Outer Space Speech & Language

Towards the end of the school year, we did an Outer Space theme in some of the preschool classrooms.  With it being the end of the school year AND testing week for the classroom teachers, it was a crazy week so I opted for activities that kept it simple!

With my speech kids, we made aliens with paper plates and target words printed on green paper.

I used pictures from my Cariboo phonology set, as well as from Primary Punch's No-Prep Apraxia set, so that I had a variety of pictures for all of my artic, phono, and apraxic kiddos!  I printed these on green printer paper to make the base of the alien face.

If you have a die-cut machine at your school/clinic, making the eyeballs are super easy, too!


Our space-themed sensory bin was a huge hit, too! (You can find the free printables here)

It was great for my articulation/phono kids working on blends, using words like star, space, sky, fly, planet, gravity, and blast, but was also really engaging for my language kids, too! We talked in simple terms about what gravity is/does, how planets rotate around the sun, what was special about certain planets (like the rings of Saturn), where/when you see the moon and stars, how astronauts get to outer space, etc...

My favorite conversation all week went like this:
Me: How do you know so much about outer space?!
5 year old: Because I've been to outer space!
Me: Oh yeah? How did you get there?!
5 year old: With a rocket ship
Me: (laughing) Where did you get a rocket ship?!
5 year old: From the rocket store

..I mean, I feel like that's a pretty legitimate answer for his story :)

As much as I loved the sensory bin, though, the alien sensory bags were my FAVORITE!

I was fortunate in that one of my prek teachers had green hair gel in her cabinet, so we used that up first (by the way, Tina, I still owe you 4 or 5 bottles of hair gel!).  Once we ran out of that, we used clear hair gel with a couple drops of green food coloring.

We sorted googly eyes by small/medium/large sizes, and also targeted following directions by having students pick a certain number of a certain size eye to put in their bag each turn (ie "Put 3 small eyes in the bag").  After their hair gel and eyes are in the bag, they can squish the hair gel to move the eyes around.  Be sure to use duct tape or packing tape to seal off the opening of the bag when you're done so nothing accidentally explodes in their backpacks!

What are some of your favorite things to do for outer space week?

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

Rainbow Sensory Bin

Thanks to Felice at Thedabblingspeechie, I've been inspired to create some new sensory bins for my kiddos.  This past week at school, we've been doing a weather theme with the A.M. classrooms and my preschoolers LOVED feeling the materials in this weather-themed sensory bin while working on basic concepts, as well!

I bought some blue glass stones from the floral section of Dollar Tree and put those on the bottom as "rain drops."  I bought one bag, but probably could have used another to fill out the bottom a little more! I placed cotton balls on top of the stones as the "clouds," and then put my cut-in-half rainbow cards in the bin, dispersed among the clouds.

I had my students pull out one card at a time and we identified the concept (“Is coffee hot or cold?”) and then placed it on the table. As students took turns, if an opposite was pulled from the bin that matched a previously-chosen opposite card, I had them find the friend who had a matching card (“Does anyone have the opposite of ‘big?’ Big and….” They would then match up each side of the rainbow to make a full rainbow, and we left the rainbow sets in the middle of the table. 

The activity was a hit so I wanted to share it with all of you! I made a set with clouds instead of rainbows, as well, in case you need cards with less visual stimuli.  Download it for FREE here in my TpT store!  Happy Spring! :)

"Sweet" Activities for Speech and Language

Valentine's Day always falls around the week of parent/teacher conferences in my district, so I don't typically get to do much therapy around the theme of this holiday.  The week leading up to Valentine's Day only has one full day of therapy for prek, with the second day including the classroom Valentine's party for the last hour of each half day session.  We then have parent/teacher conferences and inservices all day Wednesday/Thursday, so I essentially only have a day and a half of therapy to squeeze in Valentine activities.  We did manage to squeeze in a couple fun activities, though, so I wanted to share them with you!

First up is an articulation activity we used to target blends.  We used the conversation hearts and "STacked" them to practice ST blends.

The kids would say "stack a blue" or "stack a green" etc.. with whatever color they were adding to the tower.  I have quite a few phono kids working on marking /l,r/ blends, as well, so "green" and "blue" were great target words, too!  You could also target /k, g/ sounds with "stack" "pink" and "green."  Another fun way to target /g/ would be to have a little competition where the student(s) working on /g/ say "GO" and you see who can stack the most hearts in 1 minute.  

Seasonal erasers are the best! I bought these at Target in the $1 bin, and they have so many uses! I typically use them for Bingo or for roll & cover pages (Mindy at The Speech Bucket has great freebie packs of seasonal roll & cover/color page- click here for the Valentine edition, and Meredith at Peachie Speechie also has fun seasonal roll and cover/color "100" challenge pages that you can use these with- click here for her Valentine edition.

For my in-class small group rotations, I did a science experiment called "Dancing Hearts" that uses the conversation candy hearts.   I followed instructions from Playdough to Plato's post, using a glass, candy hearts, alka seltzer, and sparkling water.  The combination of Alka Seltzer and sparkling water creates gas bubbles that make the hearts float up and then sink back down when the gas bubbles pop.  The bubbles are constantly forming and popping, so it looks like the hearts are "dancing" as they move up and down.  

Before we started, we made a graph of our predictions re: which color hearts would stay at the bottom and which would float and move to the top.  Afterwards, we got started with the experiment.  I brought the crushed alka seltzer tablets to the classroom in a baggie and the kids each took turns pouring some of it in.  They each picked a color heart to put in, and then each poured a little bit of sparkling water into the glass.  It takes a minute for the hearts to start moving, but the fizzing up of the glass keeps them entertained enough and talking in the meantime ;-) 

I had various results with this experiment in each classroom (though the pink ones consistently floated!), but the kids ooh-ed and ahh-ed over it regardless of how many candies actually moved. When you pour the sparkling water in, it fizzes up and the glass is FULL of bubbles, which got them SO excited about the experiment! One of my kids turned around and was shouting at his friends across the room at a different table because he was beside himself with excitement! Haha.

TIP: I would suggest crushing up the alka seltzer tablets ahead of time at home (putting them in a plastic baggie and crushing with a hammer would probably be easiest).  My para and I crushed them at school and it looked like an episode of "Breaking Bad"  all over my therapy table in my room when we were done! Ha ha.  

What fun activities did/do you use for Valentine's-themed therapy?

Popper Toys

You guys. How have I gone so long without popper toys in therapy?!  I am in love with the pig and penguin poppers I got for Christmas, and so are my students. We had to set some ground rules at first-- you know, things like "We don't aim the ball at teachers or our friends" and discussions of, "No, the animals are not "farting" or "pooping" but are just blowing out of their mouth." (Sigh.. little boys and their early obsessions with bodily functions.. ha ha).  Once the ground rules were set, though, the poppers have been a HUGE hit in therapy over the last few weeks!

Initially, I just thought they'd be fun as a reinforcer.  Turns out, they're good for a lot more than that! Below, I'll share some different ways I've used the poppers!

1.  Articulation
If you follow me on Instagram, you probably saw this recent post:

One of the first activities I did with the popper was put some artic cards up on my door and have kids aim the popper at a card of their choosing.  For mixed groups, I designated each student a color and they had to aim for their color when it was their turn.  My particular poppers also work great for /p, b/-- ball, pop, penguin, and pig! You can use a carrier phrase like "Hit the ___" or "Pop the ___" when you aim at cards, too.  Carrier phrases are a great strategy to use with apraxic kids or your artic kids working at the phrase level.

(PS- Lisette from Speech Sprouts had an AWESOME idea to practice the /p/ sound with her poppers- check it out on Instagram!)

2.  Pronouns
I've stuck pronoun cards on the door, too, to work on "he," "she," and "they."  BUT, I've also worked on that pesky "I" (If you gave me a dollar for every time I heard "my" or "me" instead of "I" in preschool... Well, I'd have enough to buy myself a couple Starbucks beverages on a daily basis ;-)).  You can have students aim at cards on the door, or, depending on the room setup, you can aim at different objects around the room- posters, the door, cabinets, a chair, etc.... and have them say "I'm aiming at ___"

OR, you can decide to designate your popper animal as a female or male, and practice using he/she.  For instance, "He hit the ___"  This would be an easy way to work on pronouns in a mixed group with artic students without having to get out extra materials (because, in the words of Sweet Brown.. "Ain't nobody got time for that!")

3.  Increasing MLU
There are so many short 2-3 word phrases that you can incorporate while using the poppers with your late-talkers that may only be using single words...
"My turn" / "Your turn"
"Ball please" "Pig (or whatever your popper is) please"
"Ball in" "Put ball in" "Pop out" "Pop ball out"
"Green ball" "Black ball" (or whatever color balls come with your popper)
"Pop pig" "Pop penguin" "Pop ball"
"Hit ___"

4.  AAC- Core vocabulary
You may have seen this idea on my Instagram, too-- I used the poppers in conjunction with AAC with one of my nonverbal kids, and oh man, did he LOVE it! We targeted "in" to put the ball in the mouth, but you could also target core words such as: out, my/my turn, want/want turn, go, put/put in, more, and play.  My one little guy kept verbally saying "ooooh!" and "whoah!" when we played-- it was the most verbal I had heard him all school year!

5.  AAC- PECS
I've also used the poppers with students using PECS.  They had to exchange a picture of the ball in order to get one to place in the popper's mouth.  It's a highly motivating activity, trust me!

Which one is your favorite popper animal? Have you used them any other ways besides the ones I've listed? Let me know in the comments below!

**
PS- An exclusive, behind-the-scenes shot (I know- you're really hitting the jackpot with this one- ha!) of trying to take a photo of the poppers at home, with Bruce, one of my dogs, who just wants to play with them SO badly but was already told "no."  Hilarious!  #puppylife #rufflife

PPS- A couple days after I had to tell my dog not to play with them, my husband came upstairs with one of them and shot it at me while I was working on this post-- Popper toys are fun for both dogs and humans...kids and adults.. a multi-faceted toy anyone can enjoy! ;-)

Gobble Up Holiday Goodies

Can you believe it's the LAST WEEK of November?! This Fall has FLOWN by, and I can't believe it's almost time for Thanksgiving! Thankfully, I have plenty of goodies for you to gobble up, along with many of the other ladies that are a part of The Frenzied SLPs!

First off, if you have to work a portion of this week leading up to Thanksgiving and still need some turkey-themed activities, here are a couple of ideas for you:

1.  Articulation chef hats

These were so cute on the kids! Our 4 year old classrooms are doing food units and learning about bakers/chefs, different kinds of foods, and different tools you may use to cook and bake.  The chef hats were a perfect tie-in!

If you have short sessions like I do (15 minutes) and want these done in one session, then I'd recommend cutting up artic pictures ahead of time in addition to having the strips already cut and ready to go (If you have one of those industrial paper slicers in your building, that makes it way easy!).  However, you could easily stretch this into two sessions and have them color the pictures while they practice during one session, and then during the next session,  have them glue the pictures on while practicing.

2.  Dough and Dot:  Fall Edition

Fun fact #1:  Little kids love dot markers.  Especially the "extra juicy" ones that give out a lot of paint without a lot of pressure.  I mean, I guess if I were in preschool and could make a lot of mess with very little effort, I'd probably be happy, too.  Fun fact #2:  Little kids don't ever get tired of playdough. Ever.  EVER!  This packet includes dot marker pages for Fall/Thanksgiving WH questions and basic concepts, and playdough pages for -ing verbs/pronouns/'be' verbs, vocabulary, and open-ended pages.  I stick the playdough pages into 3 ring page protectors so I don't have any prep work involved!

However, if you are off the whole week, or have your Thanksgiving lesson plans already set and are gearing up for winter, I have some ideas for that, too!

1.  Christmas cookie craft

When I look back at this picture, it always makes me chuckle :) I've typically used this activity during our Give A Mouse A Cookie unit, but this would be great leading up to Christmas (if you celebrate and are allowed to incorporate it into your lessons at school) to pretend to decorate Christmas cookies!  It's a fun sensory experience that usually gets my littles talking, and we can work on simple sequencing of steps, too. I can hit some /sp/ blends with this too-- if we use a "spoon" to "spread" the shaving cream and use glitter as the "sprinkles!"  Find more cookie activities in this blog post.

2.  TpT Products & A Freebie

Grab some language activities for your younger students, and get your kids up and moving with the phonology games! Winter Wonderland of PreK/K Language, Decorate the Tree Phonology, Build a Snowman Phonology-full version, Build a Snowman Phonology-freebie /f/ version

Also, over 70 SLPs contributed to this year's Gifts of Gab ebook-- download it for free to see hundreds of both paid and free TpT products for your holiday/winter season!

What are some fun holiday activities you do with your kids? We'd love for you to link up and share your ideas with us, too!

An InLinkz Link-up

Thankful and Grateful- A reflection on the last 2.5 years (and giveaways!)

Hi, guys! I'm teaming up with the rest of the ladies from The Frenzied SLPs to bring you a "thankful and grateful" blog hop with the chance to win some great prizes! After reading, you will want to collect the letter at the end of my post, and make sure to hit "next blog" to continue along the hop. When you put all of the letters in order, starting from the first blog, it will spell out a message that you'll enter into the drawing for some great prizes!

I can't even believe it's been almost TWO AND A HALF YEARS since I started this blogging journey.  I started in July of 2013, after several months of talking myself out of it, convinced that I couldn't do it.  As I sit here reflecting on the last couple years, there are so many people and opportunities I am thankful for, so bear with me-- this may get a little long.  And, maybe a little sappy... #allthefeels

I am beyond thankful for every single one of you reading this right now.  Every single instance where you have taken the time out of your busy days to pop over to my blog and read a post, every time you have "liked," commented on, or shared something of mine on social media, every time you spend your hard-earned money in my TpT store-- every single instance encourages me to keep going.  I'm just one little fish in a sea of many incredibly creative and talented SLPs, and to know that my ideas are inspiring others and being used all over the country (the world?) is inspiring to ME! Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU for all of your support, no matter how large or how small of a gesture!

Source

I wouldn't have started this journey without my husband.  He has been 100% supportive and believed in me every single step of the way, even when I didn't believe in myself. He was the one who, ever so slightly, kept nudging me towards stepping outside my comfort zone and going for it.  He refuted every argument I had until I had no more, and convinced me that what I had to contribute to the SLP world was worthwhile.  He is and always has been my #1 fan!  Words would never do justice to the gratitude I have for him being my personal cheerleader and always pushing me to do more, even when I think I can't!  Both of our families have been super supportive, too, and my little sister tells every SLP-to-be she meets at college about my blog, for which I am also very grateful! :)

Right around the time I was almost/kinda/pretty sure I maybe wanted to start a blog, the School-Based SLP Facebook page was started, and in the thread for introductions, I said I had a TpT store (I had started about 6 months prior to that), and that I was contemplating blogging.  Mia from Putting Words in your Mouth, said she found me on TpT and was following me <insert excited squeal and total fangirl moment> and encouraged me to start a blog if I was already thinking about it.  I loved Mia's blog already, so her encouragement helped nudge me in the right direction.  Rachel from Queen's Speech, whose blog I also had already been following, was really supportive in that thread, too, and gave me advice on starting a Facebook page for TpT/blogging (I was probably just fan-girling all night throughout that thread, talking to all of those "big-timers" I had followed for a while!)  I'm sure Mia and Rachel have no idea that I still think about their encouragement from that thread from time to time... but I do!

"A Rising Tide Lifts All Ships"

If you happened to watch the Lucky Little Learners/Schroeder's Shenanigans in Second periscopes from TpT Vegas this past summer, they used this quote several times to talk about the importance of supporting others. Helping other fellow bloggers/TpTers be their best in turn helps you be your best.  Keeping in line with this, I have to give shoutouts to some other SLP bloggers that have helped me along in the journey, whether they realized it or not!

1.  Jenn from Crazy Speech World:  My very first blog post was participating in her "Show me the Data" link up.  She was so sweet responding to my post, saying she felt lucky that I linked up with her for my first post, related to my being chronically messy, and welcomed me to the blogging world! Having another one of my favorite bloggers take the time to read through my post and acknowledge various things I said in there was SO COOL! (I was ecstatic when she commented on my post... another fan girl moment. Don't judge.)  It was another little nudge in the right direction-- this time, to keep going, rather than just beginning.

2.  Jenna at Speech Room News:  About 4-5 months after I started blogging, Jenna messaged me on Facebook to tell me she'd nominated me for "Best New Blog" in the Edublog awards! (I simultaneously celebrated and, you guessed it-- fan-girled out again at the same time.  Are you noticing a trend here?) I was ecstatic and so honored that a well-established blogger with thousands of followers took notice of my blog! That was probably a major turning point for me, when I thought, "Hey! I really CAN do this!"  Words would not do justice to the amount of gratitude I have for giving me that moment. THANK YOU, Jenna!

Jenn & Jenna are also two people whose "voice" and personalities really come through in their writing through blog posts and posts to Facebook/Instagram--something I am always striving to do more of! I really admire their ability to do this with such ease.

3. The ladies that are a part of the Frenzied SLPs: I was genuinely honored to be asked to join your group of other great bloggers over the summer! I've been struggling to keep a balance this school year, trying to juggle my workload + TpT + blogging + social media for blogging + keeping the non-SLP parts of my life alive, and I probably would not be as motivated to keep blogging as consistently without the topic ideas and support from all of you! <3 You are all wonderful, talented women and I have so much respect and admiration for what each of you do!

4.  Everyone who has asked me to guest post, join their blog/Instagram/Twitter/Facebook hop, or join their giveaway... Manda & Shanda at Twin Speech, Felice from Thedabblingspeechie, Danielle from Sublime Speech, Elizabeth from The Speech Owl, Lyndsey from Speech to the Core, Jessica from Figuratively Speeching, and Maria from Communication Station.  There are hundreds of other bloggers you could have asked instead of me, so I have always been grateful for the opportunity to join in the fun!  I've had the opportunity to get to know Felice and Danielle a bit more, too, and they are both hilarious-- grateful for the SLP friendships this blog has opened up for me!

Starting a blog/TpT store was a risk--a risk in the sense that I was putting myself out there to be judged and was making myself vulnerable.  Heck, it still is a risk!  Every time I create something new or write a new post, or am about to share a therapy idea on social media, that little voice of insecurity comes back to rear its ugly head.  As we all know, though, without risk, there is no reward, so I'm much better now at silencing that voice than I was when I first began.  And speaking of rewards....

One of my Instagram posts was featured in the August issue of the ASHA Leader a couple months ago!!  THE ASHA LEADER that is sent out to over 150,000 SLPs every month!! (#nobigdeal #famous)  I decided last January that making it into the ASHA Leader via my blog would be one of my goals for 2015. #REALTALK:  Honestly-- I was way too scared to put it in writing in my 2015 SLP Resolutions blog post because I thought it was maybe too far of a stretch or that other people reading would think that was a dumb, unrealistic idea.  But, referencing Lucky Little Learners' Periscope sessions from the summer again... "If your dreams don't scare you, they're not big enough."  Despite that inner voice of insecurity, I continually put myself out there over and over via this blog, and the rewards have been greater than I could have imagined! One of my coworkers is good friends with someone on our school board, so she passed on the article link to the Board member, and it then made its way to my superintendent, director of special education, and principal.  I mean, really, how cool is that?! And it's all because I have had support from my husband, all of you readers, various bloggers, and other friends/family!

In closing... Blogging has made me a better therapist. It pushes me to try to think outside the box and be more creative with my students in order to have material to blog about or share on social media, which benefits all parties involved! Blogging has also allowed me to connect with others who are passionate about what they do, and I am inspired by them every single day.  I am SO thankful for this avenue and for every opportunity I've had to connect with other SLPs, both bloggers and non-bloggers alike.

If you're still with me (I know, I'm sorry this was long.. I just have a lot to be thankful for!), thank you.  Thank you for all of your support over the last two and a half years.  I wouldn't be here without you! xoxo.


Here is my letter for you to collect along the hop:

a Rafflecopter giveaway