Stages of Speech and Language Development

Every child is unique, and there can be significant variation in language development patterns. 

Stages from 0 to 3

First year

Regarding the development of speech and language, both monolingual and multilingual children typically progress through several stages. These stages include cooing, which occurs from around one to six months old, followed by babbling between four to ten months old. Around nine to twelve months old, children often engage in jargon, a stage characterized by expressive but unintelligible sounds. Finally, as they approach their first birthday, children typically begin speaking their first words.

⇒ cooing recognises parent's voice and make eye contact.

⇒ babbling no bilabial sounds to get attention.

⇒ imitation of sounds two-three syllable words and understands frequently used words. Uses gestures and pointing to help communicate.

Second year

As multilingual children reach around 18 months of age, it is expected that others will be able to comprehend about 25% of their speech. During this stage, their vocabulary across all the languages they understand typically ranges from 20 to 50 words, with a focus on playful babbling and single-word usage. As they approach 24 months, multilingual children are anticipated to progress to using two-word phrases and being understood by others approximately 50-75% of the time. At this point, their vocabulary is expected to expand up to around 200 words, encompassing all the languages they are exposed to. It's important to note that they may use up to 50 words from their overall repertoire of words.

⇒ babbling, imitation of sounds.
⇒ first words may emerge with a slight delay compared to some monolingual peers, but it is important to understand that this delay is well within the normal range of development. Around 10 words across all the languages spoken. These words are may not be clear.

⇒ language blend words from different languages are combined to form a single word.

Third year

As the third year unfolds, a multilingual child is anticipated to progress to using three-word phrases and acquire a vocabulary of around 1,000 words, encompassing all the languages they are exposed to. Moreover, during this stage, others should be able to understand the multilingual child with an accuracy ranging from approximately 75% to 100% of the time. They have an expressive vocabulary of approximately 300 words across all the languages they speak.

⇒ language blend 

⇒ language mixing words from different languages are incorporated into the same phrase, it can be described also as "code-switching"

Do they get confused?

Multilingual children do not experience confusion when acquiring multiple languages simultaneously. In fact, being consistently exposed to two or more languages from birth is the most straightforward path to achieving success in multilingualism. From infancy, they can already distinguish between the languages they hear. By the age of four or five, they begin to develop metalinguistic awareness, becoming conscious of their two languages and capable of reflecting on their language usage. When their parents communicate with them in different languages, these children quickly learn to differentiate between the languages and can even respond in the appropriate language without any signs of language confusion.

For more 👉 Multilingual education

Resources you can explore:

Stages of Speech and Language Development, gov.uk
Infant Language Development Phases, sunny days

Language development Prof. Fred Genesee 

Department of Linguistic University of Massachusetts Amherst, Prof Barbara Zurer Pearson

A psycholinguistic approach to code-switching: The recognition of guest words by bilinguals by F Grosjean