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Long & Short Sounds

Teaching the concept of long & short sounds, addresses the phonological process of ‘Stopping’. Stopping occurs when a child stops the air flow required to produce some sounds (sh, s, v) 🌬

An example of this is when a child produces a short B sound for a long V sound. To address this I have used Minimal Pair cards so the child can see their target and error words 👀

I’ve had great success using the metaphor of ‘long sounds’ and representing it with either play dough or these caterpillar images 🐛

It also helps when I have such amazing parents working alongside me. They work super hard to facilitate practice at home, which makes the absolute world of difference! Thank you parents 🥰

Written by Emily Baxter

Blossom Rural Director & Speech Pathologist (B.SP, CPSP)

"As a Speech Pathologist, I love working with rural families on their child’s literacy, speech and language skills. I opened Blossom Rural in January 2021 after noticing the lack of Speech Pathology services in my local Far Western NSW region. The number of rural children, living on properties and remote towns, who were not able to access regular Speech Pathology intervention without driving to a major capital city, was astounding. These were the families I had always hoped to work alongside and provide an accessible service to. I grew up in Broken Hill before heading to Adelaide for Boarding School at 12 years of age followed by university. The healthcare gap between country and city was very obvious!"

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