Language skills

• By the age of three your child will be really starting to get to grips with using language.
• He can deal with more complex ideas, such as a word having a variety of meanings depending on the context. For instance, he now knows that ‘no’ can mean ‘not’, depending on the context of its use.
• Later in the year he’ll start to use more abstract verbs like ‘think’ and ‘know’, and the development of his memory will let him start to tell you short stories.
• He’s gaining control of the tip of his tongue while speaking, and can manage sounds like ph, th, and r.
• You can help with language development by singing rhyming songs together to build an awareness of the correct language sounds to achieve.

Learning foreign languages

• Young children will learn new languages easily if they’re exposed to them at a young age.
• If you live in a bilingual home, you may want your child to learn both languages equally if possible.
• The best way to achieve this is to set boundaries between which parent speaks which language, and where and when each language is spoken. This will help to prevent your child from becoming too confused.
• If your family isn’t bilingual you can find preschool programs that introduce a second language as a part of daily activities, not as a formal lesson.