Articulation Development In Children

Impaired or fluctuating hearing due to frequent ear infections, prolonged or recurring illnesses interfering with sound play or child-parent interaction, and impaired oral-motor coordination are examples of factors which may contribute to a delay in speech sound mastery. Quite often we cannot identify any factors in a child's background that might account for delayed articulation skills, yet a delay is present. As children learn speech sounds, they frequently make one or more of the following types of errors:

• Substitution of one sound for an other, as in "wace" for "race."
• Omission of a sound, as in "__ouse" for "house" or "rabbi__" for "rabbit."
• Distortion of a sound, which results in the production of the intended sound in fairly recognizable, but obviously altered fashion.

A variety of other errors may be made as well, but these are the most common and the most easily identified by parents, teachers and physicians.

Children learn correct speech sound production by listening to and imitating appropriate models. Articulation skills develop over a period of 5-6 years, as a child gradually learns to control the movements of his tongue, lips, jaw and soft palate and coordinate these movements with the production of an air stream. By age 3, a child's speech should be at least 80% intelligible (easily understood) and by age 4, his speech should be 100% intelligible, even though he may still have a few error sounds.

The following list represents approximate ages at which we expect children to be producing various sounds correctly:

Sounds Mastered By Age

• 3 years: m, n, h, w, p, b, t, d, k, g, f & all vowels
• 4 years: y, v, j
• 5 years: s, ch, sh
• 6 years: th, zh, r, l, z

When a child has numerous articulation errors, their speech may be virtually unintelligible, a condition that can be profoundly handicapping. Frustration, withdrawal from situations requiring speech, and behavior problems frequently stem from moderately to severely delayed articulation skills.