The Cycles Approach for Phonological Patterns: More Progress in Less Time!
I love the Cycles Approach (developed by Barbara Hodson and colleagues). But what I found is that not a lot of clinicians are confident knowing HOW to implement this approach. Well, I’m going to give you a step-by-step break down so you can start using this effective intervention for speech sound disorders today.
What kids are appropriate for Cycles?
Cycles is usually used with kids who have a bunch of phonological patterns/processes, are pretty unintelligible, and are on the younger side (let’s say preschool-Kinder). These kids can have extensive omissions, moderate substitutions, and a limited consonant repertoire.
What is a Cycle?
Cycles Approach For Speech Therapy Primary Patterns Visual
This is where the biggest misconception comes in. A “cycle” consists of targeting ALL the primary phonological patterns (more about these later) - and phonemes within those primary patterns - that a child is not yet producing in his speech but that he is stimulable for. So one cycle may include targeting the following phonological patterns: final consonant deletion, S blends, fronting, and gliding. You work on each phoneme within a pattern for an hour and just move on. Don’t work toward mastery. This allows you to work on a bunch of targets in a shorter amount of time. This approach also mimics more natural speech sound acquisition (we don’t master /b/ completely before we move on to /p/ when learning to speak, right?), and allows you to make greater progress faster! You complete one “cycle” when you work through ALL of those patterns with the child. I’m going to link a great free visual I created here . It will totally help you see what Cycles primary patterns look like. Seriously, click the link. It’s going to really make it clear for you!
So how do I “do” Cycles?
First, you need to conduct an evaluation. Look for phonological patterns in the child’s speech. When you are using the Cycles Approach there are 6 primary patterns you are really concerned with: syllableness, final consonant deletion, initial consonant deletion, anterior/posterior contrasts (i.e. fronting or backing), S blends, and gliding of liquids. Go consult that visual I mentioned to see what I mean!
Cycles Approach in Speech Therapy for Phonological Processes
Determine which of these patterns the child is stimulable for and which phonemes within that pattern the child is stimulable for. For example, when looking at final consonant deletion, determine if the child is stimulable for final /t/, /p/, /m/, or /n/. If the child is only stimulable for final /t/ then only work on that phoneme when targeting final consonant deletion. Work on final /t/ for an hour (can be one 60 min session or two 30 min sessions), and move on! Then look at initial consonant deletion. Maybe the child is stimulable for initial /m/ and initial /b/. Work on initial /m/ for one hour. Then move on to initial /b/ for one hour, and then move on to the next pattern that the child is stimulable for (e.g. fronting/backing). If a child is not stimulable for any phoneme within a pattern, it is ok to skip that pattern and move on to the next one! You can keep checking for stimulability as you work on other sounds/patterns.
When you have covered all the patterns a child is stimulable for and all the phonemes within each pattern, then you have completed one cycle! Go back to the beginning and start a new cycle. Target any patterns and phonemes again that the child still needs to work on (e.g. patterns that you are not seeing emerge in conversational speech).
Each individual Cycles session follows a set format: review previous sessions words, auditory bombardment, practice, stimulability check, metaphonological activity, and auditory bombardment again. I’ve also outlined that in the freebie linked here.
How do you choose target words?
In Cycles, you only need 3-5 words per phoneme targeted. So when working on final /t/, you only need 3-5 final /t/ words! But make ‘em good! Choose words that are only one syllable and have good facilitative context. For example, if I was targeting initial /k/, I would not choose the word “cat” as one of my targets. The final /t/ is terrible when working with a child who fronts! I would choose words like “key”, “cape”, and “cup.” If you need some great no prep sheets with perfectly selected targets - I’ll link that here. Sometimes I choose words I know I have a minimal pair for - so that when the child “gets too good for cycles” I can switch approaches easily. I use these minimal pairs cards that I created with this idea in mind!
You need to get a lot of trials!
I aim for 100 every session! It’s not as hard as it sounds. I use quick turn-taking activities, clicker counters, iPad apps that track productions, and whatever else will motive the child. The sheets I linked here are also designed to easily help you achieve 100 trials per target if you need some more ideas!
Home practice?
That depends. I only want the child practicing correctly. So I will only send home words if I am sure the child is going to say them accurately. That means at times I may only send home one word for practice! Or I may send home none. Practice makes permanent, right? And we don’t want kids practicing something incorrectly! You can also simply give an auditory bombardment word list that a caregiver reads to the child for home practice.
Need more information?
I have created a complete toolkit that makes it simple and easy to understand the Cycles Approach - no more guesswork or flipping through a million different resources! It includes checklists, forms, step-by-step walk throughs, and even a sample client so you can see exactly how to implement the Cycles Approach. It also includes over 220 stimuli cards for all primary patterns so you can get started right away. It is literally a “one-stop Cycles shop!” I’ll link it here or click on the photo on the right!
So that’s it. I tried to keep it short and sweet. Once you understand Cycles, I know it will become one of your go-to interventions with highly unintelligible little ones! If you have any questions, e-mail me! I love to chat speech sound disorders!
