Children are born ready to learn a language. Still, they need to understand the language or languages that their family and environment use. Learning a language takes time, and children vary in how quickly they master language and speech development milestones. Typically developing children may have trouble with some sounds, words, and sentences while they are learning. However, most children can use language easily, around five years of age.

Parents and caregivers are the most critical teachers during a child’s early years. Children learn language by listening to others speak and by practicing. Even young babies notice when others repeat and respond to the noises and sounds they make. Children’s language and brain skills get stronger if they hear many different words. Parents can help their children learn in many different ways, such as:

• Responding to the first sounds, gurgles, and gestures a baby makes.
• Repeating what the child says and adding to it.
• Talking about the things that a child sees.
• Asking questions and listening to the answers.
• Looking at or reading books.
• Telling stories.
• Singing songs and sharing rhymes.

These activities can happen both during playtime and during daily routines.