Merry (Tangled Tuesday) Christmas!!

This week, I was asked to participate in “Tangled Tuesday”. This is a GREAT idea that Amy of “Major Speech Pathology Fun by a Minor Girl” started. Tangled Tuesday consists of two bloggers swapping activities and writing a review. Each person also creates one freebie, so keep reading to check out our materials as well as some great, FREE activities!

This week, I got to use and review “Germy Definitions” and “Germy Battle Game”, which are both awesome activities!

Germy Definitions: A lot of my students are working on describing with attributes, so “Germy Definitions” was a great game to play with them! Each student starts with a mat to collect their germs on and a “germ away” card. This card can be kept and turned in for another turn if a student happens to draw a germ that they already have. (So cute!) The point of this game is to be the first to collect all six germs, while defining each word correctly. This is how we played them game. One student stated as many attributes as he/she could think of for each item and if the other students had an additional idea, they would provide a question or clues in order to help the student think of more attributes for the item. Examples of the words to define include, “fork”, “shoe”, and “telephone”, to name a just few. I’m always looking for a new way to work on attributes since this is such a significant target area for a lot of my students, so this was a great new game for them! Besides the creative concept of the game, the graphics are really cute too! This was definitely a hit in my therapy room!

All set to go! A germy mat for everyone and some "germ away"!

Lots of cards to choose from!

Winner! A full card!

Germy Battle Game: I LOVE any game that can be used as a reinforcer. I get to pick the target and the game just goes along for the ride! That’s why the Germy Battle Game is so great! This game is almost like a re-vamped version of war, but WAY more fun because it involves germs! We used this game while determining which two cards go together and WHY they go together. (Man, is this part difficult for my students!) Anyways, after each student answered a question (or 2 or 3 or 8 – I like to get my money’s worth!) they got to take a germ card. At the end of each “round” we compared each card’s point value to determine who had the highest card. The student with the highest card gets to take everyone else’s cards. If there is a tie, the students get to take another turn as a “tie” breaker. This game even passed the “can we play this next week?” test, so my students definitely enjoyed it!

Germy Battle Game used with "Go Together" cards!

You can check out Germy Definitions here and the Germy Battle Game here.

Along with all of her other great materials, Amy from Major Speech Pathology Fun by a Minor Girl has included a FREEBIE that you can pick up at her store! You can access her TpT store and the freebie here.

As a ‘thank you’ for this fun and free activity, please consider giving her a ‘like’ on her facebook page (www.facebook.com/MinorSLP) so that you can follow along with all of the great ideas that she comes up with!

Amy has also reviewed my Polar Bear Articulation products, that you can check out here and here (along with a freebie!!!!!) You can check out her review of Polar Bear Articulation at her blog. Both Polar Bear Articulation packets will be on sale on Tuesday, December 25th and Wednesday, December 26th. If you’d also like to follow my facebook page, you can do so by clicking on this link.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

The Grinch Visits Our Speech Room!!

If you’re looking for a last minute holiday idea for your speech room, look no further than the Grinch! Here is an activity that we did this week in our room…

My friend’s amazingly artistic son made this fantastic Grinch out of poster board which you are welcome to recreate, or you could also just print out a few Grinch coloring sheets. I like this one from HelloKids.com. Since the Grinch's heart was too small, we gave him a little more love and put hearts with our artic pictures on him in order to make his heart bigger.

By the end of the session, we had put enough hearts on the Grinch to make his heart a regular size again!

If you've already moved on from holiday activities and are looking for something more "wintery", here are a few more options...

Polar Bear Articulation - Early 8

This is activity is broken into 2 different sets - /m/, /b/, /n/, "y" and /d/, /p/, /h/, /w/. Here's how to play this activity. Laminate the polar bear and cut it apart into 3 pieces for beginning, middle, and end sounds. Laminate and cut apart the sound picture cards. Either lay the polar bear parts out onto the table or attach them to tap lights as shown below.

The intent of this activity is to allow the student to determine where they hear their sound in the word (beginning, middle, end), so they select a card and decide where the targeted sound is located. Students then touch the polar bear corresponding to where they hear their sound.

This has been such a fun activity! If this is an activity that you think you could use in your classroom, you can access the /m/, /b/, /n/, "y" unit here and the /d/, /p/, /h/, /w/ unit here!

Last but not least, a few last minute New Year's activities...

New Year's Listening Comprehension

I just can't get enough listening comprehension activities for my students. For whatever reason, this is just a tough area for many of them, so we are constantly working on this area. This activity includes 24 reading comprehension cards as well as a game board. Each card contains a short passage and two questions about the passage for a total of 48 reading comprehension questions!! The questions basically make up a story about New Year's for a great, themed activity!

This activity is available at my TpT store here!

New Year's Style Fact vs Opinion

This activity includes 32 “complete the sentence with a fact” cards,

32 “state an opinion about a situation” cards,

32 “fact or opinion” cards where students have to determine if a statement is a fact or opinion,

12 “my favorite fact and opinion” where students receive a card and have to draw their favorite ________ (food, sport, etc) and then state one fact and one opinion about it,

1 visual aid card with fact and opinion definitions and examples.

Also included in this activity is a New Year’s game board!

If you'd like to include this activity in your New Year's lessons, you can grab it here!

Common Core Based Language Assessment

The last activity that I've posted lately is an informal assessment tool. This item is based off of the common core for kindergarten through fifth grade in the area of language arts (specific to speech and language pathology). Each grade level document features 8-10 questions that can be used to determine useful goals for each student. Appropriate answers are given from kindergarten through third grade. Answers are not given for the fourth and fifth grade "assessments" since these students are more adept at reading and the assessment does not need to be given verbally to these students. Although this assessment is comprehensive, it is also very "grammar-based". This is an awesome material for obtaining a better idea of each student's strengths and weaknesses!

You can check out this material here!

As a little "head's up", next week, I'll be participating in a "Tangled Tuesday" with Major Speech Pathology Fun by a Minor Girl. We'll BOTH be offering Christmas Day freebies as well as reviewing some great products! Stay tuned!

Chain Letter Link Up

About a week ago, I participated in a Chain Letter Link-Up started by Teach Speech 365. She interviewed 4 different SLP bloggers, including WordNerdSpeechTeach, and then it was our job to continue the trend and interview a few other fantastic bloggers.

Meet: Tej of Let’s Talk Speech and Language and Amy of Major Speech Pathology Fun by a Minor Girl!!! They’ve included some great freebies so keep reading to find out more about them and download their great materials!

Blogger #1: Let’s Talk Speech and Language

1. Your name, email, and blog address Tej Sohan Ms.Sohan@gmail.com http://www.letstalkspeechlanguage.com/

2. When and why did you start blogging? I started blogging in June of this year. As a middle school SLP I felt like there was a lack of therapy ideas and resources available. I eventually realized that I could help fill that void.

3. What is your favorite population to work with? I suppose by default I have to say middle school? Lol, but I actually do prefer to work with the MS bunch. They push me to be creative and are unabashedly honest.

4. How much time per week do you spend blogging? Approximately 5-8 hours.

5. What's your favorite topic to create materials for? I rarely create materials. I enjoy blogging about everything!

6. What's the best thing about blogging? Knowing that you are a useful resource to your audience!

7. Do you have any blogging tips? Use social media to help publicize your posts. Make sure to include at least 1 image in your post so you can pin it to Pinterest boards.

8. Add a question and answer of your choice (can be speech related or not). Did you always want to work with the middle school population? No! All throughout graduate school I wanted to work with geriatrics. Never did I think I was going to end up in a school discussing Facebook with a group of adolescents. That's the greatest thing about this field, so much variety!

Here is Tej’s freebie!

Blogger #2: Major Speech Pathology Fun by a Minor Girl

1. Your name, email, blog address, link to TpT store if you have one Amy Minor http://majorspeechminorgirl.blogspot.com http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Major-Speech-Pathology-Fun-By-A-Minor-Girl

2. When and why did you start blogging? I started an official public blog in October of this year. However, I have been blogging privately for a long time. I blogged privately as I had no idea that there would be so many people interested in what other people had to say =) I decided to make my ideas public because I have always been a sharing person and blogging is a great way to do just that!

3. What is your favorite population to work with? I LOVE junior high. I know this is not a typical answer that most people give, but I love that the students are beginning to form an educated opinion about real life issues. I do also still like that they still have that "I am still kind of scared of getting in trouble" kind of attitude too haha!

4. How much time per week do you spend blogging and/or creating materials? I spend anywhere from 4-5 hours a week. I work at 4 different facilities- 2 schools under 1 job, and then 3 area hospitals/inpatient rehabs so I am a very busy girl! I try to write blog posts ahead of time, so I don't have to worry about it while working so many hours-- see below for my blogging tip!

5. What's your favorite topic to create materials for? I like to create incentive games that can go with any activity. Since my caseload is so diverse, I am forced to have very flexible materials. My second favorite is language: synonyms, antonyms etc

6. What's the best thing about blogging? The best thing about blogging is my husband doesn't have to listen to me talk about my speech therapy ideas anymore! haha just kidding! I like being able to share my ideas and learn from others! I believe it is making me a better therapist and I hope I am helping others in their journey to be the best therapist they can be!

7. Do you have any blogging tips? Yes, don't be afraid to write your blogs ahead of time and schedule them to be posted. For example: I have written 6 blog posts today and I have scheduled them to be posted to my blog throughout the week to come! It’s a real time saver and it helps me keep my thoughts on the blog and not so scatter-brained as I sometimes can get since I have to balance so much in my life!

8. Add a question and answer of your choice (can be speech related or not). What are some of the most meaningful items that you have ever received as gifts? I have a few things really. I collect clowns (I know most people don't like that about me). 1. I received a large clown decanter from my Grandma McMillie that was given to her by my mom when she was younger. 2. I received a 2 dollar bill from my Aunt Kathy for Christmas one year. My aunt and uncle gave it to me as a gift in a card when they did not have a very big disposable income due to her medical bills- its the thought that counts and I treasure it every day because that is the TRUE meaning of Christmas. 3. Another clown: my parents got married in a small little town in Georgia. On their 23rd wedding anniversary, they went back to the same town to renew their vows. (They got married on the 23rd of August- that’s why it was a special anniversary). While they were there, they stayed at an Inn. There was a clown there that was not originally for sale. They explained to the Inn Owner that I liked clowns and got to know them during their stay. At the end, the Inn Owner gave my parents the clown to give to me as a gift. Her name is Lucy and I will LOVE her forever. Do you guys have any treasures from when your parents got married? 4. Last but not least my wedding ring: my husband is such a rare find and I am honored to be his wife everyday!

Here is Amy’s freebie that you can access at her TpT store here!
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Please give Let’s Talk Speech and Language and Major Speech Fun By a Minor Girl a “like” on facebook if you download their activity, as well as Teach Speech 365 for starting this whole idea!

If you're looking for even MORE freebies, you can also check out my TpT store!

Ice Skates, Hot Chocolate, and A Freebie!!

I’ve been busy this week creating lots of new products in anticipation of my first (20% off) TeachersPayTeachers sale!

This post includes a look at some new products as well as a FREE item that you can download at my store!

I love being inspired to new create materials and products when I see cute graphics and I just couldn't pass up the graphics for this new Ice Skating Functions activity!

This activity includes 48 function/object cards (24 pairs total). The object cards have a child on them and the function cards have ice skates on them. The intent of this activity is to pair up the items with their function. Examples of this activity include: "scissors", "we cut with them", "paper", "we write on it", etc.

You can check out this Ice Skating Functions activity here!

A few weeks ago, I was working with a few of my students on the concepts “before” and “after”. Holy cow was this difficult, which left me feeling like I had to go about teaching them these concepts in a different way. Most of my students are strongly visual learners, so I tend to make a lot of visuals to go along with my activities and this one is no different! Introducing… Ice Skating Before and After!

This activity includes 18 "before" and 18 "after" cards targeting 2-step directions. It also includes a visual aid to help your students determine how to follow directions that include before and after. I had my students reference this visual aid before they started to follow the direction and they were practically completing them (correctly!) without any help from me! I love when that happens!

You can check out this Ice Skating Before and After material here!

This last activity is a yummy one! Hot Chocolate Causes and Effects!

This packet includes 24 cause and 24 effect cards. Cause cards are in green and effect cards are in pink. Students choose a card and answer the question on it. (E.g. "What is one cause of a snow day?", "What is the effect of skipping lunch?", etc) The black cards have both causes and effects on them. (E.g. "I took a nap because I was tired.") Students need to correctly determine which part is the cause and which part is the effect. Also included in this packet is a visual aid to guide the students’ understanding of causes and effects as well as examples on both cards. (I love my visuals!)

You can check out this Hot Chocolate Causes and Effects activity here!

And finally, for a freebie…

Last year, the speech pathologists in my district started a new tradition in which we all exchange speech and language Christmas gifts!! This happens to be one of my favorite holiday gift exchanges because I work with amazing SLPs who all have fantastic ideas and they always inspire me by giving me a different way to think about the job I do.

One of the speech pathologists made a story map stick from cute picture cards and paint stick… genius!

With her permission, I’ve recreated her idea and in honor of our SLP Christmas exchange, it will also be available to you for free at my TpT store. I hope this inspires you to create an SLP Holiday of your own where you work!

This isn't the greatest picture, but I hope you get the idea. She velcro'ed the "plan" square to the back of the paint stick.

I love this material and am so excited to use it with my kids!

You can grab this freebie here!

Happy holidays!

Polar Bear Sequencing and Inferencing

Sequencing is one of my favorite skills to work on, but lately, I’ve grown a little tired (and I’m sure my students have too) of putting pictures in the correct order and retelling the story, so I wanted to create an activity to target sequencing in a different way. Therefore, I bring you Polar Bear Sequencing and Inferencing!

This activity includes (24) 5-step sequencing tasks. There’s one problem with this activity, though… one of the steps in the sequence is missing! Students must decide which step has been “conveniently” left out and add it, in order for the sequence to make sense. Every card also includes an inferencing “what comes next?” question intended to help students think of a logical action that might come after the sequence.

You can grab this Polar Bear Sequencing and Inferencing activity at my TPT store here.

Here’s an additional holiday-themed activity from one of the 1st grade teachers at my school that I borrowed and tweaked a bit to go along with this activity. This was originally meant to be a writing activity where students write about their holiday preferences/traditions. Certainly, you could use this activity “as is” to work on syntax, carryover of articulation skills, etc, but in order to pair it with the Polar Bear Sequencing and Inferencing activity, here’s an alternative option.

Materials: Large sheets of white paper, 1” thick green strips of paper, 1” thick red strips of paper, bows, and “gift tags”. I liked these gift tags from thestir.cafemoms.com, so I just printed them and cut them out for my students to use.

Activity: Students glue one green or red strip horizontally to their white paper and the other strip vertically. Next, they draw or write the 4 different actions from a sequencing task card, numbering the steps as they go. (They can also write the title of the activity on one of the green or red paper strips.) Right now, I know you’re asking the question: “Wait a minute, though! One of the steps is missing!” and you’re exactly right. That’s where the gift tag comes in. Students write: “The missing step is…” and then write the missing step (as well as the number of the missing step) on the gift tag. Then, they can attach the gift tag and the bow to the center of their “present” to complete the activity. Hope you find this material and/or activity useful! Thanks for reading!

Mooseltoe!!! (A Literature-Based Activity Pack and a *FREE* Therapy Idea)

Ok, I’ll admit it, I’m a literature junky – always have been, always will be. Not surprisingly, books tend to make their way into my therapy sessions on a pretty frequent basis and when I can find a book that I can use for both language AND speech goals, I’m one happy SLP! Introducing…. "Mooseltoe" by Margie Palatini.

If you haven’t read this book yet, it’s about an adorable little moose who spends his time decorating his house for the holidays, but forgets one thing – the tree! After discovering that there are no more trees to be sold, he decides to make himself into a tree and lets his family decorate him with lights, ornaments, candy canes, and even a star.

My “Mooseltoe Activity Pack” has all you’ll need for young students as well as your older ones. The pack includes: 16 regular past tense verb cards, 32 rhyming words, 16 idioms/proverbs cards, 32 synonym cards, 12 tier 2 vocabulary cards, 1 story map sheet, and 1 character description worksheet!!!

Regular Past Tense Verbs: To play/use these cards, pass out all regular past tense verb cards to your students and begin to read the story. When a student hears the word on their card, they make a sentence about something that has happened in the story using their regular past tense verb. (I often make the kids do something silly when they hear their word – put their finger on their nose, do a little jig, etc. For some reason, this improves their listening skills… Huh… weird!)

Rhyming Words: To play/use these cards, present the student with two cards and either say the words to the child or have the child read the words. Students then determine if the words rhyme or not. To make the activity tied to the book, talk about how each word relates to the story.

Idioms/Proverbs: To play/use, divide the cards into one stack of idioms/proverbs and one stack of idiom/proverb definitions. Lay the idiom/proverb definition cards out on the table and present a student with one idiom/proverb card. Students must scan through the definitions to find a meaning that is appropriate for the idiom/proverb that they have. I always like to relate figurative language back to real life so that students can understand how these phrases are used. Challenge your students to think of a situation where their idiom/proverb would be applicable.

Synonyms: Two ways to play, 1) Present the student with two cards and ask if they have the same meaning. If the cards have the same meaning, the student must make a sentence with one of the words and then switch out the synonym word for the other word in the pair. I’ve found that this can be really useful to check if the words they chose are actually synonyms or not. 2) Played just like memory, cards are placed face-down on the table. Students take turns picking two cards until they find a match of cards that have the same meaning.

Tier 2 Vocabulary: To play/use, pass out all vocabulary cards to students and begin to read the story. When a student hears the word on their card, they raise their hand and read the sentence on their card. Using context clues and three multiple choice options, students choose the correct definition. They can then make their own sentence about the word once they understand the definition.

Story and Character Maps: To play/use, story map - students draw pictures of the beginning, middle, and end of the book following a discussion of the story. Character Map – students write characteristics of the moose in the bubbles.

You can grab this all-in-one pack here!!

As mentioned before, this book is not just for language! We also used it to work on artic too (any sound, in any level, in any position!!!!) Our occupational therapist’s son is an amazing artist and he made a great replica on poster board of the front of the book. I attached my “mooseltoe” to a tissue box and off we went decorating! The kids first got to add a few beaded necklaces that I had found at the dollar store and then off we went to decorate our “mooseltoe” so that he looked just like the character in the book. We created artic ornaments and stars to hook on his antlers.

Every time we saw the moose (which just happened to be every page – what a coincidence!) we said our word/phrase/sentence, etc and put an ornament onto our moose. He was a gawdy mess when we were done, but so incredibly cute! The picture is a little blurry, but I hope you get the idea!

Hope this fun little idea might just find its way into your therapy room! Thanks for reading!

Polar Board Pete Multiple Meaning Words and a **FREE** Therapy Idea

A lot of my older students are working on multiple meaning words so I decided to post an activity to target this area... Oh, and I was hooked on the cute polar bear clip art the moment I saw it! I bring you - Multiple Meaning Words with Polar Bear Pete, which includes 20 pairs for a total of 40 cards. To Play: Students select one Pete the Polar Bear card and state the word that is being defined. Then, they must find the cave card with a different meaning for the same word. Find a match and take another turn. The student with the most matches at the end of the game wins! Also included with this download is a game board for another variation of the activity!

This first page tells you all about the product and how to play the game.

This is an an example of the multiple meaning pair cards. See what I mean about these cute graphics from GraphicsFactory?!

For a variation of this game, I've also included a polar bear game board. My kids love anything that seems remotely like a game, so I hope your kids will like this too! Grab this great activity here In addition to posting various materials, I will always try to also include one completely free idea that only takes a little bit of craftiness! I co-teach 2 classroom lessons per week with my friend, Sara, who is an amazing 4th grade teacher. This week we were targeting academic vocab and since the holidays are right around the corner, we decided to create some vocab lights to decorate her tree. We used our Ellison machine to cut out light bulbs and wrote a vocabulary word on the metal part of the light bulb and definitions on the actual bulb part.

Next, we passed out all of the pieces to the students. Each student had to read their "bulb definition" and then the person who had the word that was being defined would hold up their word and shout it out. Once the word and definition were matched, kids taped both parts together.

The kids loved the activity and it really made them think! Hope you might be able to use this activity in your room too!

A Closer Look and a Therapy Room Idea

Hello again! First of all, thank you so much for all of the support you've shown me over the last few days!! I really, really appreciate it! As always, you can follow my blog and/or my facebook page, which is www.facebook.com/wordnerdspeechteach I've posted a few materials on www.teacherspayteachers.com lately, so I wanted to take a closer look at a few of the resources that are ready to be used in your classroom! The first activity is my favorite!!! This activity includes 544 activity cards targeting the following phonological processes: cluster reduction, final consonant deletion, fronting, stopping, and gliding. There are 48 cluster reduction cards (/st/ and /sp/0, 80 final consonant deletion cards,96 fronting cards with /k/ and /g/ in the initial and final position, 272 stopping cards featuring /s/, /sh/, /ch/, /th/, /f/, /v/ in the initial and final position and /z/ in the final position, and 48 gliding cards with /l/ and /r/ in the initial position. To play this game, each student receives a “baking mat”. Students take turns drawing the “ingredients/baking utensils” with words on them to match the items on their mat while saying the word on the card. If they need a specific ingredient/utensil (if that spot is empty on their baking mat), then they put that card on top of that item. For example, if they draw a card with "sugar" on it and they do not already have a card on the "sugar" spot, then they put that card over the "sugar" spot on their baking mat. If they do not need the card and they already have that ingredient, they put the item back into the pile/bag they drew it from. The first student to draw all ingredients and baking utensils wins! Extra turn and lose a turn cards are also included. We played this game today in a few therapy sessions and my kids LOVED it! One of my little ones actually asked me how I find such fun "games" to play with them all the time!! They think they're playing a game while I'm teaching them to produce sounds correctly?!?! I'll take it!!! Here's a picture of the the game board. They're well on their way to filling the whole thing up!

My little Vanna White showing off the activity! I purchased a little reindeer bag from Target and used that for the kids to pull the cards out of.

I also have an activity on TpT that targets naming items in a category and includes 35 cards. Both concrete (name items that are green) and abstract (name items that make you happy) categories are included. To play this game, students pick a card and name any number of items that belong in that category - you choose the amount! My students have really liked this activity and they have enjoyed trying to avoid the gingerbread house that causes them to lose a turn.

The last activity that I have posted for sale on TpT is a Gingerbread Synonyms game. This awesome activity includes 64 cards (32 pairs) of synonyms to match, as well as an additional activity sheet in order to help students understand that synonyms have the same meaning. To play this game, any number of synonym pairs are placed out on the table, just like memory. Students must select a card and then try to find its synonym match. To increase exposures, if students select cards that are not pairs, you could have them choose one card and provide an appropriate synonym for the word to ensure that they know what they're looking for. (Pairs are in the same color to make finding a match in these 32 pairings a bit easier!) This activity also includes a *bonus* sheet to help students practice writing sentences while interchanging both of the words in the synonym pair. Students check "yes" if they can put both of their words into the sentence without changing the meaning of the sentence. There are four additional free activities on TpT, so feel free to check them out as well! (Click on the TpT button on the side of my blog to see all of these items.) As promised, here's an idea for a **free** activity to do in your therapy room. One area that I always feel as though I'm targeting is describing with attributes. Today, we made evergreen trees with attributes (with the help of Pinterest, of course!) First, I took green paint sample strips and cut them into triangles. Then, I wrote various items on the back of the triangle (e.g. milk, scissors, basketball, etc.) Students then had to write 3-4 attributes on the front of the tree/paint sample that described the word on the back of their paint sample. After we had all of our attributes written down, we read them to each other to see if our descriptive words were specific enough to help our friends guess the word. I think equally as exciting as this activity, was the fact that they got to use Sharpies. (These are pretty much off limits to my kids as I'm always worried that they'll color themselves, me, or something else in my room that just does not need any additional color!) Hope this activity (or a variation of it) might be useful in your room!

Thanks for reading! I have lots of fun things to share in the next few weeks! Let's just say that the Grinch is visiting our speech room this week for some pretty fun artic activities and tomorrow I'll be doing a co-teaching activity in 4th grade with Christmas lights and vocabulary!

Hello Blogging World!!

Hello! I am a speech-language pathologist in Cudahy, Wisconsin. I absolutely love my job because I can be creative and collaborate with other amazing professionals! I have decided to start this blog in order to feature products that I have created as well as share free and/or inexpensive activities that I do in therapy. In addition to individual and group therapy sessions, I also run a snack bunch group with our great special ed teacher, co-treat with our wonderful occupational therapist, and co-teach with an amazing 4th grade teacher. So in addition to sharing ideas, I will also focus on these somewhat more unique aspects of my job. Please feel free to share thoughts and ideas as to what activities you would like to see added to my blog! Thanks for reading!

Each week or two, I use a different theme in my therapy room.  This last week, our theme was gingerbread men!! 

One of the most fun activities we've done all year - we turned the outside of the speech room into a gingerbread house!!!  I cut small strips of red and white paper and wrote artic words onto the pieces that I had cut.  Then my students marble painted each sheet in the opposite color (red got white paint, white got red paint).  They loved shaking the shoe box and most were pretty curious when we took the top off to reveal perfectly decorated “candy cane pieces”.  A few asked how the paint got on the paper.  J  My language students’ tasks were a bit more varied.  Students that were working on attributes tackled the candy canes.  They wrote a word that I had given them at the top of the candy cane and then filled in the white space of the candy cane with attributes that described the original word.  We also put wh-questions onto the gumdrops and answered who, what have/doing, and where questions.  A lot of my students are working on synonyms and antonyms, so we got out our peppermint swirl candies and for this activity.  I wrote “a word that means the opposite of /same as big/glad/tiny/etc is” and then they filled in the word.  Last but not least were the lollipops… which took on the students working on “go togethers.”  Again, students wrote down a word that “goes with” with a word I said.  I’m not sure who was more excited about this activity – the kids or myself but either way, we had a great time in speech this week! 

In addition to this idea, I’ve also posted some of my other gingerbread-themed materials at my brand new teacherspayteachers store.  So far, I’ve included 2 category naming activities (one where students name the category that all of the objects fit into and the other where students name items that belong in a category), a 76-page phonological processes “baking” activity (my students LOVED this activity this past week and I got lots of repetitions from them – win win!), a compare/contrast holiday-themed activity, and a synonym match activity. 

Please feel free to “like” my facebook page (www.facebook.com/wordnerdspeechteach) in order to stay up-to-date with new activities and materials coming from my speech room to yours!