At age three your child should have a vocabulary of 300-500 words. He’ll be speaking in complete sentences of five to six words. You’ll find that he uses voice inflection and imitates adult speech. Children at this age are often chatterboxes. But don’t discourage their use of speech they are practicing and learning. You’ll often hear your pet phrases coming out of their mouths or comments that you don’t want repeated. So it is important to watch what you say as a parent.
A stranger should be able to understand most of what your child says. But up to half of their words could still contain mistakes. At this age my son said, “pupcake” for “cupcake” and “pseghetti” for “spaghetti.” Some sounds are harder to make than others and it is common for children to substitute the w sound for r (“wabbit”, “wock”) or d for th (“dat,” “dee” for three). The American Academy of Pediatrics notes that the “sounds b, p, m, w and h will only begin to emerge midway through this year, and it may take months after that for him to perfect his use of them.”
Now that your child has a good, usable vocabulary you can help him expand and increase his vocabulary.
Start substituting larger words in your own speech. Instead of using “big” to describe something use “large,” “gigantic,” or “huge”.
Expand upon your child’s speech. If she picks up a rock and says “rock” you can add, “Yes it is a big gray rock. See it has a white stripe in it.”
During imaginary play ask your child to describe what they are playing. Ask questions like “Where the princess lives?” or “What did you see while riding your stick horse?”
When he talks about something ask him questions. This helps him learn to express his thoughts.
Reading is also a great way to increase vocabulary because many words that aren’t used in everyday vocabulary are used in books. See my list of “Top 10 Picture Books for Preschoolers” for some great book ideas.
Children at this age are trying to use and understand pronouns. The words “I,” “me,” and “you” can be confusing because they change depending upon who is talking. The American Academy of Pediatrics reminds parents that when children make mistakes like “Johnny want a cookie”, “don’t correct him by suggesting he say ‘I would like a cookie’, you’ll only confuse him more, because he’ll think you’re talking about yourself. Instead, use these pronouns correctly in your own speech. Say, “I would like you to come” instead of “Mommy would like you to come.”
For more information read my blogs on other Speech and Language Topics:
Child Speech and Language Development
Speech and Language Delays
Causes of Speech and Language Delays
Speech: Birth-12 months
Speech: 1-2 years
Speech: 2-3 years