Quick Fix Therapy Idea: School Supply Lists

Background and graphics are courtesy of Bunting, Books, and Bainbridge and My Cute Graphics!

I was in Target today near the school supplies (eek, the new school year is coming) when something caught my eye. Well, ok so LOTS of things caught my eye, but one thing in particular can be used in therapy and it's FREE! Target provides copies of the school supply lists of nearby schools. So this little SLP grabbed 3 of them: Kindergarten, 2nd and 4th grade. It's interesting to see how different they are!

Where will I be taking them? To work with me to use in the first few weeks! How? With these FREE worksheets that I made. Articulation, language, grammar skills all rolled into one activity? Yes, please! I did leave some space to customize, as I'm sure lists will vary from state to state. 

What do you think? Will you try this activity?

Show Me The Data Linky Party

Jenn over at Crazy Speech World had an awesome idea to do a data collection linky! So far, a bunch of fabulous SLP bloggers have linked up to bring you their methods of collecting data. I decided to join in the fun. 

I must proceed with a word of caution. Due to moving a lot in recent years, I've had different methods of collecting data, depending on the state and setting I was in. One district had data collection sheets that we were all required to use. That was my Clinical Fellowship Year, so I didn't mind having something already in place. The next year, the district I was in didn't have a formal system, so I made up my own simple data tracking sheet. Then I was in a private practice, which was a whole different ballgame. 

Whew! This fall, I am excited to be returning to the school system. Based on past experiences, I created a sheet that I know I will end up tweaking as the year goes on, but at least it gives you an idea of how I like things laid out. I like to have a big space for writing goals/objectives and an open space to write data. I usually jot myself a note regarding the activity we did. 

Click on the picture below to grab a copy of my data collection sheet! If I change it later, I'll be sure to update it here!

How do you keep your data organized? 

Clinical Skills Confidence: Language Samples Part 2

Time for Language Samples Part 2!

If you missed Part 1, check it out HERE. 

I made a language sample checklist that can be used when taking language samples. It is not exhaustive, but should give you a good idea of a student's strengths and weaknesses. Grab it HERE!

While taking a language sample, I am looking for the following:

• Does the student speak in complete sentences?
• Are there a lot of grammatical errors?
• Can I follow what the student is saying?
• Does the student use age appropriate vocabulary?
• Are there any stuttering like behaviors?

This is where we have to quiet our SLP tendencies to talk too much! I find it hard sometimes too, especially with a student who is shy or not really saying much more than 1-2 words. Resist the urge to ask too many questions. If you do speak, use open ended comments or questions, such as "I really like to go to amusement parks. I don't like going on roller coasters though." This way, the student will hopefully open up and start a dialogue, rather than just answering your questions with 1 or 2 words. 

What do you use when taking language samples? Tell me below!

Quick Fix Therapy Idea: Screenshots!

I've talked about using apps like GoodNotes for activities like my Find A Difference: Farm Edition (free) activity to save on ink and time. Now it's time for another way to use this app for a quick and easy therapy idea!

First, you need to know how to take a screenshot. It's very easy: on your iPad, find a page that you'd like to capture. Click the power button and home button at the same time and voila - it saves the screen shot to your home page.

I decided to go to Pediastaff's pinterest page for verbs, which can be found here. I took a screen shot of some pictures that I liked.

Now, open the GoodNotes app. On the left hand side, there is a + sign. Click on that and retrieve the screenshots from your camera roll. 

Now you can use the pen or highlighter feature (found at the top of the app) to have some fun with your students. Have them describe a picture so you or a peer can guess which one they are talking about. Formulate a sentence about each picture and cross them out as you go. Follow directions (draw an X over the picture of the boy with the hat and circle the picture of the dolphin). 

The possibilities are endless!

Have you used the screenshot feature for therapy purposes? Comment below and tell me how!

Clinical Skills Confidence: Language Samples

Time to talk about language samples! 

I like to make sure I take a language sample when I do an assessment. Of course, this is not the ONLY time I take one, but it gives a good representation of a student's strengths and weaknesses, grammar skills, narrative skills, and overall language skills. 

This is where I'm eternally grateful to have an iPad. I can easily grab it to take a recording and go back to it later on. In a pinch, I can use my digital recorder. 

Sometimes, I have students who are not as easily engaged in a conversation. In these cases, I may pull out a book to have him/her narrate a story or watch a short video to help the student start. In an effort to save you some time, I created some language sample prompt cards that you can whip out instead of having to come up with a topic! Grab your free sample HERE. I also have the full product on sale in my TPT store, which you can grab HERE!

Stay tuned for a future Clinical Skills Confidence post where I will write about what I look for in a student's language sample! Let me know what YOU use to get a language sample from your students!

Love It and List It! Linky

I'm linking up with Jenna's Love It and List It! Linky - check out her post here.

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links!

Jenna will be choosing a topic every 3rd Friday of the month. This month she'd like us to share our favorite games! Here goes...

1. Chef Cuckoo: Choose some ingredients to make the best or worst meal (salad, pizza, soup, etc). Students love to discuss how to make the ickiest dinner...the higher the yuck factor, the better! 

2. Funglish: This game has a ton of tiles with different adjectives. Your task is to describe an item by pulling various tiles. Better suited for the older, reading students! I like to use the tiles for sentence formulation and other tasks as well.

3. Melissa and Doug Felt Food: not really a game, but can easily be made into one using any cards/language task. First one to build a whole sandwich wins!

These are just a few in my arsenal!! What are your favorite games???

Quick, Get Under The Table!

"Quick, get under the table!" 

What?!?! 

Head on over to see my guest post on Playing With Words 365 and check out my tips for therapy activities you can do in an unusual place...

Thank you to Katie for allowing me to be a guest blogger! Please feel free to visit my blog, FaceBook, TpT store, or Pinterest page for more fun tips and tricks! :)

Review: Workday Dentist

I recently reviewed Merge Mobile's Storybook Maker app, and was excited to have the opportunity to review another one of their apps! This time, I will be reviewing Workday Dentist.

Disclaimer: This app was provided to me to try; however, all opinions are my own. No other compensation was received. 

Workday Dentist is a "teeth"rific app that includes the following tools so your students can appropriately "treat" the patient:

1. Power Drill

2. Gold and Silver Cap Installers

3. Tooth Extraction Tool

4. Tooth Sticker Applicator

5. Toothbrush

6. Braces Applicator

7. Gas Mask

8. Scraper Tool

You can pick one of 3 patients...for some reason, all my students picked the grandpa!

They loved picking different toothpaste colors. Don't you wish you could do this in real life?

What I Love:

1. Functional: this is a great way to discuss dental hygiene, manners, and why we brush our teeth. It also might help relieve some anxiety that some students might feel about going to the dentist. 

2. Motivating: My students really loved being able to change the colors of the toothpaste! I had one student that got a kick out of pulling the teeth out with the "chomper"tool. 

3. Language Expansion: There were a ton of opportunities to pull language out of my students. We talked about what was wrong with the patient's teeth, what color toothpaste we wanted to use, and what treats to feed the patient.

What I Would Love To See:

1. I would love it if the name of the tool was spoken when you picked it up. One of my students asked me what the name of something was and I didn't know!

2. A fun dental hygiene quiz might a great, educational thing to add!

Overall, I loved the app and so did my students. I used it with students ages 4-7, but I think older students would enjoy it too!

Merge Mobile has been kind enough to offer 3 codes for me to giveaway, so enter below!! Make sure you head on over to their Facebook page and give them a like!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

S-peachy Feedback Linky

Click on the above picture to be taken to Nicole Allison's blog - she's the awesome SLP who came up with this idea! 

So I searched through some recent TPT feedback and found this comment from stephlovescsd:

"This is a FANTASTIC resource!! I'm currently completing my last clinical practicum in a hospital based pediatric outpatient program. The toddlers and preschoolers I work with LOVE the my play home app. This packet will be great for pulling more language out of them during therapy. Thanks!!"

If you left the above comment, email teachspeech365@gmail.com to let me know what free item you'd like from my store!

Check back every 3rd Monday of the month for more fun feedback linky parties!

No color ink, no laminating therapy idea

I recently found this great irregular past tense activity from A Speechie's World earlier this week. I decided to share with you a quick idea that involved no color ink and no laminating! The cards are laid out with the present tense verb on the top (spaceship) and the past tense verb on the bottom (alien). I decided to cut out the card and leave the verb pairs attached. See picture on the left:

Sometimes, I will print TPT activities in black and white and let the kids color the cards during the session. I folded the strips and put the cards out on the table with the spaceship facing up. I told the student that our mission was to "find all the aliens!" If he said the correct irregular past tense verb, he got to turn the card over to the alien side. I used 10 cards and really drilled the ones that he was having difficulty with. It was an easy and fun way to work on irregular past tense verbs.

Thanks to A Speechie's World for a great activity!

July SLP Link Up

Laura of All Y'all Need has created another SLP link up! Check out the original picture here! Join the fun and add your 2 cents...here's mine:

Just lounging: I'm still working, so I'm not completely on vacation. But when I get some time, I love to lounge...by the pool, on the couch, you name it. It doesn't matter where, and sometimes I fall asleep...oops!

Using the pool: See above. We have a pool at our apartment complex, so I try to get out there when it's hot. Lately, it's been so humid that even stepping outside takes your breath away. The best days to sit outside are when there's a breeze.

Loving summer: See above (haha). I love summer. Period.

Yummy pasta salad: Summer means BBQ. We had some friends over for the long weekend, and I went a little nuts making food. The good thing is I now have enough pasta salad to last me all week long! 

Hope your summer is fabulous!

Clinical Skills Confidence: Preschool Party!

Disclaimer: Pictures link to Amazon where you can purchase the described item. I am an Amazon affiliate. 

Who loves working with preschoolers? I generally consider preschoolers to be 3-5 year olds. I love working with children of all ages, but I find children this age to be pretty entertaining and fun to work with. These little ones are starting to exert their independence (and boy do they sometimes) and figuring out the world around them. 

Though not exclusively, I've worked with this age group since I graduated. Here are my favorite, inexpensive things to use with this age group: 

1. Balloons: Oh, the fun you can have! I like to blow up a balloon, hold it up and say, "ready, set, go" before letting it fly all around the room. The look of delight on their faces is priceless. Fair warning: they always want one to try blowing it up themselves, so I have extras on hand. If I have a child who is working on expanding utterance length, I will often prompt him/her to say "blow...blow bigger...blow more..."

2. Pill boxes: These little compartments are great for lots of different things. I sometimes put buttons or other little things inside and prompt the kids to say things like, "open, shut, I see ____, I found ____." I put velcro or something over the day/time. 

3. Stretchy book covers: Small confession - I like back to school time when all sorts of school supplies are in stores. I found these soft book covers on clearance once and have used them for different things. I purchased a bunch in different colors. If you invert one of the sides, they can be hung over the backs of chairs. You can have the kids do sorting, vocabulary, WH questions, or other activities this way. They are really soft too, so I've had kids who just like putting their hands in them and twisting for a mini-sensory break.

What are your favorite inexpensive things to use with this age group?

July 4th SLP Fun!

A little fun for the 4th! Don't forget, my whole TPT store is 20% off! Wishing everyone a happy, safe, and fun 4th! :)

Red, White, and Blue SLP Sale!

I hope everyone has some fun plans for the 4th of July!! While you're decked out in your red, white, and blue, make sure you fill up your TPT shopping cart to save 20% off my entire store (7/4 only)! Click the picture below to be taken to my store!

My newest product is called Candy Coated Expressive Language and it targets enough expressive language skills to fill a candy jar! Target word retrieval, associations, comparing/contrasting skills, and much more. Click the picture below to be taken to the TpT description and download the preview to see what's included. Homework pages are also included in black and white! 

As a fun way to end the 4th of July (besides fireworks), if you purchase something from my TpT store tomorrow, come back here to enter a special giveaway! 4 lucky people will be able to pick any item from my store! Be sure to follow the directions on the Rafflecopter to enter!

Happy 4th of July :)

a Rafflecopter giveaway