Cycles Approach
Maximal Oppositions
Maximal Oppositions is a phonological approach that follows a similar format to that of Minimal Pairs; however, there are larger treatment sets targeted. This approach is focused on sound segment production, phonological awareness, increasing intelligibility and increasing input processing/speech perception. The clinician should target non-stimulable sounds, later developing sounds and sounds that are always incorrect. Goal progression should be horizontal, across multiple goals.
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The clinician should target isolated speech sounds and articulatory movements, real words and contrastive words. Responses should be in imitation and can also be spontaneous; and the client should be knowledgeable of their progress. A speech language pathologist is required to implement this approach. A parent and/or teacher can also be helpful when carrying over to other contexts.
Resources:
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Gierut, J. A. (1989). Maximal Opposition Approach to Phonological Treatment. Journal of Speech and Hearing Disorders, 54(1), 9–19.
Allen, M. M. (2013). Intervention Efficacy and Intensity for Children With Speech Sound Disorder. Journal of Speech, Language & Hearing Research, 56(3), 865–877. https://doi-org.ezproxy.bgsu.edu/1092-4388(2012/11-0076)
Sessions can be one-on-one or in a group dependent on the client. The clinician can also plan for a structured or naturalistic setting. According to research, it is recommended that sessions be held 2-3 times per week, for about 30 min/session. The clinician should also target about 80-100 trials per session to get ample data. Total intervention time for this approach is recommended to be three months in length. There are two phases in this approach; the imitation and spontaneous phase. During the imitation phase, the client imitates the clinician's production. The client must have an accuracy percentage of 75% or higher prior to moving to the spontaneous phase. In the spontaneous phase, the client produces the targets independently.