Cycles Approach Materials Kit | Phonology Worksheets and Homework (No Prep!)

No-Prep worksheets (with homework boxes) plus instructions for implementing the Cycles Approach to Phonological Remediation. Includes everything you need to target the primary set of phonological processes, based on Barbara Hodson's recommended phonemes/targets.

What's Included:

This kit includes instructions on how to use the Cycles Approach to help a child remediate their phonological processes (also found in this post here). Plus, the following:

• Two-page planning sheet: Use these pages to mark down which phonological processes (and phonemes) you will target within a cycle. Includes all of Barbara Hodson's recommended first processes and phonemes.
• One Page Worksheet/Homework Page for Each Recommended Target: You'll find one page for each of the following targets. Each page contains 20 words that contain that target. You will find 3-5 that they are stimulable for and circle them. Then, you'll practice those in therapy and send them home as homework. Each page also has a homework box at the bottom with instructions for caregivers.
  • Syllable Deletion:
    • 2-Syllable Words
    • 3-Syllable Words
  • Initial Consonant Deletion
    • Initial /p/
    • Initial /b/
    • Initial /m/
    • Initial /w/
  • Final Consonant Deletion
    • Final /p/
    • Final /t/
    • Final /k/
    • Final /m/
    • Final /n/
  • Medial Consonant Deletion
    • VCV Words (Vowel-Consonant-Vowel)
  • /s/ Blends (Initial)
    • /sp/ Blends
    • /st/ Blends
    • /sm/ Blends
    • /sw/ Blends
    • /sn/ Blends
    • /sl/ Blends
    • /sk/ Blends
  • /s/ Blends (Final)
    • Final /ts/ Blends
    • Final /ps/ Blends
  • Velars (Fronting)
    • Final /k/
    • Initial /k/
    • Initial /g/
  • Backing
    • Initial /p/
    • Initial /b/
    • Initial /m/
    • Initial /t/
    • Initial /d/
    • Initial /n/
  • Gliding of Liquids
    • Initial /l/
    • Initial /r/
    • Initial /kr/
    • Initial /gr/

What is the Hodson Cycles Approach to Speech Therapy?

An amazing speech-language pathologist named Barbara Hodson created the cycles approach, sometimes called the Cycles Phonological Remediation Approach as a way to help children with many phonological processes make faster progress in speech therapy. Hodson’s research showed that children can improve their intelligibility faster by cycling through all of the different phonological processes that they need to target. Instead of working on one phonological process until it is mastered, you work on each process for a set amount of time and then move on to the next. You can read Barbara Hodson’s in-depth research here.

When to Use the Cycles Approach:

The cycles approach to speech therapy is intended for children who meet the following criteria:

• Highly unintelligible (very difficult to understand)
• Frequently leave out or omit speech sounds
• Replace some sounds with other sounds
• Don’t use very many different consonant sounds

How Does the Cycles Approach Work?

In the cycles approach, therapists treat phonological processes, which are error patterns in children’s speech. For example, some children delete all consonants off the ends of words. This is called “final consonant deletion” and is a specific pattern of speech errors. This is considered a phonological process.

The cycles approach treats children who use a lot of different phonological processes (error patterns) by targeting each process for a short amount of time and then cycling through other phonological processes.

For example, therapy may target final consonant deletion for 2 weeks and then switch to target stopping of fricatives for another 2 weeks. After all phonological processes are targeted, the cycles start over again and the original process is targeted again. Therapy is continued for each process until it is eliminated from the child’s conversational speech.

Which Phonological Processes to Target First:

Barbara Hodson laid out a nice plan for which phonological processes to target first when using the cycles approach. First, you start with processes that are on Hodson’s “primary set” of targets. These are the processes that impact speech intelligibility the most.

The key is to only include targets (phonological processes) that the child is stimulable for. The goal is to have them practice these targets successfully as many times per cycle as possible. The only exception is gliding, which is targeted with all clients even if they are not stimulable. For this process, you will help them approximate the /l/ and /r/ if they are not stimulable for those sounds yet.

If there is a phonological process in the primary set that the child is not yet stimulable for, use a few minutes each session to work on increasing their stimulability of those sounds.

Primary Set of Targets:

• Syllable deletion: make sure each syllable is marked, even if not all sounds are present
• Sound deletion (FCD, ICD)
• /s/ clusters: significantly improves intelligibility
• Fronting/Backing (Anterior/Posterior Contrasts): Work on velars if fronting or alveolars/labials if backing
• Liquids are targeted at the end of each cycle even if they aren’t stimulable (this is the only exception to the stimulability rule): Target /l/ and /r/ (by emphasizing vowel to suppress the /w/ substitution, go for an approximation)

Cycles Approach Steps:

Here’s how you’ll run your cycles during the cycles approach:

1. Choose your phonological processes for the first cycle (example: “final consonant deletion”)
2. Choose at least 2 phonemes per pattern (example: “final /t/ and final /p/”) This kit includes guidance on which phonemes to choose first
3. Each phoneme (e.g. /k/) within a process (e.g. velars) is targeted for 60 minutes in one week (two 30-minutes or three 20-minutes)
4. Choose 4-5 words to target over and over during those 60 minutes. They should be stimulable for these words so that all productions are successful This kit includes 20 words for each phoneme so you can find 5 they are stimulable for
5. Once cycle is done, reassess convo and see what they still need. Recycle any phonological process that aren’t emerging in conversation

Cycles Approach Steps for Each Therapy Session

1. Review: Review the previous session’s word cards.
2. Auditory Bombardment: Amplified auditory stimulation is provided for 1-2 minutes: the clinician reads around 12 words that contain the target pattern for the session.
3. Target Word Cards: The client draws, colors, or pastes pictures of 3-5 target words on large index cards. Child repeats the words modeled by the clinician.
4. Production Practice through Experiential Play: While playing games, clinician and child take turns naming the pictures on the cards. Clinician provides models and tactile cues. The child should achieve 100% accuracy (choose words that are the easiest for the child to produce).
5. Stimulability Probe: The clinician asks the child to say a bunch of words that contain the target pattern for the next session. Whichever sound is easiest for the child will be targeted during the next session (for example, the child may have to say a bunch of /s/ clusters and the easiest one is selected for practice).
6. Auditory Bombardment: Repeat step 2.
7. Home Program: The child practices 2 minutes per day by having a parent or aide read the list aloud and then naming the picture cards of the production practice words.

Who is This For?

This kit was created for use by speech-language pathologists and SLPAs who are working with children with multiple phonological processes. These pages are great for educators and parents to use as well, but the speech-language pathologist will need to specify which words to target first.

More (Free) Resources:

Need more information about how to use the Cycles Approach to Phonology? Check out our free blog post and video here: https://www.speechandlanguagekids.com/how-to-use-the-cycles-approach-for-speech-therapy/

❤ Images for this eBook were lovingly provided by Tobii Dynavox and Boardmaker.  We use Boardmaker’s PCS symbol library for our products because we love the clean, easy-to-understand look of the pictures.  Plus, this provides an amazing consistency across our products.  You can use PCS symbols in your homemade therapy materials as well!  Visit www.goboardmaker.com to learn more! ❤