Mouth Sounds
Music Therapy speech videos & songs for special needs individuals.
Goal 1: Client will produce targeted speech sounds in isolation.
Goal 2: Client will produce targeted speech sounds in one-syllable words.
Domain: Speech
The English alphabet contains 26 letters. The English language contains over 40 speech sounds… even phonology experts disagree on the exact number. So, while teaching sounds based on letters is a good start, it does not cover the entire range of sounds needed for fluent speech.
The answer? The IPA, or International Phonetic Alphabet! Although our focus is English, the IPA can be used to transcribe sounds from any language on Earth. Dictionary entries are usually followed by IPA symbols to aid in pronunciation. Example: phoneme /ˈfoʊ nim/ A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound in speech. This project teaches 42 phonemes.
Learning to speak can occur naturally by listening to others, but because fluent speakers don’t spend their days saying “buh, buh, buh” and “puh, puh, puh” some students struggle to produce speech sounds (phonemes) in isolation. To assist these students, each phoneme has been paired with a common word. These words are both sung and represented with a picture. Each word was selected because it was one-syllable, a high-frequency word, and easily represented by a picture. The targeted phonemes are frequently the initial sounds in the targeted word, unless (due to the above conditions) they fit better at the end or (for vowel sounds) in the middle of the word.
There are a total of 42 videos, 26 for consonant sounds and 16 for vowel sounds. There are also 42 songs, the same songs used in the videos. There are also 42 fill-in-the-blank songs to be able to expand on each sound. For example, after practicing /b/ and “ball” you may want to try additional words that begin with the /b/ phoneme: bus, bike, bird, etc. or you may attempt /b/ in the final position of a word: job, cab, web, etc.
Are these all of the English phonemes? Yes and no. These are all of the English phonemes that can be spoken/sung in isolation. Some sounds only occur in multi-syllabic words. Once a word has more than one syllable, one of those syllables is stressed. Some phonemes only occur in unstressed syllables and (by definition) cannot be spoken in isolation. Vowel sounds /e/, /o/, /ɚ/, and /ə/ are unstressed variants of /eɪ/, /o/, /ɚ/, and /ə/. The differences between these stressed and unstressed sounds are minimal. The alveolar tap /ɾ/ and glottal stop /ʔ/ are lazy versions of the /t/ and /d/ phonemes found only in multi-syllabic words such as “better” and “ huddle”. Your student will have little difficulty in acquiring these slight alterations if they can master the 42 phonemes included in this project.
Mouth Sounds (consonant sounds) download includes:
- (b p d t g k ks kw v f ð θ z s ʒ ʃ h dʒ tʃ m n ŋ j w l r)
- 26 videos [mp4 video files]
- 26 regular songs [mp3 audio files]
- 26 fill-in-the-blank songs [mp3 audio files]
- 26 lyrics [PDF]
- 26 lyrics & chords [PDF]
(consonant sounds) DOWNLOAD PAGE
Mouth Sounds (vowel sounds) download includes:
- (i u ju ɪ ʊ eɪ oʊ ɝ ɛ ʌ ɔ ɔɪ æ ɑ ɑɪ ɑʊ)
- 16 videos [mp4 video files]
- 16 regular songs [mp3 audio files]
- 16 fill-in-the-blank songs [mp3 audio files]
- 16 lyrics [PDF]
- 16 lyrics & chords [PDF]
(vowel sounds) DOWNLOAD PAGE
Mouth Sounds (all sounds) download includes:
- (b p d t g k ks kw v f ð θ z s ʒ ʃ h dʒ tʃ m n ŋ j w l r i u ju ɪ ʊ eɪ oʊ ɝ ɛ ʌ ɔ ɔɪ æ ɑ ɑɪ ɑʊ)
- 42 videos [mp4 video files]
- 42 regular songs [mp3 audio files]
- 42 fill-in-the-blank songs [mp3 audio files]
- 42 lyrics [PDF]
- 42 lyrics & chords [PDF]
(all sounds) DOWNLOAD PAGE
