How many words 18 month old?

[missmysexybody]

My DS only says daddy, ma ma, got and NO!

How many words does your 18 month old DC say? Im hearing about 18 month old children speaking in sentences (?) so am getting very worried. What do you think?

Some children speak a lot, some not at all.

at 18 months it is far more important that your child understands what you and is able to communicate by other means than language e.g. pointing.

Fwiw, Dc1 (autism) had about 20 words and DC2 was talking in 2-3 word sentences and had a huge vocabulary.

Around 18 months my daughter had a 'language explosion' and suddenly all these words were coming out. Now at 20 months she makes good efforts to say every word she can and has started putting 2-3 words together. She will point at things, I'll tell her what they are called, and she'll try to say the word. I did baby signing with her from 13 months and her communication is ace, but I can't say if it's because of that or just her own ability. They're all so different!

Every child is different.

DS1 only had a few words at 18 months, while DS2 was speaking in sentences. DS3 was similar to DS1.

It's more important that your DS is understanding what's being said to him, and from what you say it sounds like he is so try not to worry.

I'd also add my niece said barely a word until she was 2 .... It was all in there but she just didn't speak. Then she started speaking and she was off. My sister was worried about her, but you could see she understood every word you said, just didn't or wasn't ready to communicate with words (she preferred pointing and saying 'uh uh uh uh'....reeeeeally annoying). I really wouldn't worry unless you have other concerns as there aren't many 'speaking in paragraphs' 18 month olds out there!

Thanks for the answers, that really helps me. Ill stop worrying . . .until next month ; )

My twins are 18 months and one talks more than the other. One twin has 15 words and the other just 5 words. I am not worried as they understand loads, I am looking forward to them having this "language explosion" soon.

I have read somewhere that between 6 and 20 words is 'typical range' for this age. Agree they all go at different rates though. My DS1's language just exploded at around 20 months, he started putting words together, would say things like 'back mummy car now' when he wanted to leave somewhere, for example. In contrast, by 20 months DS2 had few words and certainly wasn't joining any. Can remember being quite worried at the time. But his language explosion came later; I actually think that by 2.5 years his language was better than DS1's despite the fact that DS1 got started earlier.

At 18 months my dd had no recognisable words. Then in the space of a few weeks at age 2 she had the 'language explosion' another poster mentioned. Never shits up now at 2.5ys

Oops! Never shuts up now!

It was over 50 and putting words together occasionally.
Like 'good girl' at about 14m
A lot of speech now at 22m is what i would call rote sentences like
I dont know
I did it
Bye bye mummy see you soon
With some original phrases in there.

It seems to vary so much from child to child even in a family
They look for putting words together at about 2, which they think takes a vocab of about 50 words.

Things like baby signing, singing nursery rhymes, picture books can all help
Expanding on anything they say
We have play food and i say stuff about what she brings to me
The words are slow up to 50 or so but then in a couple of months we've had hundreds.

At 20 m

At 20 months DD had about 100 words. DS had none (they are twins).

Ah it is so variable child to child, don't worry yet! My ds1 said only "Mama" and "Dadda" until he was 2yo, at which point his speech spewed forth and he started chatting away merrily (and hasn't stopped since). Dd2 started much earlier and at 17mo says quite a number of words. Boys are often slower to start talking than girls. Never compare with your friends' toddlers! I was a bit anxious when ds1 said next to nothing compared with my friends' chatty little girls, but the anxiety amounted to nothing in the end. Ds1 also used a dummy quite a bit, whereas dd2 only has hers at night. I don't know if yours uses one but that can slow their language down a little at first - even if that is an issue, the speech catches up quickly and it won't be a long term problem. If you have any concerns about his hearing, chat to your HV and GP, but otherwise just keep playing with him and letting him hear you speak and it will come.

Kind words. mummyxtwo - I won't compare or worry just yet! He does have an older DD who will not stop talking so I wonder if its because he cannot get a word in : )

Can I be the ultimate in cheeky and give you a link to our research study?

It's at uk-cdi.ac.uk/

What we find is that when families fill in our questionnaire they realise their child knows more words than they can think of off the top of their head. And we also agree that comparing your child to just your friends' children isn't that helpful as they may not be very representative.

We can't yet tell you what's typical for a child of a given age because that's what we are finding out, but we can give you a record of what your child can say and understand now.

Parents can participate up to the last day before their child turns 19 months (and from 8 months if anyone else is interested, you can sign up on advance too!).

I hope that's not TOO cheeky to post that link.

Interesting and not cheeky at all. Ill take a look thanks.

Great stuff, if you have any questions do ask.

My DD is just 17mo I think she has about 15- 20 words:
Please, Ta, Down, Hiya, Bye Bye, Cheese, Apple, Ducky, Birdie, Book, Chair, Highchair, Shoe, Yeah, the name of our cat, mummy, daddy, rara (her grandma). She doesn't string anything together. Some of her friends speak a bit more, some a bit less. I think they're all different and as long as some form of communication is occurring and babbling then there's not too much to worry about.

I think it would be difficult to estimate another childs vocab as certainly mine would say a lot less in public (lol) especially when there are new toys there, she will start talking more about an hour later when she calmed down a bit.