually consisting of only a consonant and vowel, or with the consonant and vowel repeated. e.g. mama, dada, no, tea, wowwow, byebye.

It is common for consonants at the ends of words to be missed off at this stage, and because of the limited range of speech sounds, many words may appear similar, e.g. “da” may be used for ‘that’, ‘daddy’, ‘cat’, ‘car’, etc.

At this age developing a child’s listening skills will enable them to focus their attention on specific sounds, crucial for them to focus their attention on speech sounds when they are ready to acquire these.

Activity sheet

Speech and sound awareness

At this age there is a great deal of variability in the acquisition of speech sounds. The sounds that are starting to develop include p, m, h, n, w and b.

Activity sheet

Pictures of ‘Noisy Things’

Animal Pictures

Speech and sound awareness

At 3 years of age, children are usually able to:

• Recite familiar rhymes e.g. ‘Jack and Jill’
• Produce rhyme by pattern e.g. give the word “bat” as a rhyming word for “cat”
• Recognise alliteration (words beginning with the same first sound), e.g. “blue, butterfly, they’re the same”

Children are learning a wide range of sounds around age 3. These include: m, n, h, p, ng, w, d, t, y, b, g, and k. Some of these sounds will have been used by some children before this age – children can vary as to which of these early sounds they learn first. Around age 3 and a half, children also start to use the speech sound ‘f’

Activity sheet
Listening to Sounds // All Ages
Listening to Speech Sounds in Words // All Ages
Listening to Individual Speech Sounds // All Ages

Nursery rhymes

Speech and sound awareness

4 years: At this age, children are learning the sound ‘l’, but might produce this as ‘y’ (e.g. light pronounced as ‘yight’). They are also learning the sounds ‘sh’ and ‘ch’, but may pronounce these with a ‘t’or ‘s’ instead (e.g. ‘Shop’ becomes ‘top’ or ‘sop’, ‘Chair’ becomes ‘tair’ or ‘sair’).

4 and a half years: At this age, children are learning the sounds ‘s’, ‘z’ and ‘j’. These sounds may also be pronounced as ‘t’ or ‘d’, e.g. ‘Sun’ becomes ‘tun’, ‘Zip’ becomes ‘dip’. 5 years: Children are now learning the speech sound ‘r’. This can be pronounced as ‘w’ initially, e.g. ‘rain’ is pronounced as ‘wain’.Children’s speech between the ages of 4-5 years old will still contain substitutions for some speech sounds, as detailed above. However, their speech should be easy to understand to people outside of their immediate family, and when speaking in and out of context.

Children’s awareness of sounds within words is developing at this age. These skills are crucial pre-literacy skills. They will be able to recognise that two words rhyme, and suggest their own rhyming words (real or nonsense words). They will be able to break words up into syllables (e.g. ‘happy’ has two beats), and are just learning to count single sounds (phonemes) within words (e.g. know that ‘cat’ contains 3 sounds, c-a-t).

Activity sheet
Listening to Sounds // All Ages
Listening to Speech Sounds in Words // All Ages
Listening to Individual Speech Sounds // All Ages