/s/ Blend Flashcards (sp, st, sk)
Flashcards targeting /s/ consonant clusters.
Session summary (SOAP)
Stays on this screen. Nothing is saved or sent.
Mark a card Correct, Correct with cue or Incorrect and the summary writes itself here.
How to run it
Hold the /s/ and then release into the stop. Sssspoon gives the fricative time to be produced before the cluster demands a stop, and shortening the hold afterwards is the fading. Group by cluster — five sp words in a row make the pattern clearer than sixteen mixed. Desk is worth its own moment, since a final cluster is a different task from an initial one. Eight minutes covers a subset.
Cueing ladder
Start at the top. Add support one step at a time.
- IndependentShow the card and wait 3 seconds for the student to say it.Log as correct
- Visual cuePoint to your mouth, or show the mouth picture for /s/ blends, before the student tries again.Log as cued
- Verbal modelSay the word; the student says it right after you.Log as cued
- Placement cueHold a steady /s/, then go straight into the next sound with no vowel between: 'sss-top', not 'suh-top'.Log as cued
Adjust it
Split the cluster with a short pause ('s… top'), then close the gap until it is one sound.
Put each word in a short carrier phrase with no /s/ in it.
Matching IEP goal
Given picture cards, Student will produce /s/ blends in single words in 8 of 10 opportunities across 3 consecutive sessions, given no more than a visual cue.
Send it home through the parent portal →About this activity
Sixteen words with /s/ clusters: spoon, spider, spot, spill and spin for sp; star, stop, stamp, stick and stove for st; sky, skate, skunk, skip and school for sk; and desk, where the cluster is at the end. A child who has /s/ on its own often loses it in a cluster, and which consonant follows makes a measurable difference.
What to listen for
Listen for reduction against insertion. Poon for spoon has lost the /s/; suh-poon has separated the two consonants. Reduction usually responds to holding the /s/ first; insertion to speeding the two up. Watch school, which is spelled with ch and sounds with a /k/ — a reading complication that has nothing to do with the speech target.
Carrying it home
Spoon, star, stop and school are ordinary words. Asking the child to say the word rather than correcting how they said it keeps this from turning into a correction routine at meals.
What's in this activity
- spoon
- spider
- spot
- spill
- spin
- star
- stop
- stamp
- stick
- stove
- sky
- skate
- skunk
- skip
- school
- desk
Questions
- What grades is this for?
- First through fourth, for students who have /s/ and lose it in clusters.
- Is it free?
- Yes, all sixteen cards play with no account.
- My child says 'poon' for 'spoon'. What is that?
- Cluster reduction — the /s/ is dropped rather than separated. Holding the /s/ before the rest of the word usually helps more than repeating the whole word.
Use this board with your caseload
With a free account, every correct, cued and incorrect mark is saved to the student and scored against their IEP goal, with the data written up for you. Assign it as home practice through the parent portal.
Track progress freeFree for SLPs. No card, no trial clock.