A Phonological Process is a type of sound error that is seen in typical speech sound development. These errors follow specific patterns of simplification and have typical ages they regress (or stop). Children use these as they are learning the rules and sounds of language. You may hear a child say “Dive me my boot” while reaching for a book. What did they really mean? They meant “Give me my book” but they utilized the phonological process of fronting, where k becomes t and g becomes d.
There are many types of phonological processes and they all resolve at different times in typical development.
Assimilation: When a child changes a sound to become more like another sound in a word (gog for dog). Assimilation typically disappears around 3 years old.
Cluster Reduction: When a consonant cluster (like bl, pl, sn, sm, st, etc) become reduced to a single consonant (bue to blue). Cluster reduction typically disappears around 4 years old without s sounds and 5 years old with s sounds.
Final Consonant Deletion: When a child drops the final sound in a word (boo for book). This typically disappears around age 3.
Initial Consonant Deletion: This is when the initial sound is left off (ee for see). This is typically seen in more severe phonological delays.
Fronting: Fronting is when the sounds k and g are replaced with t or d (and sometimes s). Examples are boot for book and doh for go. This typically disappears around 3.5 years old.
Stopping: Stopping is when a fricative (a sound that needs fast air flow out of the mouth) is replaced with a stop sound (a sound that requires closure and a burst of air). Examples of this are pan for fan or dumb for gum. Stopping usually disappears based on the sound being substituted. Stopping of f and s usually disappears by 3, v and z by 3.5, sh, ch, and j by 4.5 and th by 5 years old.
Gliding: Gliding is when the r and l sound are replaced with the l sound ( wabbit for rabbit). This one is an important one to remember, as it is often one of the trickiest ones for kids to stop using. This typically resolves by 6 years old. This is typically as they are getting ready to enter first grade!
(information is adapted from
Bleile, Ken M. (1995). Manual of Articulation and Phonological Disorders. San Diego, CA: Singular Publishing Group, Inc.
Bowen, Caroline, (2011). Elimination of Phonological Processes in Typical Development.
Linguisystems, (2008). Phonological Pattern Suppression by Age. http://www.linguisystems.com
Hedge, M.N. (2001). Pocket Guide to Assessment in Speech-Language Pathology (2nd Edition). San Diego, CA:
Pena-Brooks, Adriana, & Hedge, M.N. (2007). Assessment and treatment of articulation and phonological disorders in children (2nd Edition). Austin, TX: PRO-ED.)
These are some of the more seen phonological errors, although the list is longer! This is why it is important to speak to a speech-language pathologist if you have any concerns. If an evaluation is warranted the speech therapist will evaluate the sounds errors and decipher if they are articulation/motor based or phonological based.
What do do if your child has a phonological sound based disorder?
Depending on the age of your child different strategies can be used. Younger children may not want to sit through drill based activities and you may find that play based activities are the most motivating. Before you start trying to get your child to produce the sound you want to make sure they can hear the difference between sound pairs (i.e. k and t). To do this you can find pictures or a book with target sounds (minimal pairs work the best. These are basically words that rhyme). You can say “Show me the ___. Show me the ____.” If your child is able to hear the difference between the two sounds they can auditorily discriminate between the two! Now that you know they can hear the difference you can work on producing the sounds. You can play rhyming games with them, iSpy games, or read books. With older kids it is easier to have them sit and practice saying these words in pairs (boot, book) but younger kids we may need to get creative. Try thinking of target words with their missing sounds in them and how you can incorporate them in simple words into play. When working with a little guy recently I was targeting /k/ and /g/, as well as initial consonant deletion. I picked activities that had small words with the missing sounds (walk, pick, cut) and made sure these were high frequency words. Even if you can’t squeeze in the minimal or maximal pairs into activities you can target the individual sounds in comparison to their old way. Talk about their sound in a playful way, like lets make our coughing sound or gulping sound. This alone may stimulate the sound! If you child is less willing to participate in imitation tasks, try auditory bombardment. This means that you tell them a lot of words with their missing sounds in it all in a row. You may list items around the house or in a book.
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