Acquiring the ability to speak is a skill that children pick up to learn more about the world around them. Children vary in their development of speech and language. But for most children, there is a natural progression, or “timetable”, for the mastery of these skills for each language. The milestones are identifiable skills which can serve as a guide to normal development.

Typically, simple skills need to be reached before the more complex skills can be learned. There is a general age and time where most children will pass through the periods of grasping simple and complex skills. At four to six-years-old, most children should be able to speak clearly and fluently in an easy-to-listen-to voice, construct long and detailed sentences, tell a long and involved story sticking to the topic, and communicate easily with familiar adults and other children. Most sounds should also be pronounced correctly, though he or she may have difficulty with “r”, “v” and “th”.

The speech difficulty most children experience at this age (four to six-years-old) is probably at a phonetic level. That means the child has a particular difficulty producing certain sounds correctly. Alternatively, the child could have learnt to say a sound, or sounds, the wrong way, and the incorrect pronunciation has become a habit.

This is quite different from the situation of children with developmental phonological disorders who can usually make the individual speech sounds, but have difficulties organising their speech sounds into patterns. In these children, the phonological processes persist beyond typical age expectations.

There are however some ways in which adults can help children along as they learn how to express themselves through words and sounds.

Some suggestions to help you and your child with the development of sounds:

• Lead a good example
  Practice sounds with your child by modelling a clear and exaggerated ‘S’ sound by clenching your front teeth and making a BIG smile. For example, emphasise the spreading of your lips. When your child says “thun” for sun, it is best if you repeat the word stressing the ‘S’ sound (“SSSSun”). You can remind your child to keep his tongue in his mouth by saying ”Oops! I saw your tongue. Stay in your house Mr. Tongue!”
• Keep practicing together
  You could also stand in front of one another and say phrases that used the “th” sound and let him see how he is doing it differently from you. Do it several times a day for a few weeks. Your child could move on to being aware of how he or she is speaking during normal conversations, and will try to correct himself or herself when using the wrong sounds.
• Make practice fun
  Do note that when a specific sound trips up, it is an articulation problem, and those are usually worked on with most children through play. Children can play games which require them to say words correctly, including words that involve the sounds they have issues with. This will help them pick up the right sounds and have fun learning, all at the same time.