Every child will reach their own developmental milestones according to their age. What makes them different is the process of achieving it. Some child is a fast learner while some child need more time to be able to tick the milestone off. It is our role as a parent to gain knowledge on a child developmental milestone to be able to support and encourage them to develop their skills. It will also be handful when we notice certain red flags manifested by our kids. Let’s learn more on the child developmental milestones to understand your child better!
0-2 years :
- Cognitive: Recognize faces, able to pretend play, recognize two colors, recognize the sound of a few animals
- Speech: Speak simple phrases and repeat words, understand simple instructions
- Emotional: Understand simple facial expressions, attaches to parents/caregiver and show increased independency
- Social: Develop social smile, able to play with other child, imitate behavior
3-6 years :
- Cognitive: Understand concrete concepts, able to complete simple puzzle, recognize 4 or more colors, recognize alphabets and numbers
- Speech: Possess more vocabulary, uses pronouns and sometimes plurals too
- Emotional: Able to express self-conscious emotions such as pride, shame and guilt
- Social: Able to make friends, understand non-verbal cues and simple social rules
7-12 years:
- Cognitive: Increased attention span, uses logic for problem solving and explore self-interest
- Speech: Coherent and relevant context of speech, possess wide vocabulary
- Emotional: Show sign of high/low self-esteem and gradually gain emotional control
- Social: Peer group becomes more important, fear of social inclusion and understand social/culture norms
13-18 years:
- Cognitive: Understand abstract and logical thinking, able to make own-decision
- Speech: Give own ideas and opinions, understand verbal and nonverbal cues
- Emotional: Strong conflict with parents, show behavior changes and may have mood swings
- Social: Likely to engage in risky behaviors and explore self-worth
Therefore, parents are encouraged to understand their child developmental milestones and kindly seek for help if there is any red flags shown!
Sarah Aleesa
Clinical Psychologist of EGSS
