Speech assessments for Vietnamese children

I have been teaching (and learning) about the assessment of children with speech sound disorders to (and from) students in the Speech Therapy Training Program at Pham Ngoc Thach University of Medicine, in Ho Chi Minh City. In preparation for this course, I have discovered ten different assessments that have been created for Vietnamese children (listed below).

When using these assessments, it is important to determine whether they have been created for children who use northern (e.g., Hanoi), central, or southern (e.g., Ho Chi Minh City) pronunciation. However, there are 58 Vietnamese provinces, and pronunciation of consonants as well as vowels can differ between different provinces, particularly in central Việt Nam.

The results of one classroom discussion about different pronunciations of "a"

I also have shown them examples of assessments in English, particularly to compare different types of presentation, analyses, and how normative data assists in diagnosis and intervention planning.

Speech therapy students at Pham Ngoc Thach University of Medicine
after a class on Vietnamese and English speech assessments

Dr Nguyễn Thị  Ly Kha has developed an extensive speech assessment. It contains 284 words, consisting of 4 words to elicit each vowel, word initial and word final consonant, and tone. The words have been chosen to be in the vocabulary of children throughout Việt Nam. She has collected normative data on this assessment on nearly 300 children. I look forward to seeing this study finalized and published as to my knowledge, it will be one of the only, and definitely the largest normative study of typical Vietnamese acquisition in the world.

Sarah Verdon, Prof Sharynne McLeod, Dr Nguyễn Thị Ly Kha, Ms Ha Hai-Chau

A number of these assessments are available at: http://vnspeechtherapy.com/default.html

Assessment 1: ĐÁNH GIÁ KHẢ NĂNG PHÁT ÂM ÂM TIẾT CỦA TRẺ MẪU GIÁO NÓI TIẾNG VIỆT (Nguyễn, 2011)
Author: TS. Nguyễn Thị Ly Kha, ĐHSP TP.HCM, Viet Nam

Assessment 2: Vietnamese One-Word Articulation Screener (Pham, 2009)
Author: Giang Pham, MA CCC-SLP, USA (2009)

Assessment 3: Southern dialect Vietnamese phonological probe (Tang & Barlow, 2006)
Tang, G., & Barlow, J. (2006). Characteristics of the sound systems of monolingual Vietnamese-speaking children with phonological impairment. Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics, 20(6), 423-445.

Assessment 4: Articulation Test: Vietnamese (Cheng, 1991)
Cheng, L. L. (1991). Assessing Asian Language Performance, (2nd ed.). Oceanside, CA: Academic Communication Associates.

Assessment 5: Vietnamese consonant word list and Vietnamese vowel word list (Hwa-Froelich, Hodson & Edwards, 2002)
Hwa-Froelich, D. A., Hodson, B. H., & Edwards, H. T. (2002). Vietnamese phonology: A tutorial. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 11, 264-273.

Assessment 6: Vietnamese Articulation Test (West, 2000)
Author: Melanie West, Adelaide Central Community Health Service, Adelaide, Australia

Assessment 7: Vietnamese Articulation Test-II (VAT-II) (Cameron & Watt, 2006)
Authors: Tarsh Cameron and Carley Watt, Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia

Assessment 8: Operation Smile Vietnamese Articulation Screening Test (Ducote)
Author: Charlotte A. Ducote, PhD, CCC-SLP, New Orleans, LA 70121, USA (caducote@aol.com)

Assessment/Word lists 9: BẢNG TỪ ÂM TIẾNG VIỆT (Nguyen & Ducote)
Authors: Miss Nguyễn Van Anh in collaboration with Charlotte A. Ducote, PhD, CCC-SLP (caducote@aol.com)

Assessment 10: BỘ TRẮC NGHIỆM ĐÁNH GIÁ KHẢ NĂNG NGÔN NGỮ VÀ KHẢ NĂNG TÍNH TOÁN CỦA TRẺ TỪ 6 ĐẾN 9 TUỔI [EVALUATION TEST OF LANGUAGE ABILITY AND CAPACITY CALCULATION OF CHILD FROM 6 TO 9 YEARS]
Authors: Trần Quốc Duy, Alain Content, Nguyễn Thị Ly Kha, Nguyễn Thị Hồng Phượng, Huỳnh Mai Trang, Hoàng Thị Vân
This assessment and normative data considers: phonological awareness, vocabulary, grammar, memory, and knowledge of numbers and calculation