During the free speech sample the child says "It jumped on the blocks." Which of the following is a true statement about the number of linguistic units contained in this utterance?

• A. Nineteen phonemes
• B. Three syllable onsets
• C. Two morphemes
• D. No rimes

Answer: (B)

The key idea is counting syllable onsets—the initial consonant(s) that begin a syllable. In a syllable, the onset can be a consonant cluster or nothing if the syllable starts with a vowel; the rest of the syllable is the rhyme (vowel plus any following consonants).

In the utterance, there are five syllables corresponding to the five words: It, jumped, on, the, blocks. The onsets are:

• It: none (starts with a vowel)

• jumped: /dʒ/ (the sound /dʒ/ begins the syllable)

• on: none (starts with a vowel)

• the: /ð/

• blocks: /bl/

That gives three syllables with onsets, i.e., three syllable onsets in total. The other options don’t fit because they describe counts at different linguistic levels (phonemes, morphemes) or properties (no rhymes) that aren’t what’s being tallied here.