Babycentre toddler milestone charts - a load of tosh?

[SaveScrabulous]

I'm just curious as to whether other people think these are a load of tosh, possibly designed to make parents feel all positive about Babycentre because they make a lot of average skills seem advanced, so parents will keep visiting the site.

Most 2.5 year olds I know can do more than the things in the table linked to but I don't for a moment think all the kids I know are super clever. What's going on - is it my imagination or are these nonsense?
Here is a link to the older toddler ones:

www.babycentre.co.uk/toddler/development/milestonecharts/31to36months/

Save, I looked at the chart you linked to for 2.5 years. Recalling dd whose talking only just took off at around that time, I would not say that the skills listed are average. She had a spread of skills in all 3 categories of mastered, emergent and advanced. Rather than achieving all the first, some in the second and fewer in the 3rd as the chart might lead you to believe.

I checked the 17 mth chart for ds, who is generally developmentally a lot more advanced than dd at an equivalent age. Same story.

The babycentre charts remind me of the What to Expect charts. Just cause worry when the range of normal at that age is very very wide.

Children develop at different rates - I would not use the term 'clever' for toddlers. I think of it as precocious or advanced. A lot of it evens out by school age.

my ds can do nearly all on chart but just not the talking he is 2.7 and hasnt mastered this yet but nearly everything else on chart all children learn things at different rates what one child can do another cannot these are just rough guides at the kind of progress to be expecting from a child this age

I was about to say "sounds average to me", then noticed the mastered/emergent/advanced headings. Thinking of DS and his contemporaries, I's have said that now, at 36 months, most of them could do most the things listed across all three categories for that age. But maybe DS is a genius?

That's kind of what I mean. Disregarding ds, most of his mates at 30 months could so do the later things for say 33 months e.g. name one friend.

I've felt that too SS - my dd is a genius and waaaaaay out front if those charts are to be believed but so are the other 20 or so 2 year olds at her toddler group!

yep according to this we should all be heading over to the g&T pages now!

By the way does anyone know of any more sensible alternatives?