Phoneme Counting - Children

Background

This is an auditory test of the ability to count the number of individual phonemes in words. There are 15 test items and 6 practice items. For each item, the client's task is to identify the number of sounds/phonemes heard in each pictured word after it is spoken by the examiner. The words are of 2, 3 or 4 phonemes in length. The client identifies the number of phonemes by indicating whether the word belongs to one of 3 piles: 2 sound words, 3 sound words or 4 sound words. It is important that clients understand that this is not a spelling task, in that they must count the sounds they can hear, rather than the letters used to spell the words.

Stimuli

Individual pictures for each stimulus word are presented on cards. There are 6 practice items.

Presentation

Cards with the number 2, 3, and 4 should be laid out on a table. Explain to the client that these are the 'piles' into which words must be sorted. Present the picture card for each item and label it.

Instructions

Tell the client that you will show a picture and name it, and that you want the client to listen to the sounds in the words, and then tell you which pile to put the card onto.

Examiner: (Show each picture) I'm going to show you some pictures and tell you their names. I want you to help me to sort the pictures so that all names with 2 sounds in them are together. They will go here (point to the card with "2" on it). All names with 3 sounds will also be together here (point to the card with "3" on it), and all names with 4 sounds will be together here (point to the card with "4" on it). You need to listen to the name of each pictu re and decide how many sounds it has. Remember to listen for sounds; don't think of the letters as if you were going to spell a word. This is about sounds that you hear.

For the practice items:
Practice 1. (Show cat) How many sounds can you hear?

• If client is correct, say, That's right - the sounds in cat are /k/ /a/ /t/ - 3 sounds.
• If the client is wrong, say Listen as I say the sounds in cat - /k/ /a/ /t/. How many sounds was that? If client is wrong - repeat the sounds and give the answer. Put the word into the "3" sound pile.
• Repeat this process for Practice Items 2-6.

Repeats

For test items, if no response or the client requests it, repeat up to 2 times.

Scoring

Write down the number for the pile indicated by the client in the space provided. Tally the number of correct responses.

© 2000  Phoneme Counting - Children (Information)