A dynamic approach to phonological assessment

Dynamic and static assessments in phonological disorders provide different information about a child’s skills and development. Dynamic assessments evaluate a child’s phonological system when given support, whereas static assessments evaluate skills without support. The Scaffolding Scale of Stimulability (SSS), described in this article, is one example of a dynamic assessment used to evaluate phonological disorders. The SSS comprises a 21-point hierarchy of cues and environmental manipulations that can be used to support a child in the production of phonemes. Use of the SSS is illustrated by a case study of a 4-year-old boy with moderate phonological disorder. The SSS is compared to a static assessment, a probe of 60 single words based on the child’s error patterns. The two assessments are compared across treatment at three time intervals: prior to treatment, after 3 months of treatment, and after 6 months of treatment. Results indicated that scores on the SSS could differentiate the boy’s phoneme productions based on the amount of support needed, while phoneme scores on the probe were at 0% accuracy. As a composite score, the SSS showed a greater percentage of change earlier in treatment and across time when compared to the probe.