When you had your daughter or son, all your friends told you to savour each and every moment, as time would go by faster than you could imagine.

And now that you’re out buying presents for her eighth birthday, you finally understand what they meant. It really does feel like yesterday you were watching her take her very first steps.

As an 8-year-old, your child is going to go through a lot of emotional, mental, and physical growth. They are also reaching a point of a lot more independence and maturity. However, we understand that it can be overwhelming watching your child go through all these changes and that many parents don’t feel equipped to deal with them.

So, we thought you would benefit from understanding what milestones your child is going through in a bit more detail.

Let’s start with the language and cognitive milestones:

8-year-old language and cognitive milestones

Great vocabulary growth. At this time, you can expect your child to carry out much more complex conversations with you. After all, they have learned an estimated 3,000 new words during the year. Support them in this area by engaging them in conversation regularly.

A keen interest in reading. As an 8-year-old, your child will most probably show a keen interest in reading, and you might find them up reading long past their bedtime! Support them in this area by encouraging them to read independently.

Moving into more abstract thinking. At age 8, your child is moving into more abstract thinking and will be able to understand numbers in a more complicated way. For example, beforehand they may have needed to physically count out a group of objects to solve a maths sum like 26 plus 8. Now, they will be more able to rely on symbols and solve equations using an algorithm.

Now that we’ve talked about your child’s language and cognitive milestones, let’s move on to their emotional and social milestones.

8-year-old emotional and social milestones

The ability to mask their true emotions or thoughts through decentralisation. Remember when your child would receive a present from a relative, and couldn’t hide their distaste? Well, luckily, those days should be over now! At age 8, your child should be able to see things from another person's point of view through decentralisation.

They may take great pride in being part of a team or other group. At 8 years old, your child should have a more sophisticated sense of themselves in the world, and will therefore feel great pride in being part of something special like a team, group, or organisation.

They will become skilled at interacting with peers. At age 8, your child will be developing friendships that they greatly value. In general, friendships are very important to 8-year-olds, and at this stage they will likely be able to determine who they want as a friend, and what characteristics they like in a person.

They will desire more privacy. Your child is likely to want more privacy during this stage in their life. You can support them with this by knocking before entering their bedroom and allowing them to change out of sight if that’s what they want.

They will take more interest in responsibility. For example, they may want to take care of a pet or wash a load of their own laundry.

They may have more interest in taking care of their personal hygiene. For example, brushing their own teeth and bathing without your help.

Finally, let’s take a look at a few of the movement, hand, and finger milestones that you also may notice in your 8-year-old.

8-year-old movement, hand, and finger milestones

They are able to balance better and more intentionally. Their locator and motor skills like jumping, turning, and spinning, are becoming a lot more refined at this point in their lives. You may also notice that they are a lot more interested in activities such as using a skateboard or riding a bike.

Their handwriting will become more precise. You will probably notice their writing is a lot neater and smaller, with the lettering being around the same size. As their small muscles have more stamina at 8 years old, they will be able to write a full story without losing precision in their writing.

They will be able to open lunch items like zip-lock bags and wrappers independently.

They will be able to tie their shoelaces independently.

What are the developmental milestones for an 8-year-old?

Unii shares developmental milestones to expect at this fun age.