Speech Sounds in English

 
M Sound
N Sound
 
 
 
 
 
 
W Sound
H Sound
Y Sound
NG Sound
 
 
V Sound
 
 
Th Sound
 
 
R and Vocalic R Sounds
R Blend Sounds
L Blends
S Blend Sounds
 
 

Click on a letter for word lists and activity ideas.

Speech Sound Disorders

Speech sound disorders can be organic or functional in nature.

Organic (developmental or acquired)

  • Motor/neurological

    • Dysarthria (execution)

    • Apraxia (planning)

  • Structural

    • Cleft palate or other orofacial anomalies

    • Structural deficits due to trauma or surgery

  • Sensory/Perceptual

    • Hearing impairment

Functional (no known cause)

  • Articulation (motor aspects)

  • Phonology (linguistic aspects)

*ASHA.org

Treatment for Speech Sound Disorders

Speech sound targets and a treatment approach should be determined by a licensed speech-language pathologist. These may follow an articulation approach, a phonological/language-based approach, or a combination of both.

Common treatments include, but are not limited to…

  • Articulation intervention

  • Cycles approach

  • Minimal pairs approach

  • Complexity approach

  • Natural speech intelligibility intervention

  • Speech sound perception training

  • Core vocabulary approach

For details and a complete list visit the Amerian Speech-Language-Hearing Association website.

*Sources

“ASHA.” American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, www.asha.org/.

Crowe, K., & McLeod, S. (2020). Children's English Consonant Acquisition in the United States: A Review. https://doi.org/23814764000300140072

McLeod, S. & Crowe, K. (2018). Children’s consonant acquisition in 27 languages: A cross-linguistic review. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology. doi:10.1044/2018_AJSLP-17-0100. Available from: https://ajslp.pubs.asha.org/article.aspx?articleid=2701897