Abstract
Summary
A predictive articulation screening test was devised for school entrants to find out if, by its use it would be possible to select for speech therapy only those children whose speech was unlikely to improve quickly, i.e. during their first two terms in school.
Ten separate tests regarded as being predictive of speech improvement were tried out. School entrants found to have defective speech at the first survey were retested six months later. The results on the predictive tests of those who improved were compared with the predictive test results of those who had not improved. It was found that three of the tests were good predictors in 85 % of cases. Using these it was possible to predict which speech defective children would improve sufficiently within six months not to require speech therapy.