{Review} Understanding and Explaining Time in Sequential Stories

Here's the last (but not least!) in a three part review series of new materials by Great Ideas for Teaching.  This final resource is called Understanding and Explaining Time in Sequential Stories.

This material is "designed to help students comprehend how much time it takes to complete sequential stories or events.  The activities are designed to help students understand that events can happen in a very short period of time or can happen over a much longer period of time."  This skill is essential for improving overall comprehension skills.

Pictured above is the student worksheet.  Pictures are used to tell a story, while the instructor reads a short narrative to accompany the illustrations.  Then, questions are posed to clarify how much time was needed to complete the actions in the story.  This also helps to determine if the student can remember details from the narrative.  In addition, it allows the student to show his/her ability to follow directions related to time.  This resource targets a child's ability to understand the importance of time in sequential stories.  It also shows him/her the importance of time in their own daily routine.

The instructor's worksheet includes questions such as:
- Did this story take place in the morning or the evening?
- At what time did Larry go out to check on his pet?
- How much time passed from the beginning of the story to the end of the story when Buddy came home?

I absolutely love this resource and know that I'll get a lot of use out of it.  It includes short narratives that are also supported by picture cues, which are very useful for students struggling with narrative skills.  It also asks simple and more advanced questions that rely on a student's ability to pay attention to the story and pick up on specific details.

You can find this (in my opinion) must-have product for $29.50 HERE!


Disclaimer:  This product was given to me for review.  No other compensation was provided.  The opinions expressed here are solely my own.

{Review} Auditory Comprehension/Vocabulary Activities for Non or Minimally Verbal Children

Here is a wonderfully versatile workbook from Great Ideas for Teaching that is intended for non or minimal verbal children.  (But wait, there's more - continue reading to see all of the goal areas that it could be used to reach!)  Introducing, Auditory Comprehension/Vocabulary Activities for Non or Minimally Verbal Children! 

This material is intended to "provide structured comprehension lessons and vocabulary building for young children".  The book uses many pictures so that children can indicate how much they know receptively without having to verbally express their ideas.  It is intended for children ages 3-7.

There are 38 two-page lessons in this book.  Each one contains a student worksheet that has many different pictures (6-12) and an instructor's worksheet.

Instructor's worksheet questions include directions such as:
- "Point to someone who is riding a tricycle."
- "Point to someone who is hitting a ball."
- "Point to someone who is blowing bubbles."
- "Circle someone who is being kind to animals."
- "Put two lines under someone who is a very good jumper."

- "Put an X under someone who has her feet on pedals."

(The level two directions are a bit more difficult than the level one directions for differentiation.)

In addition to using this book for children who have minimal verbal skills, it could also be used to target:
- pronouns (subjective and objective)
- third person singular verbs
- present progressive verbs
- regular/irregular past tense verbs
- more advance vocabulary
- object descriptions
- 2-step and 3-step directions

You can find this fantastically diverse workbook for $32.00 HERE!


Disclaimer:  This item was given to me for review.  No other compensation was provided.  The opinions expressed here are solely my own.

{Review} Language Stimulation Activities by Great Ideas for Teaching, Inc.

Great Ideas for Teaching is at it again!  They have three new materials that I'll be sharing my review of over the next few days.  First up, is Language Stimulation Activities!

This material can be used to "provide structured, repetitious activities that will assist students in fully learning very important language terms...".  It is intended for children in preK through 2nd grade.

Each concept pair includes two student worksheets and two instructor worksheets.  The student sheet includes four pictures - two to demonstrate each concept.  The pages below show the concepts of hot and cold.

The instructor's sheet for the first worksheet includes questions and directions such as:

- "Is ice cream hot or cold?"
- "Point to a picture that shows cold weather."
- "Are frozen things hot or cold?"
- "If the hot sun shines on a snowman, what will happen to it?"
- "When it snows, is the weather hot or cold?"
- "Is the word chilly more like hot or cold?"
- "On a cold day, does a coat keep you warm or cold?"

In all, there are 20 questions on this first instructor worksheet that can be used and/or tailored to the individual needs of students.

The second student worksheet includes six concept pairs.

According to the instructor's worksheet, students must circle, underline, or mark the picture in another way to appropriately follow the directions that are given.  Additional questions are asked as well, such as "Circle the one that has flames.  Is it hot or cold?"

What I love about this material:
- It targets lots of different concepts - hot/cold, happy/sad, wet/dry, new/old, open/closed, inside/outside, front/back, high/low, top/bottom, through/around, big/little, long/short, narrow/wide, fast/slow, push/pull - to name just a few!
- It provides tons of practice with the same concept.  Often, I feel as though students with language impairments don't receive enough exposure to targeted goals.  In this case, students can repeatedly work on the same concept area.
- The pictures represent the concept they are portraying very well, so as not to confuse young children.

You can find this awesome material to target concept acquisition in a variety of ways for $29.50 HERE!


Disclaimer: This item was given to me for review.  No other compensation was provided.  The opinions expressed here are solely my own.

New Year Easy Prep Activity!

Happy New Year!  I hope that you had some time to relax and recharge during your winter break!  I always find myself scrambling to come up with some *ahem, last minute* activities to do with my students to celebrate the new year.  That's why I wanted to share this one with you!  This activity was developed for a group that our special ed teacher and I run, but could easily be adapted to target artic, verbs, other grammar skills, etc.   For this group, we were targeting basic one-step and two-step direction following from a speech/language standpoint.  (E.g. "Point to the word "it", then put a blue stamp on it.")

First, we grabbed a template for a party hat.  This one was my favorite!

For our group, we wrote upper and lower case letters as well as sight words in the circles.  Then, we got out our bingo markers and got our decorating skills on!

Do you have any favorite New Year's activities?  Feel free to share them!!

A Whole Slew of New Activities and GIVEAWAYS!!

I've been working on a lot of new activities lately, so I've taken some time away from my blog, but now I'm back with many new activities and giveaways!

Here's a comprehensive activity to target past, present and future verbs, called Hot Chocolate Verb Tenses!

This activity includes 60 "sort the sentence" cards where students must decide if the verb is past, present or future.

It also includes 54 practice cards for children to gain more experience with the skills that they have learned.

You can find this great grammar activity HERE!!

I always like to use the New Year as a time of reflection for my students, seeing as it's about the half way point of the year.  Therefore, I made a packet that includes reflection writing prompts, inferring questions, and prediction questions called New Year's Reflection, Inferring and Predicting Pack.

Here is one of the reflection question prompts.

This activity also includes 24 inferring scenarios...

as well as 32 predicting scenarios.

You can find this activity HERE!!

Last but not least is an activity, called New Year's Celebrations Around the World, that targets a whole host of skills including: vocabulary skills, inferencing, listening/reading comprehension (nonfiction), grammar skills through writing prompts, and articulation at the reading and conversation levels!

Eight countries are targeted in this activity.  Each one includes a page-long reading passage,

as well as a vocabulary worksheet,

and a inferencing/listening comprehension/writing prompt sheet.

You can find this activity that targets a variety of goal areas HERE!!

And now, here's the best part... You can enter the rafflecopter giveaway below to win one of two copies of "New Year's Reflection, Inferring, and Predicting Pack" or one of two copies of "New Year's Celebrations Around the World"!!

Happy Holidays!!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

{Review} Fun with Verbs & Sentences

Here's a look at a cool new app from Hamaguchi Apps called, "Fun with Verbs & Sentences"!

This app is developed for children ages 2-5 and targets basic syntax skills.  It includes 266 colorful animations to grab and hold a student's attention and targets 39 verbs.

I started by adding users to use the app.  I've added my name to the "Add Individual User" area so that I am able to track data and keep track of progress.

Here's a look at the settings options for the app.

The "Activities" tab allows the user to choose from activities as well as how those activities are shown.

The "Sentence Type" tab includes verb (only), subject + verb, subject + verb + object, subject + verb+ prepositional phrase, or random.  You can also choose between using pronouns or nouns.

"Track Progress" by turning to progress tracker on or off and deciding whether or not to display scores.

The "Verbs" tab allows you to choose random vs. custom verbs.  You can also select the present ing form, past regular, past irregular, or random.

The "Cueing" tab provides options for visual support, as well as if the sentence is modeled by the narrator before the animation.

Finally, you can choose how often you'd like to play the Bubble Game.  (More about this game later.)

After the set up, you're ready to start using the app!  First, start by choosing the person who will do the action.

Then, choose the action.

Here, I've chosen subject + verb + prepositional phrase, so I selected where the action happened.

Last, you can watch a video that corresponds to the sentence that you've created.

Then, it's time to review and/or say the sentence.  On the bottom of the screen, there are instructions to, "Tap once to see the picture.  Tap again to hear the words."  This is a nice way of providing the student with as much support as he/she needs, but not going overboard.  Students can also record their sentence and compare it with the correct sentence.  On the left, you can track correct vs. incorrect responses if you choose to do so.

When you're all done, you can view data from the session.

As I mentioned before, a bubble game is also included.  Simply tap the object that you'd like to find, then pop the bubbles to find the object.

What I like about this app:
- It provides scaffolded cueing for students by giving just enough, but not too much help.
- For students who need a good deal of support with syntax, it provides them with a step-by-step way of creating a sentence.
- For students who are just working on verbs, it provides a cute, short video for them to watch related to the verb.

You can read even more about the app HERE and you can find the app at iTunes for $15.99 HERE!  (The lite version is $.99.)


Disclaimer: This app was given to me for review.  No other compensation was provided.  The opinions expressed here are solely my own.

{Review} Expanding Expression Tool

You know how there are just some therapy materials that you simply cannot live without?  Well for me, one of those items is the Expanding Expression Tool by Sara Smith.

                                          

(Graphic Courtesy of Expanding Expression Tool)

This multisensory tool is an extremely versatile item that can be used to target the following skills (to name just a few):

- oral expression

- written expression

- vocabulary comprehension

- defining and describing

- making associations

- stating functions of objects

- stating categories

- stating similarities and differences

How it works:  

Well, first of all, the kit comes with the following items:

- string/ball visual tool

- kit manual

- object cards for describing

- stickers for writing

- poster

- dice game

- picture icon cards

                                 

(Graphic Courtesy of Expanding Expression Tool)

Since students with language disabilities often have difficulties describing, this tool is absolutely awesome because it breaks down the tasks listed above into smaller pieces.  The kit is designed with designated colors and repetitive materials.  Each color stands for a specific attribute of an item (e.g. green group, blue do, pink parts, white where, etc).  Students methodically move through each color to describe objects, define, make associations, etc.  (I use this tool most often with describing, so that is my frame of reference, but as you can see, it can be used to target so many other skills too!)

Here is a specific example of how to use the item for describe.  Take a banana for example.  Typically, if I asked a student to describe a banana, he or she might say, "you eat it" or "it's yellow".  (Or if I'm really lucky, maybe "You eat it AND it's yellow.")  By using the EET, look at all of the ways that this item could be described...

- Green Group: This item belongs to the fruit group.

- Blue Do: You can peel the item and you can eat it.

- White Eye: This item is yellow and it is shaped like a crescent.

- Pink Parts: This item has a peel and a short stem at the top.

- White Where: This item grows on trees, but you find it most often in a grocery store, typically in the produce section.

- Orange Extras: This item is often eaten by monkeys and the peel can be slippery.

Here's a closer look at the visual tool.

This is the manual that comes along with the kit.

These EETCHY Steppers are an add-on that can be used to get your students up and moving throughout a therapy session.

What I love about this item:

- The string/ball visual tool is a step-by-step way to describe that is hands on and really grabs a student's attention.  My students get excited every time I pull "him" out.  (Each group has their own name for him and they all remember his name.)

- This tool can be used for SO many skills.  It is ridiculously versatile!

- The manual comes with a large variety of materials that support the program and the hands-on materials that come with the kit.

The kit is $229.00 and can be found here but there are also tons of extra add-ons to enhance your kit that can also be found at the same site.

To find out more about the Expanding Expression Tool, you can go to their website and read all about it.  

Disclaimer: This item was given to me for review.  No other compensation was provided.  The opinions expressed here are solely my own.