Which teaching strategy would be most helpful for students who confuse the sounds f and th in their own speech?

How to teach fricatives to kids (f, s, z, th, sh, v)

For many children with speech delays, long sounds called fricatives are particularly difficult.  These are sounds that require continued air-flow, like /f/, /v/, /s/, /z/, “th”, and “sh”.  If your child has difficulty with all of these sounds, keep reading to learn how to help him produce them correctly. If your child only has trouble with one or a few of these sounds, he will probably learn better if you teach him how to produce those sounds specifically.

How To Teach Fricatives, Step One:

Auditory Discrimination

The first thing you will need to do is help your child hear the difference between fricatives (long sounds) and the short sounds that she is saying instead.  To do this, you will need to come up with some pairs of words that are exactly the same except that one has a fricative and one has a short sound (preferably the short sound that your child replaces that sound with, these are called minimal pairs).  For example, if your child says /t/ for /s/, you would want to come up with some pairs like “toe” and “sew”, or “tent” and “sent”.  Here are some lists of pairs for the most common replacements for long sounds:

• /t/ for /s/: toe/sew, tent/sent, tip/sip, tell/sell

• /d/ for /z/: do/zoo

• /p/ for /f/: pan/fan, pat/fat, pork/fork, fill/pill, four/pour

• /b/ for /v/: bail/veil, vet/bet (man, those are harder to think of than some!)

• /t/ for “th”: thin/tin, thigh/tie

• /d/ for “th”: there/dare, they/day

• /t/ for “sh”: shoe/two, shy/tie, ship/tip, shore/tore, shop/top

Once you have picked some of these pairs, you will need to make cards for each word.  You can either print out pictures you find on google image or draw your own.  Place two pictures in front of your child from the same pair.  Tell your child what each picture is called and then have him close his eyes.  Hide a penny under one of the pictures.  Then, have your child uncover his eyes and tell him which picture to look under.  For example, if you had two and shoe out, you could say “look under ‘shoe’”.  Make sure you exaggerate the first sound when you say it.  If he looks under the wrong picture, say “Oh listen, that word has a long (or short) sound” and exaggerate the sound for him again.  Keep doing this until your child can correctly pick the right picture each time.  Your child may be able to do this right away or it may take several weeks.  Keep at it! While you’re doing this, point out fricatives and short sounds when you hear them, but your child doesn’t need to say the sounds yet at this point. ** Modification:  If your child is not interested in the “hide the penny game”, get out two paper or plastic cups (not see-through) and put one picture on top of each cup.  Hide a piece of candy under one of the cups so that when your child finds the right one, he gets a small piece of candy.  Mini M&Ms work great for this!

How to Teach Fricatives, Step Two:

Say Fricatives in Words

Once your child can hear the difference between long and short sounds, it’s time to start having your child say those fricatives in single words.  Put two words from a pair in front of your child again, but this time, inform your child that he will have to tell you which picture to look under.   Have your child close his eyes and hide the penny (or candy) under the picture with the fricative.  Have your child open his eyes and tell you where to look.  Your child will probably say the word with the short sound first so repeat the word back to your child and look under the short sound picture.  Then, have your child guess again.  If he says the short sound word again, say “you said ‘two’ but it’s not there.  Do you mean, ssshhhoe?”  Then, help your child say the word with the correct fricative so you can look under that picture.

Once your child can do this, try having your child label a picture of a word with a fricative by just showing her the picture and saying “what’s this?”  Once he can do this consistently, you’re ready to move on to the next step.

How to Teach Fricatives, Step Three:

Saying Long Sounds in Sentences

Once your child can say fricatives in single words, have your child create a sentence using that word.  You may have to help your child say the sound correctly in those sentences for a while until she remembers to do it on her own.

How to Teach Fricatives, Step Four:

Catch Your Child In Conversation

Once your child can produce the fricatives correctly in sentences, you will want to help him remember to use it all of the time in conversational speech.  If you hear your child say fricatives incorrectly, repeat your child’s error back to him as a question.  For example, if your child says “where’s my two?” (instead of shoe) you can say “your two?”  See if your child can fix it back to shoe.  If not, say “Oh, do you mean shoe?  Where’s your sssshhhhoe?”  Then, have your child say the sentence again using the fricatives correctly.

This process may take a while so be patient while trying to teach your child how to say fricatives.  With consistent practice and loving support, you can help your child be able to say these sounds correctly.  Don’t forget to use the social media buttons below to share this post with your friends!

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20 Comments

1. I did this hide the penny game with a little girl this morning and she loved it! She squealed and laughed every time she found it!

2. Just curious, what phonological process is it when a kid says s for sh in she, when they just take out the sh & replace it with an s

   • If that is the only error that the child has, then I would not consider it a phonological process, but rather simply a single error. However, if the child typically takes sounds that are produced on the palate (like “sh”, “zh”, “ch”, “j”, and “y”) and produces them on the alveolar ridge (/s/, /z/, /t/, /d/, /l/, /n/), then you could consider this to be the phonological process of fronting of palatals. It is the same concept as velar fronting (/k/ turns to /t/, /g/ turns to /d/) but with palatal sounds instead. You could use this same approach for those errors as well.

3. emma June 10, 2014 at 4:17 am - Reply

   anymore v and b words! it is very hard

4. Great ideas thanks. My son has difficulties with the fricatives due to his nasal air flow – he uses his nose for all of the sounds. My SLT offered us a nose clip but he hates wearing it. Any advice? I’m also looking for free or downloadable worksheets / cards with these sounds – any suggestions?

   • Nasal air flow issues are very hard to give suggestions without knowing the child because all problems are so different. I’m afraid I won’t be able to help with the air flow problems. I have a few free artic card/worksheet downloads on this page (www.speechandlanguagekids.com/products) but if you need cards and worksheets for all of the fricatives, you’ll want to purchase my All-In-One Articulation Program and Materials Kit http://www.speechandlanguagekids.com/teachspeech

   • janet hammond April 11, 2017 at 3:38 pm - Reply

     Have your child examined by an ENT:

     How can a submucous cleft palate be identified?
     “The most common reason that a child is evaluated for a submucous cleft palate is abnormal nasal speech…. A submucous cleft palate may be identified by the presence of a bifid uvula; a very thin translucent strip of lining (mucosa) in the middle of the roof of the mouth; and, a notch at the back edge of the hard palate that can be felt by the fingertip. However, in some children, the palate may appear normal on physical examination despite the fact that the child is experiencing speech problems, persistent ear disease, and/or swallowing difficulties. In such cases, special tests are necessary to fully assess the palate. These tests include x-ray examination and nasopharyngoscopy (looking at the palate through a very small tube that is placed in the nose). These evaluations are most commonly done by members of a cleft palate team. If you suspect your child has a submucous cleft, you should contact a local cleft palate team (http://www.cleftline.org/parents-individuals/publications/submucous-clefts/)

     • You can also try shining a flashlight in their nose and see if you can see the light through their palate. Doesn’t work for every kid but it’s another tool to try!

5. Andrea Sellar September 22, 2015 at 9:45 pm - Reply

   I’d like to ask about a child who backs all initial fricatives with”g”.
   He can achieve the sounds in isolation but we are finding it really difficult to transfer to word level. Do you have any activities that you use to work on initial “sh” and “s”?

   • Hmmm… I don’t think I have anything that is specific to what you’re talking about. Have you tried doing those sounds at the beginning of nonsense syllables? Like suh, soh, soo, etc.? That seems to help me when I have a kid who can do something in isolation but not single words.

6. Susan May 3, 2016 at 6:24 am - Reply

   I’ve been told my daughter has air flow stopping so starts a lot of her works with “d” e.g. “dat” instead of “that”, “do” instead of “shoe”. Will this help? Or are there any more suitable exercise? Thanks so much

   • The thing you’re describing sounds like trouble with fricatives so this article should give you some guidance!

7. Claire May 3, 2017 at 5:54 pm - Reply

   I’m working with a nearly 5 year old who uses ‘s’ for ‘f’. He can put his top teeth on his bottom lip and blow, but his tongue stays in the same place for ‘s’. Have you any suggestions I could try to correct his tongue placement please?

   • I’m wondering if you could work on teaching the child the difference between tongue up, tongue down, tongue back, etc. so that he can feel the difference and then play around with making the /f/ sound with the tongue in those different positions. Since I haven’t worked with that child directly, I can’t say what will work, but that is something I might try if I had a child with a similar problem.

8. Riddhi May 24, 2017 at 4:13 pm - Reply

   Hello! What are your suggestions for working on fricatives and affricates for a preschooler that is ingressing/breathing in for each sound? She is able to produce the sounds correctly in isolation with lots of modelling and verbal cueing, but when we add a vowel (with and without aspiration), she either puts a large significant gap between the two sounds, or ingresses the fricative then produces the (aspirated) vowel.

   • Kena Roth January 31, 2018 at 8:49 am - Reply

9. Riddhi May 25, 2017 at 11:23 am - Reply

   Hello! Would you have any suggestions for working on fricatives/affricates with a preschooler that ingresses/breathes in for the sounds? She is able to produce /s/, /sh/ and /f/ in isolation, but when we add on a vowel (with our without aspiration), she is not able to coarticulate them smoothly and there is a large gap between the sounds. We have tried the sounds in VC as well and she has the same type of gap between vowel and fricative.

10. Kels February 19, 2018 at 10:06 am - Reply

    Hi, can you provide any tips on how to support a child who can discriminate accurately (they are fronting) but when they come to producing the ‘k’ words at word level they consistently make a ‘t’ sound. Is it just about highlighting their error and giving them tips but still staying at the word level? Rather than helping them make it in isolation, CV etc (as this is more of an articulation approach). Thanks

11. Michelle November 4, 2018 at 11:30 am - Reply

    I have a 4 year old boy who uses c for f so fan is can and so forth, he can make the f sound and if I have him do fffff an he will say ffff an but when we do it fan he immediately say can.. is their ways to correct this? He is in speech but itbdoesnt seem to be helping greatly. I’d like to find different activities for him that could help

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