Phonological Development: Ways of Simplification

Annotations:

• Simplifying pronunciation by deleting sounds. 

1. Final consonants may be dropped. For example, the /t/ in 'cat' and 'hat'.
2. Unstressed syllables are often deleted. For example, 'banana' can be simplified to 'nana'.
3. Consonant clusters are reduced. For example, 'snake' becomes 'nake' and 'sleep' becomes 'seep'.

Annotations:

• Simplifying pronunciation by substituting harder sounds with easier ones. 

1. Substituting /r/ (as in 'rock') for /w/.
2. Substituting /th/ (as in 'thumb') or /TH/ (as in 'that') for /d/, /f/, or /n/.
3. Substituting /t/ (as in 'toe') for /d/.
4. Substituting /p/ (as in 'pig') for /b/.

1. When different sounds are pronounced the same way. For example, 'dog' becomes 'gog'.

1. A child refers to his plastic fish as his 'fis'.
   1. When asked 'is that your fis?', he replies 'no, my fis.'
      1. When asked 'is that your fish?', he replies 'yes, my fis'.
2. Prove that understanding develops faster than the ability to pronounce things.
3. Another child confused 'card' with 'cart' and 'jug' with 'duck', but when shown pictures of these items identified them correctly.