The age of three to four is around when kids start gabbing about anything and everything, and their chattiness extends beyond simple identification to deeper thoughts about people, their feelings, and the world. Most kids at this stage are quite chatty around trusted people, and this could even be when the famous “Why?” phase starts, where kids will ask you why until you feel like you’re the subject of an intense interrogation. Though the persistent questioning can become just a bit aggravating, it shows you just how hungry your child’s brain is for information. Your job as their parent or caregiver is to feed that hunger for knowledge and help them put all those linguistic pieces together in the right way.
Organizing their own Language
Though the words “verb” and “adverb” likely haven’t yet entered your preschooler’s vocabulary, they’re starting to see that certain words go together or serve the same function. You’ll likely see them work through this process of categorization and organization through little errors, like saying the cat “is cat-ing.”
You can encourage this by turning it into a game, asking them to name different fruits they know, different animals, etc. You can also play the “Which one doesn’t belong?” game by listing things like “man,” “girl,” “car,” and “boy.” This is a fun way to challenge them at this stage, and you may even find them requesting word-centric games during a car ride or before bed.
Helping Pronunciation
Some of those awkward phrasings and mispronunciations will start to naturally work themselves out at this age, and you can start to gently correct what you see are lingering, repeated mistakes. This should be done kindly and mainly through repeating what was said correctly and praising them when they say it right.
Pronunciation will be nowhere near perfect at this stage, as consonant blends and even individual letters like -r can still be difficult, but you should notice that your child’s speaking is starting to become clearer to people they’re not so familiar with.
There is also a significant social component that goes along with speaking to those outside the immediate family, so you shouldn’t worry if your child doesn’t want to talk to someone they’ve just met, even if it is a trusted person. Kids at this age will still usually respond with one-word answers if pressed, likely while peeking out from behind mom or dad’s legs.
Multilingualism and Foreign Languages
Whether you’re a multilingual family or just want to expose your child to a new world of words, this age is a great time to explore the concept of multilingualism. If your child has already learned some words in a different language, he or she likely doesn’t understand that those words are not normally used together with English words, so this is a good age to explain the basic idea that people speak differently across the world and that they can learn not just one language but many.
If you’re actively raising a bilingual child, don’t be worried about them mixing or combining languages. That is a normal part of the process and you should celebrate the fact that they’ve started building a vocabulary in multiple languages. And even if you’re not looking for full multilingualism at this stage and just looking to broaden your child’s horizons, watching videos together about basic vocabulary and greetings in different languages can be a fun and stimulating activity.
Playing with Language at Ages 3-4
Kids at this age will start to delight in funny words and stories, as well as responding to random, silly things like “Do you want to eat strawberries, grapes, or shoes?” You can use this enthusiasm to your advantage and make a game out of almost anything, introducing new vocab, reinforcing concepts, and gently correcting little mistakes through play.
Storytime is another great opportunity to help your child progress at this stage, and while they’ll likely still get a kick out of books at bedtime, they’re also more capable now of understanding short, simple stories that you make up, and the funnier the better.
You can also encourage your child to tell his or her own stories, but be prepared to offer lots of encouragement and prompting along the way. Though it seems like second nature to adults, the most basic storytelling concepts, like having a beginning and end, excluding irrelevant details, and following a rough chronological order, require years of learning and practice. Just encourage your child’s stories and celebrate their endeavors into a new area of language.
Final Thoughts and Concerns
Though the age-specific language requirements imposed on children often do more harm than good, there is one basic guideline that can serve parents of a 3-4-year-old. If your child is not yet combining words into short phrases and only speaking in single-word responses at this point, it’s a good idea to talk to your healthcare provider or a speech pathologist to see how to best help your child progress. Every child’s linguistic journey is different, but this is one particular milestone to keep an eye on to ensure the best for your child.
