Learning & Thinking Check
How is your child learning, thinking and getting ready for school?
Have a think about how your child plays, works out little problems and holds things in mind. A few quick questions and you’ll have a friendly read and a sensible next step.
It’s a supportive guide built around familiar milestones, not a diagnosis. Children learn at their own pace, so take the result as a gentle nudge rather than the last word.
How old is your child?
Just pick the closest age — that way we can ask the right questions.
If your child does this sometimes, or has ever done it, go with “Sometimes” rather than “Not yet”. “Not yet” simply means it’s still on its way. There are no wrong answers here, and a couple of “not yet”s is completely normal.
Signs it’s worth getting a little help
- Your child has marked, lasting difficulty learning compared with children of the same age, even with support
- Your child was using thinking or learning skills and has lost them
- There is learning difficulty in the family and your child is clearly struggling too
- Your child avoids and becomes distressed by everyday learning activities
- Your child is not showing pretend play or following simple instructions well past the expected age
Get help straight away if your child has lost skills they used to have, or doesn’t seem to hear you or respond to sounds (ask your doctor for a hearing test — don’t wait). And if your child is ever in immediate danger or has hurt themselves, call your local emergency number or go to your nearest emergency department now.
✓ Saved on this device — your result and progress stay private, and they’ll be right here whenever you come back.
Based on: CDC “Learn the Signs. Act Early.” developmental milestones (public domain) · ASHA developmental milestones · Our evidence base. A supportive guide, not a diagnosis.
Why Learning & Thinking matters
Here’s why this matters: thinking skills are the engine running quietly under all that play. When your child hunts for a hidden toy, sorts the red bricks from the blue, or remembers how the story ends, they’re practising memory, problem-solving and holding an idea in mind. These are the very skills a classroom will lean on later — not facts to be crammed, but the mental muscles that let a child work things out and stick with something a little bit tricky.
In our clinic we’re big believers that curiosity is worth protecting. A child who feels safe to try, get it wrong, and try again keeps that lovely spark of wanting to know. That matters because early confidence with learning tends to snowball — the child who enjoys figuring things out reaches for the next puzzle themselves. Every child learns in their own way and their own time, so the aim is never to push, but to keep learning feeling like play, so your little one heads into school seeing themselves as a capable thinker.