# What is a typical two-year-old's language like? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 28, 2015, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022 "2015-10-28T22:23:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![MLS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MLS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MLS)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2015, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022/21 "2015-10-29T19:55:44Z")
A neighbor’s kid when I was a child was well over two years old and barely spoke one understandable word. His utterances were mostly limited to nonsense syllables like “Ga Ga.” The parents had him checked out to see if he did not hear, or had some other problem. Turned out there was nothing wrong with him except he was the youngest of four. If he wanted something all he had to do was point at it and say some random sound. When the family stopped responding to that behavior he began to use words and sentences fairly quickly. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [October 29, 2015, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022/22 "2015-10-29T22:06:07Z")
> [@delphica](#): > > I’m not sure what kind of movies you saw (home movies? feature films?) Indie films. One had a plot, the other was more akin to a documentary. ---
**Author:** ![delphica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9a140/32.png) [@delphica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/delphica)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2015, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022/23 "2015-10-30T00:18:35Z")
> [@elfkin477](#): > > Indie films. One had a plot, the other was more akin to a documentary. Yep, I just wouldn’t feel I could judge how much/how well a kid talks by how that kid appeared in a film. ---
**Author:** ![P-man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/p-man/32/3606_2.png) [@P-man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/P-man)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2015, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022/24 "2015-10-30T00:45:02Z")
Our older son only spoke the initial sounds of words until around 20 months (He’d say “mi” for milk, for instance). As soon as he said whole words the sentences started coming. They weren’t grammatically correct at first. “Doodoo pants yes have” was one of the first I remember. By two they were pretty much grammatical, though. His brother wasn’t saying much of anything at two. We got him speech therapy through the county and he was soon speaking fluently. My Mom claims I was speaking in sentences at 18 months, but I don’t remember. ---
**Author:** ![Arrendajo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Arrendajo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arrendajo)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2015, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022/25 "2015-10-30T02:34:58Z")
I work with all ages of children, so I’m exposed to a pretty good sample of 2 year old speech. They are really all over the map – some are almost mute and others are very wordy. The main thing I notice is that they are often very difficult to understand. They don’t have precise control over the speech machinery and they are just beginning to grasp the fundamentals of the language. But the main hindrance is that they will talk about things from home – things you have no knowledge of – and expect you to be familiar with it. Often a parent will translate a toddler’s babble for me. It’s peppered with pet names for toys and stuffed animals and things familiar to the child and parent but not me, and gross mispronunciations of common household items that the parents understand but no one else. It’s fascinating to watch language develop from nothing to fluency in a few short years. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2015, 12:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022/26 "2015-10-30T12:19:39Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > That is very, very hard to believe. I have never in my entire life encountered an 18-month-old child who spoke in “complete sentences.” > > Two year old will typically have a vocabulary of fifty to a hundred words and they can repeat phrases, like “want the juice,” but complete sentences would be damn rare and a kid who jut had 25 or 30 words isn’t really cause for concern. If it was just me, might wonder too, but I was nearly eight by the time lil bro was one and a half. Unlike me, he’d been a couple of inches taller than average at that age. I remember that adults meeting him at that at age often thought he was a small for his age three year old from how he spoke. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2015, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022/27 "2015-10-30T14:26:28Z")
Another thing to keep in mind is that often a child’s receptive vocabulary is quite a bit larger than what they can actually say back to you. So they understand a lot more than you might think based on what they can articulate and say back to you. ---
**Author:** ![Ranger\_Jeff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranger_jeff/32/2065_2.png) [@Ranger\_Jeff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranger_Jeff)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2015, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022/28 "2015-10-30T14:46:29Z")
At 18-24 months, my niece was happy to mostly point at what she wanted and grunt. I recall my SIL getting on her knees to look Niece in the eye and tell her to “use words”. At about 2½ she didn’t have much to say to me (they lived several states away and didn’t see them that often) until during a family trip to the zoo she was approached by a little miniature fawn and she put a stranglehold around my neck. I picked her up and she grabbed me by the cheeks, looked me straight in the eye and told me “I love you, Uncle Ranger. We go get some ice cream now. Kay?” By her next visit, at 3½, she had been vaccinated by a phonograph needle and it was difficult to get her to stop talking to anybody about anything. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2015, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022/29 "2015-10-30T18:14:40Z")
> [@bump](#): > > Another thing to keep in mind is that often a child’s receptive vocabulary is quite a bit larger than what they can actually say back to you. So they understand a lot more than you might think based on what they can articulate and say back to you. Often? Always! ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2015, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022/30 "2015-10-31T17:52:00Z")
> [@bump](#): > > Another thing to keep in mind is that often a child’s receptive vocabulary is quite a bit larger than what they can actually say back to you. So they understand a lot more than you might think based on what they can articulate and say back to you. > [@John\_Mace](#): > > Often? Always! I’ve seen receptive language scores (for people with IDD, not necessarily children) that are lower than that person’s expressive language scores, which seems impossible. Apparently the test administrators aren’t bothered by it, though. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-a-typical-two-year-olds-language-like/736022.md?page=1)