International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA): a universal collection of letters and symbols that serve the professional interest of SLPs.

Transcription is used among SLPs during data collection to provide a consistent form documentation of the childs (or adults) exact production of a particular speech sound. Transcription allows for a reliable record of errors and makes it easier to document changes in production over time.

• Transcription should be taken very seriously to remain consistent with other clinicians and should document exactly what was said and what is sounded like

• Transcription can be broad (most common) which provides a symbol to represent each phoneme, or they can be narrow (less common) which provides as much detail as possible and includes extra symbols to characterize specific production features