About this activity
Eleven sounds sorted three ways: /p/, /m/, /s/ and /t/ exist in both languages; /ʃ/ as in sh, /z/, the fricative /v/ and /θ/ as in th exist only in English; /ɲ/ as in ñ, the trilled /rr/ and the jota /x/ exist only in Spanish. This board is a clinical reasoning tool as much as a student activity — it is the distinction between a difference and a disorder, laid out.
How to use it in a session
Use it with the student when the student is old enough to find it interesting, and use it on your own when they are not. A Spanish-speaking child who says shoe as choe is doing something predictable, because /ʃ/ is not in their first language's inventory, and that is a difference. The same child who cannot produce /s/, which exists in both, is showing something else. Twelve minutes with the board settles a question that otherwise takes a full evaluation to answer.
What to listen for
Watch the shared column. Errors on sounds that exist in both languages carry much more diagnostic weight than errors on sounds that exist in only one, because the child has had exposure and practice in both. Notice the Spanish-only sounds too: a bilingual child who has lost the trilled /rr/ may be showing language attrition rather than a speech difficulty, which is a different conversation with the family.
Carrying it home
Families are often told their child's accent is a problem. This board is a useful thing to show them: sounds that exist in only one language behave differently from sounds that exist in both, and the first group is not something to correct.
Questions
- Is this a student activity or a clinician's tool?
- Both. Older bilingual students find it genuinely interesting, and for a clinician it is a fast reference for separating a language difference from a speech difficulty.
- Is it free?
- Yes, no account needed.
- Does a sound existing in only one language mean errors on it are fine?
- It means they are expected, and expected patterns are not the basis for identifying a disorder. Whether they need work at all depends on the student's goals and the demands they face, not on the pattern alone.