At what age could your child...

[handslikebirds]

1. tell you what sounds each letter in the alphabet makes (eg A=ah)

2. tell you what letters a word begins with. Eg if you said 'what letter does garden begin with' and they say 'guh... G"

3. be able to tell you words beginning with a letter eg if you said 'tell me a word beginning with h' and they say 'hat'

Thank you!

18 months but she started talking at 6 months old, was reading and writing before school. I thought she was a genius, well she is but she got diagnosed with autism aged 5

Wow. What could she say at 6 months ?

At 6 months she started with single words ‘mummy’ ‘daddy’ ‘teddy’ ‘ball’ ‘no’ etc

By 8 months sentences , counting and colours

By 9 months nursery rhymes and copying us all the time so by 11/12 months a huge vocabulary we though she was just copying but then at 13 months she was having conversations which were so advanced by 15/16 months on one occasion when she was unwell the drs at hospital were astounded as she gave them her medical history and what was wrong . They started asking her other questions and said how advanced she was .

she picked up words from when we read together and just absorbed everything. I’m the presence of other children though she was silent . Had great conversations with adults never children though i thought she just liked adult company more. She started vomiting around other children around aged 2 especially if there were eating. Starting school they said she was ‘gifted and talented ‘ have her extra work etc but socially she regressed

How do people remember these things? Do they write it in a diary?
I honestly have no idea.

All I know is that DD got there somehow, did very well at GCSEs and A levels, and graduated with a first in a STEM degree.

Reception
Reception
y1/2 - school transitioned to letter names from sounds in infants, I can't remember exactly when.

I had a book as dd was advanced and we wanted to keep track for the HV there was also a space in the back of her red book to record milestones and notes

Eldest could do it before school, youngest in Reception but has had significant 1-2-1 input. Both have 100% different learning styles but have got there in the end.

Even the most dyslexic people I know learn to read eventually.

It was years ago and my DC were Letterland obsessed, they with three when they knew the sounds and were reading when they started school.

I’m not convinced that the replies on here will represent the average child at all so if you’re worried don’t freak out by the responses!

My eldest was reading fluently very early but was crap with phonics and her spelling still isn’t great at 7 as I don’t think she hears all the sounds in words. That said, I’d say she knew most of her sounds before starting school but needed the proper phonics teaching to cement. She has always read by memory rather than sounds though so perhaps isn’t typical.

My 4yo is patchy. Can do all of the points but not for every letter/sound. Suspect by September she will and will be on her way to reading as she’s very good at blending orally (eg if you say c-a-t she’ll blend to make the word).

The truth is that children progress at different rates, but that it all evens out over time. That being so, why do we scramble (and take pride in) getting them to do these things early, when all that this achieves is that they miss out on the precious times of early childhood when their curiosity is wide-ranging and does not need to be channelled in a narrow way. Their brains need to develop to the right point when these structured processes make sense, rather than narrowing the reality of tiny brains.

6 to be able to do those things consistently

My DS was 2 in March and he has been able to say all the letters and phonics for a couple of months now, he also knows all his numbers, he went up to 100 yesterday actually I was shocked! he has always been very interested in numbers and letters though. He knows quite a lot of the alphabet if we say A is for... there's probably only a couple of letters he wouldn't know the words for. DH and I wondered if he may be hyperlexic?

He has his 2yr HV review this week will see what they say

The truth is that children progress at different rates, but that it all evens out over time

Sorry but this is just not true. It's not a perfect correlation but children who are quick to speak, read and understand are on average more likely to be academically able than those who are later with these skills.

My 2 year old can do all of those but only very recently (he's 3 in July)

2, he had a toy that had a cloud shaped box thingy and little magnets that you put into the box and it sang, for example “Ee says eh, we says eh, every letter makes a sound Ee says Eh aaaaaand ee” I’ll have that song etched into my memory forever more 😂. I remember doing the y one with him and searching my mind for a word that stated with y and he announced “yellow”. to be fair I was a TA and taught phonics daily so it was natural for me to teach him.

Thanks everyone. Really helpful! I promise I'm not stressing about it with my DD or being pushy, it's just she's taken a real interest in words and letters and so we're keen to cultivate that interest but wanted to know what would be realistic to expect at her age.

We tried I-spy as some people mentioned here, she sort of got it but definitely wasn't doing number 3 reliably!

How old is she ? From this thread aged 2 or 3 relatively typical, 4- not delayed but on the late side. Not able to at 5/ end of reception- definitely delayed, time to get hearing and eyesight checked. Less than 2 exceptionally early.

Reception and shading into yr 1.

3-4 is more typical.

Probably actually 4-5👍 in reality.

All of them at 4. Though he knew the sounds of letters at 3 and could give examples of what most letters started with probably before 4 too.

Right the 50th centile is probably 3.8 years so 2 standard deviations something like 2.6- 5. Does that help ?🤣 (I haven't actually plotted it)

There is a difference between MN and real life.

In real life most children start school (at an average age of 4 and a half) not knowing letter names and often not knowing sounds either.

We are positively told not to teach letter names before they are secure in phonics as it messes up learning to read for some children, and you don't know if it will include your child until too late.

MN is full of child prodigies, who were completing 36 piece puzzles by 18m, reading before school, doing simple addition at 2, and moved on to multiplication by 3. All whilst eating more than a hippo at every meal, yet are always tall and slim.

It's a bit skewed tbh.

Both of mine didn't do any of these until starting school as I deliberately chose a play based preschool. They're both very competent readers now though.