Development milestone

Child development refers to how a child becomes able to do more complex things as they get older. Development is different than growth. 

Growth only refers to the child getting bigger in size.

When we talk about normal development, we are talking about developing skills like:

Gross motor:  using large groups of muscles to sit, stand, walk, run, etc., keeping balance, and changing positions.

Fine motor:  using hands to be able to eat, draw, dress, play, write, and do many other things.

Language:  speaking, using body language and gestures, communicating, and understanding what others say.

Cognitive:  Thinking skills:  including learning, understanding, problem-solving, reasoning, and remembering.

Social:  Interacting with others, having relationships with family, friends, and teachers, cooperating, and responding to the feelings of others.

Developmental milestones are a set of functional skills or age-specific tasks that most children can do at a certain age range.  Your pediatrician uses milestones to help check how your child is developing.  Although each milestone has an age level, the actual age when a normally developing child reaches that milestone can very quite a bit. 

 Every child is unique! 

Delayed milestone, also called developmental delays, is used to describe the condition where a child does not reach one of these stages at the expected age. However, in most cases, a wide variety of ages can be considered normal, and not a cause for medical concern. 

By med.umich.edu