Development of a speech assessment tool to investigate the phonological development in Saudi Hejazi-Arabic

children

PRESENTED BY: DEEMA TURKI

SUPERVISORS: DR SILKE FRICKE & DR TRACI WALKER
Introduction

Imagine this scenario please.......

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In Saudi Arabia

 SLTs rely on informal assessment tools (Khoja, 2017).

 Few English assessment tools have been translated, validated and adapted to Saudi Arabic.

 The norm-data about the development of the phonological skills is still unknown for Saudi
children.

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Challenging issue…

 Dialectal variations in Saudi Arabia.

Not taking dialectal variations into account resulted in the misdiagnosis of the phonological
disorder (Cole & Taylor, 1990).

 So… investigate the phonological development of the Saudi Hejazi dialect…

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 In this presentation…

 What is the standardized assessment tool (SAT)?

The importance of SAT for SLTs

The steps to develop a theory-based, linguistically controlled picture-naming test.

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What is the standardized assessment tool?

SAT is empirically developed evaluation tool with established statistical reliability and validity (ASHA, 2019).

1. Norm-referenced.

2. Criterion-referenced

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The importance of assessment tools for SLTs

 Gather information.
 Make a decision….
 The severity of the disorder.
 Recommend therapy…
 The frequency of the therapy.
 Educational and healthcare Policies.

(McLeod &Verdon, 2013; Velleman, 2016).

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 Saudi-Hejazi Arabic

The spoken dialect in the western region of SA.

The native dialect of 14.5 million Arabic speakers.

Its segmental inventory is similar to the Modern Standard

Arabic.

It has 25 consonants, 8 vowels, and no diphthongs.

Adapted from http://www.mghamdi.com/SaudiD.jpg

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Creating a standardized assessment tool

To consider…

Theory-based: The shift from the phoneme to syllable (James, Ferguson & Butcher, 2016).

Phonologically-controlled.

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Criteria for in developing phonologically controlled word list
Target Segments Challenging Contexts

Word-initial
consonants • Singleton (not in a cluster)
• Monosyllabic or disyllabic word, if disyllabic, target is in initial stressed syllable.
• Non-harmonic (all consonants different).

Word-final
consonants • Singleton (not in a cluster)
• Monosyllabic or disyllabic word, if disyllabic, target is in initial stressed syllable.
• Non-harmonic (all consonants different).
• Mono-morphemic (target is not in a separate morpheme).

(Eisenberg & Hitchcock, 2010)

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Criteria for developing a reliable picture-naming task
According to Hua (2006) and Velleman (2016):

 Opportunities for all phonemes to occur in all possible positions:

Syllable initial words initial (SIWI)
Syllable initial within word (SIWW)
Syllable final within words (SFWW)
Syllable word final (SFWF).

 To systematically control the syllable and word shape and length.

 Frequency of all the phonemes with considering the consonant-vowel combination.

 The familiarity of words and ease of presentation.

 Length of the task.

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Aim

To identify the developmental patterns of the phonological features among

these children

Over all aim: investigate the speech sounds development of typically-

developed Saudi Hejazi Arabic children aged between 2;6-5;11

Sub-aim: develop a linguistically controlled theory-based picture-naming

test

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Method

Finding the suitable words for children

Identifying the age of acquisition of these words

Creating words-list

Creating pictures for the words

Testing pictures-words reliability

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1. Find suitable words for children.

The Arabic articulation tests (Amayra, 1994; Amayra & Dyson, 1998; Ammar &
Morsi, 2002; Abo-Elsaad, Baz, and El-Banna, 2009; Ayyad, 2011).

The Arabic version of the McArthur communication development inventory (JISH,

2014).

Initial list of 132 words was created.

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 2. Identify the age of acquisition.

 A Google form created and electronically distributed among family members, friends, and
SLTs.

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdoPKDP3qnsk3XA11MyaAIrItBkEnpWzblgsl7QSxIq3
ETlLA/viewform

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3. UHA phonological features
Example of the word matrix including all the phonological features
UHA Arabic English
Hejazi IPA MSA IPA SIWI Phonetic SIWW Phonetic SFWW Phonetic SFWF Phonetic
Consonant Word     meaning   shape   shape   shape   shape
     

/n/ ‫نخلة‬ nax.la nax.lah palm tree /n/ CVC          

  ‫نجمة‬ naʒ.ma naʒ.mah star /n/ CVC          

  ‫نمر‬ ni.mir namir tiger /n/ CV          

  ‫بطانية‬ batˤ.tˤa:.ni.ja batˤ.tˤa:.ni.jah blanket     /n/ CV        

  ‫منشفة‬ min.ʃa.fa min.ʃa.fah towel         /n/ CVC  

  ‫منديل‬ man.di:l man.di:l tissue         /n/ CVC  

  ‫ألوان‬ ʔal.wa:n ʔal.wa:n coloring pencils             /n/ CVVC

  ‫صحن‬ sˤa.ħin sˤaħn plate             /n/ CVC

  ‫صابون‬ sˤa:.bu:n sˤa:.bu:n soap             /n/ CVVC

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4. Creating pictures.
Example of the downloaded pictures :

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5. Testing pictures-words reliability

Adult:
10 Saudi Hejazi participants named the pictures (the reliability was almost 85% ).

Children:
4 Saudi Hejazi children aged between 2;6 and 5;11 named the pictures (an average of 80%
reliability).

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 Findings
 The final version of the word list consist of 153 words elicited from 150 pictures.

 Already applied on 197 typically-developed Saudi Hejazi children.

 These words have been presented in a Power-point document on a tablet device.

 Mostly named spontaneously. The nouns were the easiest words to name.

All the images attract the children attention.

The length of the task was 10 to 50 minutes.

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Conclusion

The final version of this picture-naming task could be used as a base for creating a norm-
referenced phonological assessment tool, after testing its validity, reliability, sensitivity and
specificity in assessing the phonological features of the typically developed monolingual
preschool Saudi Hejazi children.

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 References

Abou-Elsaad, T., Baz, H., & El-Banna, M. (2009). Developing an Articulation Test for Arabic-Speaking School-Age Children. Folia Phoniatrica Et Logopaedica, 61(5),
275-282. doi: 10.1159/000235650

Alghamdi, M. (2014). http://www.mghamdi.com/SaudiD.jpg. Retrieved from http://www.mghamdi.me/

Amayrah, M. (1994). A Normative study of the acquisition of consonants sounds in Arabic (PhD). University of Florida.

Amayreh, M., & Dyson, A. (1998). The Acquisition of Arabic Consonants. Journal Of Speech Language And Hearing Research, 41(3), 642. doi: 10.1044/jslhr.4103.642

AMMAR, W., & MORSI, R. (2006). Phonological development and disorders: colloquial Egyptian Arabic. In Z. Hua & B. Dodd, Phonological Development and
Disorders in Children: A Multilingual Perspective (pp. 216–232). Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.

Ayyad, H. (2011). Phonological development of typically developing Kuwaiti Arabic–speaking preschoolers (Doctor of Philosophy). The university of British Columbia
(Vancouver, Canada).

Cole, P., & Taylor, O. (1990). Performance of Working Class African-American Children on Three Tests of Articulation. Language, Speech, And Hearing Services In
Schools, 21(3), 171-176. doi: 10.1044/0161-1461.2103.171

Eisenberg, S., & Hitchcock, E. (2010). Using Standardized Tests to Inventory Consonant and Vowel Production: A Comparison of 11 Tests of Articulation and
Phonology. Language, Speech, And Hearing Services In Schools, 41(4), 488-503. doi: 10.1044/0161-1461(2009/08-0125)

Hua, Z. (2006). The Need for Comparable Criteria in Multilingual Studies. In Z. Hua & B. Dodd, Phonological Development and Disorders in Children : A Multilingual
Perspective (1st ed.). Channel View Publications. Retrieved from https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/sheffield/detail.action?docID=265913


International Expert Panel on Multilingual Children's Speech (2012). Multilingual children with speech sound disorders: Position paper. Bathurst, NSW, Australia:
Research Institute for Professional Practice, Learning and Education (RIPPLE), Charles Sturt University. Retrieved from http://
www.csu.edu.au/research/multilingual-speech/position-paper


Jeddah Institute for Speech and Hearing-JISH (2011). JISH Articulation Test. Jeddah. JISH.

James, D., Ferguson, W., & Butcher, A. (2016). Assessing children’s speech using picture-naming: The influence of differing phonological variables on some speech
outcomes. International Journal Of Speech-Language Pathology, 18(4), 364-377. doi: 10.3109/17549507.2015.1101159

Khoja, M. (2017). A survey of formal and informal assessment procedures used by speech-language pathologists in Saudi Arabia. Speech, Language And
Hearing, 22(2), 91-99. doi: 10.1080/2050571x.2017.1407620

Safi, S., & Dashash, N. (2014). MacArthur-Bates CDI. Words check-list, JEDDAH.

Velleman, S. (2016). Speech sound disorders(First edition). Wolters Kluwer, Philadelphia

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Thank you for your listening….

Questions?

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