Collecting Baseline Data in Speech Therapy

It’s towards the beginning of the school year for many, which means new students and goals! I like to collect baseline data when I start seeing a new student or introduce a new goal. By collecting baseline data, speech therapists can create effective treatment plans and make data-driven adjustments throughout therapy.

What is baseline data?

Baseline data refers to the initial measurements of a student’s performance before any intervention begins. It serves as a starting point to understand where the student’s skills are and provides a reference for measuring progress over time.

Finding baselines can be useful in writing and setting measurable goals. Knowing where the child is starting is necessary in order to write a goal and criteria to meet that goal. Your findings will dictate what percentage and cues are included.

Baseline data can also be helpful to include in progress reports. You can include the information it in a progress note to say “the child has improved from a baseline accuracy of xx% to a current accuracy of xx%.”

By understanding where a client is starting, therapists can design personalized intervention strategies that are specific to the client’s needs. It helps in making informed decisions about whether to continue, adjust, or discontinue goals.

Are you wondering how to collect a baseline?

Baseline data is collected in a structured and objective manner. It includes quantitative information, such as the frequency of errors, level of accuracy, or response times in specific tasks.

When collecting baseline data, simply pick a task or activity that you would use in therapy. This will give you the most accuracy and consistency when collecting data now and later.

You can break down skills into smaller, observable tasks. For example, if you are starting to target the sound /s/, the accuracy with which the child is producing /s/ before beginning therapy is their baseline. This way we have a “baseline” for their abilities specifically on that goal and the way it is written.

For example if the goal is “Student will produce /s/ in the initial, medial, and final positions with 80% accuracy given min cues” then you would test the child on 5-10 stimulus items. Collect baselines for each position, noting the accuracy and level of cues given.

If you are collecting a baseline to write a goal, you can adjust the number of trials, the percentage accuracy, or the difficulty of the task based on their current performance. For example, if the student produced 30% accuracy, then you may write a goal to achieve this skill at 70% accuracy. Or if they produced 80% accuracy when provided a verbal prompt and a visual cue, then you may write the goal to get 70% accuracy without any cues or prompts.

Free resources for collecting baseline data

Data Collection Sheets and Editable Lesson Plans: Free speech therapy data sheets and lesson plans! Printable and editable sheets for quick and easy lesson planning and data collecting! Keep yourself organized from the start of the school year.

Articulation Screener and IPA chart: An IPA chart that serves as an informal articulation screener for speech-language pathologists, who may need to quickly and informally assess articulation. This is a quick reference guide for place, manner, and voice of consonant sounds. The chart makes it easy to see error patterns.

Language Sample Checklist: A quick and easy one-page speech therapy language screener. This extensive checklist includes syntax, morphology, narratives, and pragmatics sections for an informal assessment of skills.