Deck 13: Phonological Intervention Approaches

Question 1

How do phonological intervention approaches different from one another?

Answer 1

Phonological intervention approaches differ from one another in several key aspects, including their theoretical underpinnings, goals, techniques, and the populations they target. Here are some of the ways in which these approaches can vary:

1. **Theoretical Framework**: Some interventions are based on psycholinguistic theories, which focus on the mental processes involved in language understanding and production. Others might be based on behaviorist theories, emphasizing the role of stimulus and response in learning.

2. **Target of Intervention**: Different approaches may target various levels of phonological processing. Some might focus on phonemic awareness (the ability to recognize and manipulate individual sounds in words), while others might target the phonological system as a whole, including the rules that govern sound patterns.

3. **Techniques and Strategies**: Intervention strategies can range from minimal pair therapy (where pairs of words that differ by only one phoneme are used to teach the distinction between sounds) to multiple oppositions (where several error sounds are targeted at once), to cycles approaches (where different phonological patterns are targeted in a sequential manner).

4. **Intensity and Structure**: The frequency and duration of therapy sessions can differ, with some approaches advocating for more intensive, frequent sessions and others for less frequent, but longer or more strategically spaced sessions.

5. **Direct vs. Indirect Intervention**: Some phonological interventions are direct, meaning they involve explicit teaching and practice of phonological skills. Indirect interventions, on the other hand, might involve creating rich linguistic environments that promote phonological development without direct teaching.

6. **Individual vs. Group Settings**: Interventions can be tailored for individual therapy or adapted for group settings, where peer interaction and group dynamics can play a role in the intervention.

7. **Use of Technology**: With advancements in technology, some phonological interventions now incorporate computer-based or app-based activities to engage children and provide additional practice opportunities.

8. **Parent and Caregiver Involvement**: Some approaches emphasize the role of parents and caregivers in the intervention process, providing them with strategies to support their child's phonological development at home.

9. **Cultural and Linguistic Considerations**: Interventions may be designed with sensitivity to the cultural and linguistic backgrounds of the children, ensuring that the therapy is relevant and respectful of the child's identity and language experiences.

10. **Evidence Base**: The degree to which an approach is supported by research can vary. Some interventions have a strong evidence base demonstrating their effectiveness, while others may be newer or less studied.

In summary, phonological intervention approaches can differ in their foundational theories, the specific phonological skills they target, the methods and materials they use, the structure of the intervention sessions, and the extent to which they involve and are tailored to the individual needs of the child and their family. Clinicians select and adapt these approaches based on the unique needs of each child, the goals of therapy, and the evidence supporting the effectiveness of the methods.

Question 2

What is the difference between contrastive and non-contrastive approaches to phonological intervention?

Answer 2

The difference between contrastive and non-contrastive approaches to phonological intervention lies in their focus and goals.

Contrastive approaches aim to target specific phonological contrasts that are problematic for the individual. This means that the intervention focuses on helping the individual differentiate between sounds that are contrastive in their language, such as /k/ and /g/ in English. The goal is to improve the individual's ability to produce and perceive these contrasting sounds accurately.

On the other hand, non-contrastive approaches do not specifically target phonological contrasts. Instead, they focus on improving overall speech intelligibility and clarity without necessarily addressing specific sound contrasts. This approach may be more suitable for individuals who have a wide range of phonological errors or who may benefit from a more general approach to improving their speech.

In summary, contrastive approaches target specific phonological contrasts, while non-contrastive approaches focus on overall speech intelligibility without specifically addressing sound contrasts. The choice between these approaches depends on the individual's specific needs and goals for phonological intervention.

Question 3

Name four different contrastive phonological intervention approaches.

Answer 3

1. Minimal pairs intervention: This approach involves targeting minimal pairs, which are pairs of words that differ by only one sound (e.g. "cat" and "bat"). By contrasting these minimal pairs, the client can learn to differentiate between the contrasting sounds and improve their phonological skills.

2. Maximal oppositions intervention: In this approach, the therapist targets pairs of words that differ by multiple sounds, with the goal of highlighting the contrast between the sounds. For example, targeting the contrast between "big" and "pig" can help the client differentiate between the sounds /b/ and /p/.

3. Multiple oppositions intervention: This approach involves targeting multiple phonological contrasts at once, rather than focusing on individual minimal or maximal pairs. By targeting several contrasting sounds, the client can work on improving their overall phonological system.

4. Phonological process intervention: This approach focuses on targeting specific phonological processes that the client may be using, such as final consonant deletion or cluster reduction. By addressing these processes, the client can work on eliminating these error patterns and improving their overall phonological skills.

Question 4

What type of teaching cue(s) typify the meaningful minimal pairs approach?

Question 5

What is the difference between maximal oppositions and treatment of the empty set?

Question 6

List the four phases of Williams' (2010) multiple oppositions intervention approach.

Question 7

What type of teaching cue(s) typifies Howell and Dean's (1994) Metaphon approach to intervention.

Question 8

Based on the work of Hodson (2007), list the components of cycles intervention session.

Question 9

What is one of central aims of Rvachew's Speech Assessment and Interactive Learning System (SAILS) (Rvachew, 2009) approach for targeting the speech perception skills of children with phonological impairment?

Question 10

State two important elements of an effective emergent literacy program for preschool-aged children with phonological impairment.

Question 11

Discuss whether cross-domain generalization is possible when targeting one area of difficulty (e.g., phonology) in children with concomitant expressive language and phonological impairment.

Question 12

Why is emergent literacy intervention a valuable addition to an intervention program for children with phonological impairment or inconsistent speech disorder?

Question 13

Is cross-linguistic generalization possible when working with multilingual children with phonological impairment? Identify and critique peer reviewed published intervention research involving multilingual children, to inform your response.

Question 14

How could you engage in culturally competent practice with working with multilingual children who have a phonological impairment the languages they speak?

Question 15

Describe intervention strategies that SLPs could use to facilitate the phonological abilities of toddlers with limited speech and language.

Question 16

Why is minimal pairs therapy not recommended for children with inconsistent speech disorder?

Question 17

Discuss the importance of aligning target selection approaches with intervention approaches.

Question 18

Which elements of Miccio and Elbert's (1986) stimulability intervention approach do you think are the most important for improving young children's speech sound stimulability?

Question 19

Discuss the role of speech perception intervention in improving children's speech sound stimulability.

Question 20

Select two intervention approaches for children with phonological impairment. Compare and contrast the theoretical basis, procedure, evidence and resources of the approaches. In light of your critique of the two approaches, which one (if any) would you select for Luke (4;3 years) and why?

Question 21

Contrastive approaches to phonological intervention:

A) use minimal pair words as an integral component.
B) use minimal pair words as an optional component.
C) do not use minimal pair words.
D) focus on syllables rather than words.

Question 22

The phonological principle that intervention can include conversational repair sequences to improve speech intelligibility guides:

A) the types of goals targeted in intervention.
B) the types of procedures and teaching cues used in intervention.
C) the selection of phonological processes.
D) conversational speech activities rather than speech production focused at the word level.

Question 23

Oscar (4;9 years) is multilingual-he speaks English and German. He has a mild-moderate phonological impairment. You are going to use the meaningful minimal pair approach with him. This means you will:

A) start with picture familiarization, then include a period of verbal imitation before confronting Oscar with the homonymy in his speech.
B) include a period of auditory discrimination training before starting imitation then spontaneous naming activities.
C) familiarize Oscar with your selected minimal pair pictures, ask Oscar to listen and pick up one of the minimal pair pictures at a time, then, ask Oscar to tell you which pictures to pick up.
D) start with brief mouth exercises ensuring that he is stimulable for the target phoneme(s), then begin working on the target in syllables before moving to imitation of minimal pair words.

Question 24

Children suited to the minimal pair approach need to:

A) have a loss of phonemic contrast in their speech.
B) be non-stimulable for the target phonemes.
C) have distortion errors in their speech.
D) have vowel errors in their speech.

Question 25

Gierut's (1992) treatment of the empty set approach:

A) pairs two maximally contrastive singleton phonemes unknown to a child in novel words.
B) pairs one known phoneme with another unknown but maximally contrastive singleton phoneme in novel words.
C) uses homonymy facilitate communication breakdown and repair sequences.
D) starts with spontaneous production rather than imitation.

Question 26

The multiple opposition approach developed by Williams (2003):

A) includes a period of practicing the target phonemes in the contrastive word sets in isolation and syllables as part of phase 1.
B) has a brief period of naturalistic interactive play at the end of each session in phase 2.
C) uses naturalistic interactive play phase 3 but not in phase 1 or 2.
D) is suitable for children with primarily prosodic difficulties.

Question 27

A) tick, shick, sick, slick, chick; two, shoe, Sue, slew, chew; tip, sip, ship, slip, chip.
B) tip, ship, Kip, slip chip; two, shoe, coo!, slew, chew; top, shop, cop, slop, chop.
C) tea/key; tore/shore; slow/toe; tick/chick.
D) deep, sheep, keep, sleep cheep; do, shoe, coo!, slew, chew; door, shore, core, slaw, chore.

Question 28

Wendy (4;5 years) is a monolingual English-speaking girl. She has a moderate-severe phonological impairment and is the first phase of Howell and Dean's (1994) Metaphon approach. This means that she is:

A) engaging in listening activities and developing metaphonological awareness.
B) increasing her metacommunication abilities and learning what to do when communication breaks down.
C) engaging in speech production activities and developing metaphonological awareness.
D) using minimal pair words to apply her metaphonological knowledge in communication-centered speech production activities.

Question 29

Hayden (4;2 years) is a monolingual English-speaking boy. He has a severe phonological impairment. A unique component of an intervention session for Hayden based on Hodson's (2007) cycles approach is:

A) the inclusion of four or five strategically selected minimal pair words.
B) amplified auditory stimulation of a list of approximately 20 words containing the session's intervention target for Hayden.
C) drill play speech productive activities.
D) emergent literacy activities targeting phonological awareness and letter name/sound knowledge.

Question 30

Pippi (4;10 years) is a monolingual French speaking girl. She has a phonological impairment and is receiving PACT (Parents and Children Together) intervention, based on Bowen (2015). A unique element of PACT is:

A) the use of metaphonological cues and metaphor.
B) phonetic production training with Pippi.
C) the deliberate focus on educating and involving Pippi's parents in intervention.
D) the use of minimal pair words.

Question 31

Jonny (4;7 years) is a monolingual English-speaking boy. He has a severe phonological impairment, poor speech sound stimulability, and speech perception difficulties. You begin intervention by targeting Jonny's speech perception skills using Susan Rvachew's (2009) Speech Assessment and Interactive Learning System (SAILS) program. During SAILS, Jonny will:

A) tell you whether the words he is listening to sound the same or different.
B) practice non-stimulable and stimulable phonemes in isolation.
C) engage in free play while listening to a list of words containing his non-stimulable phonemes.
D) listen to and make judgments about pronunciations of the same word spoken by different speakers (children and adults, male and female speakers) in addition to errored productions of the target word.

Question 32

Hakeem (5;2 years) is multilingual-he speaks English and Arabic. He has concomitant phonology and morphosyntax difficulties. During a morphosyntax intervention session, he would be engaging in:

A) focused stimulation of the target morphemes in a narrative activity following by elicited production activities.
B) auditory stimulation of a list 20 words containing the target morphemes in words followed by imitation of the target morphemes in the words.
C) imitation of the target morphemes in words, then cloze tasks.
D) focused stimulation of the target morphemes in a narrative activity following by simultaneous then delayed imitation of the target morphemes in words.

Question 33

Archie (2;6 years) is a monolingual English-speaking boy. He has a small phonetic inventory and limited stimulability. You have selected to use Miccio and Elbert's (1996) stimulability approach. As part of Archie's first intervention session you:

A) teach him the names of alliterative characters for all consonants and consonant clusters in English, their corresponding gesture, picture, and associated speech sound.
B) teach him the names of 21 alliterative characters, show him pictures to go with each character, and ask him to imitate each associated speech sounds.
C) instruct Archie to verbally imitate 21 consonants in isolation and in CV syllables with the support of pictures and gestures.
D) teach him the names of 21 alliterative characters and their corresponding gestures, show him the pictures for each alliterative character, and provide him with auditory models of the speech sound associated with each character.

Question 34

The intervention approach better suited to Jarrod (7;0 years), a monolingual English-speaking boy who has inconsistent speech (phonological) disorder is:

A) minimal pairs.
B) core vocabulary intervention.
C) stimulability intervention.
D) Metaphon.

Question 35

When a child is practicing consistent productions of words as part of the core vocabulary approach to intervention:

A) simple CV and CVCV words are practiced.
B) opportunities to imitate should be kept to a minimum.
C) opportunities to imitate should be maximized to ensure accurate and consistent production.
D) feedback about speech accuracy is prioritized over feedback about consistency.

Question 36

When targeting pre-tonic weak syllable deletion, it can be helpful to start:

A) with mimed imitation, so that the child see the mouth movements necessary for the first syllable.
B) at phrase level (e.g., big potato / /) rather than word level.
C) with imitation of each syllable at level (e.g., potato /p/, /te/, /to/) before progressing to phrase level.
D) with spondees and words comprising Sw stress before progressing to wS and wSw stress patterns.

Question 37

The goal that would not be appropriate for a late-talking toddler showing early signs of a speech sound disorder would be:

A) expand the syllable-shape inventory.
B) expand the phonetic inventory.
C) encourage the development of two-word utterances as the expressive vocabulary increases.
D) encourage the development of Sw and wS stress patterns.

Question 38

Jamal (4;11 years) is multilingual-he speaks Arabic and English. He has a phonological impairment in both languages. With respect to target selection, you would:

A) target the phonological patterns in the language that you speak.
B) prioritize error patterns and/or phonemes common to English and Arabic, with similar error rates in Jamal's speech.
C) target error patterns and/or phonemes that only exist in one language (either English or Arabic) and/or are only in error in one language.
D) prioritize speech production errors identified by the child and family.

Question 39

The target selection approach suitable for the maximal oppositions approach to intervention is the:

A) complexity approach.
B) developmental approach.
C) systemic approach.
D) cycles approach.

Question 40

Luke (4;3 years) is a monolingual English-speaking boy and has a phonological impairment. As part of your overall management plan for Luke, you have selected multiple oppositions intervention to target his extensive phoneme collapses, and emergent literacy intervention (focused on phonemic awareness and letter name/sound knowledge) to mitigate his risk of literacy difficulties. The task that would not be appropriate when targeting Luke's phonemic awareness is:

A) phoneme categorization.
B) phoneme detection.
C) syllabification of disyllables and polysyllables.
D) phoneme isolation.