April Showers: Using water in speech/language therapy

I am excited to be linking up again with The Frenzied SLPs group today to bring you a series of posts on using water activities in therapy! I think you will really enjoy the wide range of ideas we have for you :)

I just recently tried out a new activity with one of my little guys with Autism who is working on requesting. He really likes art activities, so we used some coffee filters and dot markers to stamp all around the filter.  The color bleeds through, so be sure to have something underneath the filter, like a tray of sorts!  I had him request different color dot markers using a color strip from Felice's (The Dabbling Speechie) AAC Starter Pack (which I use all. the. time.  Worth every penny!).   I love seeing him being able to verbalize things like "I want blue!" and "Green marker!" with some visual supports in front of him :)

After you stamp the coffee filter, you take a spray bottle with water, and spray the filter several times.

The colors should all bleed together when wet.  Ours didn't come out *quite* how I anticipated (we didn't fill up enough of the filter with color, I think), but 3 year olds don't really care about the end result- just the process!

With kiddos working on requesting, you can request with the spray bottle, in addition to colors, too.  Have them either choose the spray bottle icon to request it each time, or, for those who are a little higher level, you can have them choose a number for the number of sprays they get each time (options of just 1 or 2 is probably ideal so you get more trials in!)

For more coffee filter art ideas, do a quick search on Pinterest!

What ways do you use water in therapy? Be sure to read through the other Frenzied SLPs posts, and link up if you have a blog! We would love to hear your ideas, too!

PS- For another water-themed activity, pop over to this post to see my rain/cloud/rainbow sensory bin with a free activity download!

An InLinkz Link-up