Lakhasly

Two types of speech samples were obtained from both groups: normal children and those who stutter: spontaneous and oral reading speech samples.The selection of different sentences for each age stage was due to the design of curriculums, which are designed based on the developmental characteristics and the nature of the learners (physical, mental, and cognitive) abilities (Ababa, 2019; Bomizbr, 2018; Kassem, 2023).Based on that, each age stage read their own Arabic curriculum sentences in order to neutralize the complexity of the sentences as the children read them to lessen the influence of reading skill development on speech and articulation rates and to focus only on the influence of age on those rates.Those sentences were written in Modern Standard Arabic (henceforth, MSA).

Two types of speech samples were obtained from both groups: normal children and those who stutter: spontaneous and oral reading speech samples.
3.2.1 Spontaneous Speech Sample
About five and a half minutes of spontaneous speech were obtained from each child through answering questions about a preselected picture and describing two sequential events on a set of cards. Regarding the mean number of words and syllables for the three age stages, the first stage was 370 words and 718 syllables, the second stage was 390 words and 743 syllables, and the third stage was 448 words and 851 syllables.
3.2.2 Oral Reading Speech Sample
Regarding the oral reading sample, ten sentences were selected from the school curriculum of the Arabic language for each age stage and its equivalent school year, as Fiorin et al. (2015) suggested. The selection of different sentences for each age stage was due to the design of curriculums, which are designed based on the developmental characteristics and the nature of the learners (physical, mental, and cognitive) abilities (Ababa, 2019; Bomizbr, 2018; Kassem, 2023).
Based on that, each age stage read their own Arabic curriculum sentences in order to neutralize the complexity of the sentences as the children read them to lessen the influence of reading skill development on speech and articulation rates and to focus only on the influence of age on those rates. Those sentences were written in Modern Standard Arabic (henceforth, MSA).
The total number of words in the ten sentences that were obtained from this speech sample was approximately 32 words for the first primary stage, 43 words for the second primary stage, and 54 words for the third primary stage.