How Languages are Learned | fourth edition | Patsy M.

Lightbown and Nina

Spada

Supplementary Activity 1.1: Milestones of

vocal/linguistic development
Below is an alphabetical list of descriptors that characterize some of the things
children are able to do with language at different ages. In the Table below,
match the descriptors with the age ranges. Note that there are 18 descriptors
and 12 age ranges, so you will want to enter more than one descriptor on some
lines.
• Babbles repetitive consonant-vowel strings (for example, ba ba ba)
• Babbles with sentence intonation (for example, ba BA ba ba!)
• Begins to use grammatical morphemes and function words
• Combines words to make ‘telegraphic’ sentences
• Cries only because of discomfort or hunger
• Discriminates among similar language sounds (for example, pa and ba)
• Has a vocabulary of about 50 words
• Has a vocabulary of several thousand words
• Knows ‘cake the eat’ is silly but doesn’t know why
• Learns to use different ‘voices’ with different interlocutors
• Learns to use different language registers for different
social/academic situations
• Makes cooing sounds
• Makes some consonant-vowel sounds
• Produces ‘first word’
• Shows literacy-based metalinguistic awareness
• Starts to ask lots of ‘why’ questions
• Takes into account what listener knows (for example, on the telephone)
• Understands a few words

How Languages are Learned | fourth edition | © Oxford University

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Age Description of language development
Birth to 1 month • Cries only because of discomfort or hunger
• Makes cooing sounds

1 to 3 months • Babbles repetitive consonant-vowel strings (for

example, ba ba ba)
• Makes some consonant-vowel sounds

3–6 months • Babbles with sentence intonation (for example, ba

BA ba ba!)
• Understands a few words

6–9 months • Discriminates among similar language sounds (for

example, pa and ba)

9–12 months • Produces ‘first word’

12–18 months • Has a vocabulary of about 50 words

18–24 months • Begins to use grammatical morphemes and

function words

24–36 months • Combines words to make ‘telegraphic’ sentences

3–4 years • Starts to ask lots of ‘why’ questions

• Knows ‘cake the eat’ is silly but doesn’t know why

4–6 years • Learns to use different ‘voices’ with different

interlocutors
• Takes into account what listener know (for
example, on the telephone)
6–8 years • Has a vocabulary of several thousand words
• Shows literacy-based metalinguistic awareness

How Languages are Learned | fourth edition | © Oxford University

Press
8–10 years • Learns to use different language registers
for different social/academic situations

How Languages are Learned | fourth edition | © Oxford University

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