When does a child recognise locations?

[Krazynights34]

Might sound like a daft question...
My DC is disabled (physically, severely, no idea how intellectually able she is, but seems to be very visually aware).
I’m curious about when neuro-typical children would recognise say a car park to a place they do or don’t like. More specifically I guess I’d like to know about when they recognise routes to places...?
Any input gratefully received

My ds is 7 and can recognise places he last visited aged 4 or 5. Aged 2 he’d recognise familiar places/ routes (childminders, playgroup).

I'd say that most kids wouldn't really know how to get somewhere , until they start making their own way around. A child who is driven everywhere , wouldn't have a clue where they are or how they got there . One who walks, or maybe catches a bus, would recognise the route more easily.

Mine are 10 and 14, and unless they make their own way to a place ( like school for instance where they walk to the bus stop and catch a bus there ) they wouldn't really know where they are. They know their way around the estate that we live on, but only well-used routes like the way to the park.

I personally think it's something which gradually comes into people's heads as they grow up. I know a few adults who wouldn't have a clue how to make their way around unless they have a GPS telling them.

My 2yo DS shouts excitedly when he realises where we’re going. He recognises people’s houses and distinctive buildings like the supermarket or the swimming baths.

4yo definitely recognises roads/direction and destinations. Mostly those that are favourites.

I personally think it's something which gradually comes into people's heads as they grow up
I’ve been driven around all my life but when I passed my driving test aged 30 I realised I had no idea how to get to places. All the turn offs looked similar, I didn’t know the road names or which lane to use, because I never needed to.

DD2 has severe global delay and at 20, with lots of input over the years and significant improvements, still functions cognitively on P scales (pre key stages etc). She is very spiky in profile but for most things correlates to a NT child of 15 months to 2 years.
However, from about 2 years old, when she was much further behind in communication etc. she recognised and “knew” a number of complex car routes. Her special transport noticed it, if they diverted from her usual nursery route due to another child being off sick, she would be frantic. Similarly if we were going to the coast, the first 10 miles followed the same route we took to go to my mum’s, whose house she adored, when we took the turn off the road that meant we weren’t going there, she would wail!
She remembered places incredibly well and still does.

My 2 year old can recognise significant places such as Nursery, Nanna’s, aunties house etc. I don’t think she really recognises instantly places she doesn’t go to as often though such as soft play or the big shops (although she knows our corner shop and will point it out a mile away asking for chocolate.)

Her NT, sister with an IQ of 134 was utterly oblivious to how she got anywhere. She had violin lessons for years. One day my now DH stepped in to take her when I was tied up. He had to ring me from the car as she couldn’t direct him to the house. She’s still crap at 29.

Oh, just to add... I am NT and cannot recognise places. I can travel somewhere I’ve been several times before and it’s all new to me! I have zero visual memory and will comment on things as if seeing them for the first time on my tenth visit. I couldn’t give directions to my own house as I wouldn’t know if it was the first or fifth left. DH says it’s like being married to a goldfish.

Car park of somewhere he liked or disliked I'd say my NT DS definitely recognised by age 2. At 4 he's pretty good at knowing how to get to places we go often, I think it helps that we don't drive so walk everywhere.

This is fascinating! Thank you all!
It’s something I never thought about until the other day. My DD has been doing it (recognising car parks of places she likes) from about 9 months old and makes obvious indicators of when she’s happy about where we are going etc.
It didn’t seem odd til I looked it up but could only see intellectual reports which meant nothing to me.
I’m not worried about it, just curious about how/why she can do it. Like, is she doing it because she’s really anxious about hospital (she’s had a lot of pain in her life).

By age 2 my DD could

DS could at 2 too, he'd realise we weren't driving home...because we were driving round and round trying to get him to sleep!

When DS1 was 18 months old we went on holiday to Wales with my parents. We drove past the Brecon Beacons and Dad told us about a time he'd hiked up there. They are very distinctive in appearance.

Fast forward a year, same road, voice from the back "Bwecon Beacons!" He recognised many places we'd been to the year before like the waterfall at Cenarth and the little stream on the beach we went to.

My ds certainly could as soon as he could communicate anything, say 15 months. Dss age 12 just doesn't - still walks 10 houses past his own before it occurs to him to look at the numbers and work it out.

I can recognise towns I haven't been to in 25 years and happily direct tourists within hours of being in a new city. DP, not so much. A couple friends - we pick them up from our station rather than try to guide them through a 10 min walk with two turnings...

Mine were both under a year when they recognised places. Often recognising the journey which always astounded me as I always drive different ways so as not be bored, but they knew...

Depends how much detail you want. DS used to know we were going to nursery (as opposed to the park) as soon as we turned that corner, and would burst into tears. That was 11months.

As he became more vocal he started shouting “no kindergarten! Want to stay at home!” when we went that route, and if we actually weren’t going there but were walking past it, we told him that and he understood. That’s been from about 2.

He’s 3 now, and if we tell him where we are going, he knows which station platform we need (not just for nursery, for other places too). My DM took him home as a treat a couple of weeks ago, and he showed her the way to our house and how to get on the train because gran “didn’t know”. If we are going swimming, or to anywhere else we go to a lot, he knows where we get on and off the bus, or which way we walk.

DS1 who is NT would know where we were going from the route I was driving at 2.5. He has a very good sense of direction now, unlike me.

DD is more like me, no sense of direction, doesn’t carry maps in her head and it’s difficult to remember places. I’d say she was about 3 or 4 before she could remember places she hadn’t been to much before.

Well knew places from babies - gradually got more comfortable in baby groups that we went to weekly and 9 month old definitely very comfortable at school because she does the school run twice a day. But ways to places takes ages I think.
We go to a hall very regularly which is at the end of our very, very long road. My 3.5 year old still doesn’t know the way there (literally walk straight!) and often asks if we’ll take the car (we’ve never taken the car there) or will head off the wrong way out of the house!
But I agree with PPs, even adults are like this until they learn to drive.

My 2 YO recognises when we go to her friends house even if I haven’t mentioned where we are going.

My DS is 2.5 and knows when we are approaching landmarks such as railway bridges and tunnels. He gets annoyed if he thinks we are going to Park A but we are actually going to Park B for instance and will tell me I am going the wrong way.

Not sure exactly how young he was recognising places.

We went back to wear we lived when DS3 was about 10. We left the village when he was 18mths old. I took him to the shop which he recognised had changed and I asked him to walk home. He said “ Don’t be stupid.” I explained I had memories of a house from when I was less than 18 moths and I wanted to see if he did. So he obliged thinking I was nuts. He set off and needed a little reassurance at first. Then he got to the bit where there were four choices. He chose the path between two houses turned left after that and was in the correct road. The houses were all the same to look at and he took us to the correct house. He was amazed himself. Our house had two small trees in the front garden which had grown but were the only difference.

We walked to the shop most days for fresh bread( bakery) and a paper. DD could pick out her nursery at 18 months and there was nothing to distinguish it from the other Victorian three storey terrace house bar the sign. Just the name.

My eldest was definitely a bout two when he started recognising routes we did often (he got really cross one day when I turned off the normal route to the swimming pool and realise it wasn’t where we were heading).