Do You Have Apples To Apples?

If you have Apples to Apples for Kids, then you can use this other option for playing the game! I have to admit that I don't often pull this game out, as it doesn't always fit the needs for my groups. This week, in desperation search of something that would capture the attention of a few of my bouncing-off-the-walls students, the game made an appearance. I altered the rules. We first went over the definition of an adjective. Insert me wanting to bang my head against the wall when some kids answered "we weren't taught those." Ok...it's the end of the year. I ignored that. 

Anyway, back to the point. The green cards have adjectives on them. I laid out 5 green cards in front of each student and gave them a stack of red cards, which have nouns on them. I said "first student to find 3 nouns to fit each adjective wins." Add a little competition and we were off to the races! 

They liked it, they learned a little, we practiced language skills...the end.

Hope you can use this idea!

Peek At My Week 6/20

Disclaimer: Affiliate links are included for your convenience.

It's finally here. The last Peek At My Week of the school year. Unfortunately, it is not yet the last day of school. 3 more days and then it's officially summer vacation.

This week, I had a craft. I also had loosely planned lessons. Which sometimes got thrown by the wayside due to schedule changes, field day, or some other occurrence. I'm not surprised.

The craft was an easy paper plate and construction paper beauty. Cut a paper plate in half, glue on strips of paper and draw some clouds. We talked about summer vacation and what kinds of things they liked best about the grade that they will soon be finishing.

When time allowed, we read a funny book called The Sandcastle Contest by Robert Munsch. It's a good summer themed book about a boy who builds an elaborate sandcastle. 

After field day, I managed to see a couple kids. I work on past tense verbs a lot with these students, so retelling the field day stations was a great way to use these verbs in context. The students had fun telling me what they had to do at each station. Besides sweating profusely...as it was 97 degrees when we did field day, which makes me wish we did this in the winter!

Overall, it's been a good year. Thank you to all those who tune in weekly to see what happened in my therapy room!

Next year, I plan to try something different and post ideas for the week at the beginning of the week rather than the end. Thoughts? Would you prefer this format? If so, comment below and leave your email. First two people to do both can chose a product from my store (no bundles)!

{Review + Giveaway} Let's Use Language App

It's time for another app review! You may recall my review of Let's Be Social. If so, you'll recognize Let's Use Language, as it's made by the same developers. Read on for my review and a chance to win 1 of 2 codes!

There are 4 concept areas: vocabulary, sequencing, categories, and opposites. Plus the option to add your own lessons, which is an awesome thing! In each category, there are short stories. There is an option for the story to be read aloud. It is read in a voice similar to the QR codes. 

There are 10 stories total, plus the option to add your own. The questions are different depending on what This is an example of what the story page looks like:

Following the stories (there are 8 total, but the stories themselves are the same), the student is presented with questions to answer. There is an option for the questions and choices to be read aloud. There is also a picture cue on the left side of the question page. 

Again, you have the option to add your own question, by touching the + sign:

What I Liked:

-the stories were interesting for my students

-they love anything that's interactive

-the audio option is really nice

-the concept areas are ones that I target on a regular basis 

What I Would Change:

-I'd love the option to remove the visual cues on the question page (some of my kids were using those instead of thinking about the story)

-I'd love to see stories for older grades!! This format would be motivating for older kids too!

Overall, if you work with the elementary age population, this is an app that targets skills that you probably work on daily. The options to customize it to what you need is amazing! This app can be purchased from the app store here!

You can win one of two codes, so enter below:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Peek At My Week 6/13

Disclaimer: Affiliate links are provided for your convenience.

We're nearing the home stretch. Next week is the last full week of school. We're all just plugging along, making endless to-do lists, and dreaming of the summer vacation that's just barely out of reach.  

This week, Father's Day was the theme. I used my most recent freebie to help my kids create adjective collages for their dads. We also read a funny book called At The Beach With Dad by Mercer Mayer. 

It's about a dad who takes his kids to the beach and some problems occur. It was good for my K-3 kids to make predictions and answer comprehension questions. It was a good one for story retell too. I was lucky to see the kids that I saw, what with field trips, assemblies, and other end of year happenings around the building! One more week - we got this!

Peek At My Week 6/6

Disclaimer: Affiliate links are included for your convenience.

Only a few more Peek At My Week posts left for this school year. 2 to be exact, since that last week isn't a full one anyway. Next school year, I'm planning to do the posts at the beginning of the week so that you can get ideas of what I plan to do for the week and it will hopefully help YOU plan too.

This week the book was Blueberries for Sal by Robert McCloskey. This is an adorable black and white book about a little girl who goes blueberry picking with her mom. While out picking, they run into some other creatures and there's a mix-up of children.

I printed a simple black and white basket from My Cute Graphics and cut out some "blueberries" to glue onto the basket. Simple! We wrote words on the blueberries or talked about the characters, setting, our favorite parts and the ending. 

A bunch of my students are working on synonyms and antonyms. I found a way to motivate them and all you need are some stickers. I wrote out 25 words, each with a line. If they could give me a synonym/antonym right away, I wrote it on the line and they put a sticker next to it. We added up all the stickers and they now have a challenge to beat themselves next session. Surprisingly simple, but it worked very well! 

Those were the highlights of my week. If you're still in school or doing therapy, what did you do?

Find & Fix Task Cards [freebie]

June?!?!?! This month, my Speechie Freebie contribution are some task cards. Why? Because once we hit June, the light at the end of the "summer vacation" tunnel is getting larger. I'm not there yet, but I'm getting closer.

I created these task cards because I have several students who are working on irregular past tense verbs. I think it's crucial for them to be able to identify if a sentence sounds correct or incorrect. Each task card has one sentence with an incorrect verb that they need to find and fix. Download yours here!

Example of a task card:

How Do You Use It? Linky

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Another month, another linky party! This month, Speech Time Fun is hosting her How Do You Use It linky and featuring clothespins. I've used different kinds of clothespins, but I seem to favor the wooden ones, like these:

These are some ways I use them:

1. Recently, I handed them to a student and had him clip them onto various items in the room. We then described the item that he had clipped the pins onto.

2. Clip a bunch to a paper plate. For every word/sentence/task the student completes, take one off the plate. First one to take them all off wins.

3. You can use the big wooden ones for sorting initial, medial, and final position target words. You know the ones that are from craft stores that some people use to hold pictures. 

Those are just a few ideas!

Father's Day Freebie

It's June 1st, which means Father's Day is coming up! Well, not until the 15th, but I like to think ahead. I'm also still in school for pretty much all of June, so I usually do some sort of craft activity for both Mother's Day and Father's Day. This year, I decided to create something that you can grab for free. I call it a DAD Adjective Collage.

It's very simple. Print the DAD sheet (page 3) and a copy of the adjective strips (page 4) for each student. They can choose to cut out whichever adjectives they feel best describe their dad or add their own on the blank strips. Glue the adjectives within or around the DAD and color/decorate as you wish. 

Adjective strips:

You can also discuss synonyms, antonyms, and put the words in sentences if you wish. This way, your students will have something unique to give to their dads on Father's Day! Enjoy!