The lists you find here were designed for use in focussed auditory stimulation (what Barbara Hodson used to call 'auditory bombardment'). You may also find them useful for other applications.

    This particular set of lists were designed based on the assumption that the child needs some help focussing on the target phoneme or phoneme combination.  To that end I've tried to ensure that the target is only placed next to vowels. As well, I've tried to ensure that the vowel context changes from one word to the next. In my discussions with Dr Hodson, she agrees that the idea is for the child to pick out the target as the common element from the word list (internally; we don't actually ask them to do this). By varying the context, the only common element should be the target. If you happen to spot any errors in the lists, please let me know.

    Two possible formats for focussed auditory stimulation have been proposed Hodson and Paden originally thought of the process as simply reading a list of words containing the target. More recently they have suggested an alternative form where the clinician contrasts each word with the child's own error pattern (e.g., cup - tup - cup) so they can hear the difference. I personally favor the latter approach.

Several points should be kept in mind about the lists:

1. For each phoneme or phoneme combination, there are 4 lists of 10 words each. There is no magic number as to how many words you should read. I usually find that I can read the entire set of 40 words in 1-2 minutes even using the contrast format. You needn't do all of them each time. You could do half and the beginning of the session and half at the end (Hodson and Paden suggest always doing it at both ends of a session).

2. In some sets there are words that are repeated (because there are simply not enough different words available). This is not a problem since I tried to make sure that the repetitions are spread as far from each other as possible.

3. Some of the words may not be typical vocabulary for young children. This is also not a problem. The child's task is only to listen to the words - no need for them to say anything. The objective is for them to 'extract the regularities' and they can probably do this without actually knowing what some of the words mean.

4. Hodson and Paden advise against targetting certain phonemes, each for specific reasons.  I have not included any of these in the lists.

    - final /l/: there is a tendency to overarticulate this one and the net result is a distorted production. Working on /l/ in initial and medial position should be sufficient and in most cases should generalize to final position.

    - final voiced obstruents (stops, fricatives, affricates):  adults quite often devoice many sounds in word final position. Working on voiced obstruents in final position may result in some confusion for the child.

    - interdental fricatives /;,'/: these are among the weakest sounds in the language and among the last to be learned. Working on these should likely be an absolute last thing (if they are done at all).

    - velar nasal /a/: many adults sustitute /n/ for this, especially in final position.  As with the final voiced obstruents, working on this could lead to some confusion.

5.  I've avoided the traditional labels "initial", "medial" and "final" so as not to confuse parents.  I often give parents copies of the lists to read at home. Check out "A Note to Parents ...".

6.  I have retained the use of IPA symbols because of their exactness.  I make use of a font known as PEPPERFONT which was designed by my mentor, Dr. Lawrence Shriberg for use in his lab at the Waisman Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  It is available to download free from Dr. Shriberg's Phonology Project website.

IMPORTANT: Feel free to make use of any of these files; simply highlight those parts you wish to use with your mouse and copy and paste them into your word processing program.
 

        Peter Flipsen Jr., PhD, CCC-SLP