Developmental Milestones
Parents and teachers often ask about realistic reading and writing expectations for young children. Learn about typical developmental timelines by age and find recommendations for what parents and family members can do to support emerging readers and writers.
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National Head Start Association
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- Make Reading Count: Effective Strategies for Teaching Comprehension
- From Babbling To Books
- Differentiated Reading Instruction
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In our blogs
Sound It Out
- Kindergarten "red-shirting:" What about summer birthdays?
- Report card comment redux
- How young is too young for cursive?
- Mindful of Words
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Top articles
Basics
- Young Children's Development: What to Expect
- Literacy Milestones: Ages 3-4
- Literacy Milestones: Birth to Age 3
For parents
By age
- Start Early: The First Three Years
- Literacy Milestones: Age 6
- Literacy Milestones: Ages 3-4
- Literacy Milestones: Age 5
- Literacy Milestones: Birth to Age 3
By grade
By skill
Milestones
Speech and language
Do you have concerns?
Download and print
- Reading Tips for Parents in English and 10 Other Languages
- Emergent Readers: Look! That's My Letter!
- Beginning Readers: Look I Can Read This!
- Recognizing Reading Problems
- Common Signs of Dyslexia
FAQs
Research
- Learning to Read: Thinking and Learning About Print
- Learning to Read and Write: A Longitudinal Study of 54 Children From First Through Fourth Grades