Nahid Jalilevand - Department of Speech and Language Pathology, School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
Mohammad Kamali - Department of Rehabilitation Management, School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
Yahya Modarresi - Department of Linguistics, Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies, Tehran, Iran.
Yalda Kazemi - Department of Speech Therapy, School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran.

Objectives: Persian is a pro-drop language with canonical Subject-Object-Verb (SOV) word order. This study investigates the acquisition of word order in Persian-speaking children. Methods: In the present study, participants were ۶۰ Persian-speaking children (۳۰ girls and ۳۰ boys) with typically developing language skills, and aged between ۳۰-۴۷ months. The ۳۰-minute language samples were audio-recorded during free play with an examiner and during description of pictures.  Results: Object-Verb (OV) and subject-verb (SV) sentence structures were the most commonly used in two-component simple sentences. SOV was the most common three-component structures used by Persian-speaking children. Discussion: Despite the fact that the spoken-Persian language has no strict word order, Persian-speaking children tend to use other logically possible orders of subject (S), verb (V), and object (O) lesser than the SOV structure.

Sentence, Word order, MLU, Normally developing children, Persian