We reach the end of our review of children's language development with the stage that goes five to six years.
In this period of time we can see how, in addition to the oral aspects of language, the child will gradually be more prepared to begin a stage that will introduce him to the world of written language: reading and writing.
The expressive and comprehensive language of our child develops at a very high speed, which will allow him to have highly efficient oral communication strategies, in order to want to tell something to the people around him about his day to day.
Expressive language
Our son has, during this stage, a expressive language very rich and elaborated thanks to the articulation maturation achieved during all this time. The discrimination of sounds is increasingly fine, and its phoneme repertoire is almost complete. all the sounds that you have acquired in previous stages (/ b /, / p /, / t /, / g /, / k /, / f /, / j /, / ch /, / m /, / n / , / ñ /, / l /, / d /, / r /, / z /, / s / and the syllables formed by / consonant + l /) are perfectly generalized in their spontaneous language, and do not imply any kind of problem when articulating them.
To end this learning, the child will be pronouncing the sound / R / (the "rr") and the consonant groups formed by / consonant + r / (these symphons are the following: pr, br, fr, tr, dr , cr and gr). However, we must always keep in mind that not all children have the same facility to make this sound, since their articulation is very precise; If we see at this time that our son is not able to articulate it, we need not worry (in principle), since he can acquire it a little later, between six and seven years. However, if in doubt, it is always better to see a specialist who guides us.
As I said before, the child at this age already has a maturation of the organs involved in the articulation of sounds (mouth, tongue, lips ...) quite advanced, which will help him not to make any type of joint error (replace some phonemes for others, invert syllables when speaking, omit some sound ...) and be able to pronounce direct syllables correctly (consonant + vowel, for example: ACsa), inverse syllables (vowel + consonant, for example arbowl), locked syllables (consonant + consonant + vowel, for example clavo) and mixed syllables (consonant + vowel + consonant, for example dogsado).
The aspects that began in the previous stage concerning the metalinguistic properties (that is, be aware that the phrases are not blocks and that they can be modified by varying the words that compose them; similarly, the words can also be modified and divided in syllables and isolated sounds), little by little they consolidate.
We can see how the child can identify and name the final syllable of a word (which will give him the notion of rhyme, being able to invent two phrases that rhyme), and then in any position. You can also omit or add syllables in a word, both at the beginning, inside or at the end of the word. In the same way you can chain words, since you can more easily identify the phonemes of a word (either at the beginning of the word, inside or at the end of it).
His statements are increasingly complex and provide more information about the facts he wants to tell us. Start introducing subordinate sentences (these are sentences that alone do not make sense because it depends on another main sentence, for example: "we can go to the park when it stops raining"). In addition, it has a wide handling of the different grammatical categories (verbs, adjectives, adverbs ...) that will be of great help to be able to give messages that will make the person who is listening perfectly understand what he is referring to.
Thanks to the different situations that our son will live in his day to day, the number of words he will acquire will increase at an incredible speed. And not only will it have a very broad vocabulary, but it will know when to introduce each word, since it has cohesion and coherence when it comes to speaking more sophisticated than during the last stage.
To conclude this section, say that our child's use of language becomes increasingly complex: he can identify and know the internal states of the person with whom we are speaking more easily, adapting what he is going to tell to external circumstances . On the other hand, you can already perfectly respect the taking of the turn in the interaction with others, maintaining the proposed topic of conversation and respecting the conversational rules between equals.
Comprehensive language
He comprehensive language It also increases at the same time as the expressive, since we can see how it is able to identify a greater number of complex actions in an image, or even solve simple rhyming riddles (with or without images in front). In the same way, you can find several similarities and differences between two elements. Answer questions related to actions of close people, answer questions related to actions of known professions or social activities, or even identify absurdities in short and simple texts.
Conclusion
It is important to say that during all this time, the child has gradually been showing a correct postural attitude that facilitates vocal emission and the establishment of a correct respiratory pattern, as well as an inspiratory one (you must always take the air through the nose, to avoid health problems in the throat or even voice problems). This translates into a correct fonrespiratory coordination that allows talking as long as possible without any effort, managing to emit sounds at different intensities and tones, as well as auditory discriminating different qualities of the voice: intensity, duration, tone, timbre ...
In addition, it is from the age of five when the temporary dentition begins to fall and the permanent dentition process begins. We must keep this in mind as it often happens that many children make some normal speech errors at this stage. The most common is sigmatism or difficulty pronouncing the / s /. Therefore, it is advised not to treat until the new teeth are not large enough, since it can be a simple problem of evolution, which is overcome naturally (remember that if you have any doubts about the development of language in your children) children, you can raise it in our section Babies and more Answers.)
The process of language development it is something that does not last exactly until the age of six, but will be enriched throughout the child's life; However, it is true that it is in this age when language is more similar to that of adults in terms of complexity and elaboration.
And the most beautiful thing of all is that we, his parents, will accompany him in this process and will take a very important role in it, since we will be his models from the first moment and in which he will be fixed to be able to speak as we speak .
