About this activity
Twelve words ending in /l/: ball, bell, doll, mail, nail, pool, seal, tail, whale, bowl, hill, wheel. Final /l/ is a genuinely different sound from initial /l/ — the tongue makes the contact later and less fully, and in many accents it barely makes contact at all — which is why a child with a clear leg can still say baw for ball.
How to use it in a session
Hold the sound at the end. Asking for balllll gives the tongue time to arrive at the contact, which is what the shortened natural version does not, and then you shorten it back. Ask for the word and a two-word phrase — my ball, the bell — and stop there for a young child. Six minutes covers the twelve.
What to listen for
Listen for vocalisation, which is the characteristic final /l/ error: the sound becomes a vowel, so ball becomes baw and bowl becomes bow. It is a normal feature of some accents, so it is worth knowing how the adults around the child speak before calling it an error. Watch bowl and whale, where the preceding vowel already rounds the lips and makes vocalisation more likely.
Carrying it home
Ball, doll, tail and bell come up daily with young children. Asking a family to listen for the end of the word gives them something they can actually hear, unlike a request to listen for a sound.
Questions
- What ages is this for?
- Kindergarten through third grade.
- Do I need an account?
- No, all twelve cards play free.
- My child says 'baw' for 'ball'. Is that an error?
- It may be — that is vocalisation of the final /l/ — but it is also a normal feature of several accents. Check how the adults around the child speak before deciding it needs work.