Speech Sound Disorders

An articulation disorder refers to errors, such as substitutions or distortions, of individual speech sounds.

An example, a child may say “wed” instead of “red” or produce /s/ interdentally, which is commonly known as a lisp.

When sound errors are present, a child can be more difficult to understand when they are speaking. Children acquire different speech sounds at various ages. Based on recent studies completed by McLeod and Crowe (2018), the following graphic depicts the average age that children develop speech sounds.

Phonological processes are patterns of sound errors that typically developing children use to simplify speech as they are learning to talk.

Some examples of phonological processes are final consonant deletion (“ha” for “hat), fronting (“tat” for “cat”), or stopping (“pour” for “four”).

A phonological disorder occurs when phonological processes persist beyond the age when most typically developing children have stopped using them. If you have concerns about your child’s speech, please contact the clinic to schedule an evaluation.