Goldman-Fristoe Test of Articulation 2

Why are words such as duck, yellow, and flowers which have phonetic contexts easily influencing assimilation errors still used?

Reducing the number of phonetically “loaded” contexts and/or systematically evaluating the child’s performance in more complex contexts will be addressed in the next revision.

Why is there no inclusion of vowel production as in the Arizona Test of Articulation?

We feel that consonants contribute more important related to intelligibility but recognize that we should be cognizant of child’s vowel errors. We are considering an qualitative procedure for noting vowel errors (taking into account dialectal variations) for the next revision.

Has a study been done that looks at which format is "better" pictures vs. photographs?

I am not aware of any recent research. In research conducted with other tests at Pearson, there is no difference in performance when typically developing children are tested using photographs as stimuli rather than drawn pictures.

Are there plans to update the GFTA-KLPA-2 normative data?

We are starting a revision of the test stimuli and response forms in 2012. When completed, we will conduct a new standardization. Until then, you can be assured that the current norms provide accurate data to assist you in making diagnostic decisions for the children you are testing.

When you anticipate production of a new edition?

In a few years—currently planned for 2015

It would be great if the test tested for post vocalic "r."

We will consider with the future revision.

Will there ever be a normed intelligibility section?

Not at this time.

Do you anticipate a Spanish version in the near future?

Yes, we are planning to develop a Spanish edition.

Will there be an iPad application?

We are investigating that option.

If a student has met all of his goals and objectives and is ready to exit speech therapy...is it necessary to give him the full assessment of the Goldman-Fristoe-2?

It probably be a good way to document the changes and reason for exiting therapy, especially since the assessment is so brief to administer.

If a child's production of a sound is perceptually accurate, but the placement is incorrect (i.e. interdentalization of /t, d, n/, how would that be scored?

As correct. I would certainly note placement in comments.

If a child does not have an /s/ in his or her repertoire, marking all the /s/ blends as incorrect seems to skew the score somewhat. Have I been scoring this correctly?

This is a good point, but the norms do account for this. Also the /s/ and its blends are important for intelligibility.

The target sound in the picture balloons is the medial /l/. However, if the child has difficulty producing the /s/ sound, do you count that error when finding the raw score or only the target sound for each picture?

We only count the errors on target sounds. I would however note the inconsistency which can be useful in intervention.

The raw score is determined from the Sounds in Words section of the test. If a child scored 0 for their raw score but had 6 errors on Sounds in Sentences--could those errors be counted for a 'raw score'?

There are no norms for Sounds-in-Sentences so you cannot count those errors when calculating scores using the norm tables. It is certainly an important observation and should be noted.

How do recommend interpreting scores for a child around age 2 ½ who is administered the test but responds to very few pictures, even in imitation. His non-responses are not counted as errors, so his score is inflated.

In this case I would probably stop the test administration after a few non-responses and reschedule so child might be more comfortable and familiar with the examiner and the test environment. The score you currently obtained would be meaningless. You may also evaluate vocal development based on the child’s vocalizations in play activities, noting the child’s phoneme repertoire and syllable shapes in spontaneous productions rather than administering a standardized assessment.

I’m still not sure how to use the Supplemental Developmental Norms to interpret child's performance.

Basically, you can look at a child’s error sounds and positions in which errors occur and use the Tables to determine what percent of normal children correctly use these at the different age levels. If you want to know at what age 85% of children have the sound you would follow the chart across until you reach .85 or better.

In reference to the normative table for sound development, what is the exact chronological age for which the sample correctly produced the sounds? For example /b/ in initial position words, is it delayed at two years, zero months?

You are correct. 98% of 2 year olds produce /b/ correctly in the initial position of words; 99% of typically developing 2 ½ year olds do (see Table 1, page 7 of the Supplemental Developmental Norms booklet.)

Table 2.1 states age at which 85% participants accurately produced by age. You indicated that there was a chart available for medial and final. Can you give the table and/or reference for that?

Look at Table 6.6 on page 56 of the Manual.