New England Speech Therapy

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Happy New Year!

You may have noticed there has been a break in my blog posts, and I’m sorry for that. However, the break is for good reason, as my husband and I welcomed our first child into the world! Our beautiful daughter joined our family in the beginning of October.  We’ve been enjoying the new roller coaster of parenthood, even with little sleep!

While motherhood has been my primary job over the past few months, I’m happy to be returning back to New England Speech Therapy Inc. I currently have a few openings that I am looking to fill. I will also be returning to the blog to continue to bring my readers new content and ideas!

Looking forward to this new year, and wishing everyone a happy and healthy 2018!

Colleen

New England Speech Therapy is now booking summer sessions! If your child receives speech and language therapy at school, but does not get services over the summer, we’re here to help! New England Speech Therapy is happy to carry over goals from an IEP if you have an updated IEP or evaluation report. If not, no worries! We can perform a screen or evaluation and determine an individualized and appropriate plan of care for your child. Contact us today!

Halloween is such a fun time when working with children! It offers a lot of fun halloween activities to target speech and language skills during therapy sessions. Below are some of my favorites!

Articulation Jack-O-Lanterns

These are one of the simplest crafts to do! Simply cut out a pumpkin in orange paper. Then find some worksheets with pictures to target the speech or language goal. I had the kids cut them out and then glue them in the shape of a face. I did this with children working on articulation goals as well as with children working on language goals such as pronouns or verbs.

Halloween Activities Targeting Listening Comprehension

I found some worksheets that worked on following directions. One such worksheet was  a blank pumpkin and it had various directions to say out loud that eventually led to a Jack-O-Lantern face being drawn on the pumpkin. I also purchased this seasons themed wh-question packet and during October/November I used it for listening comprehension and working on answering questions.

Additional Halloween  Activities Targeting Articulation

In addition to the jack-o-lanterns, I also found some worksheets with halloween themes where I was able to write in various articulation words based on each child’s goal. The children were then able to color them while we practiced the target words.

We also did a ghost activity where we added various articulation picture depending on what sounds each child was working on. The faces this kids drew were so cute!

Finally, an oldie but a goodie! I love the various “chipper chat” type boards from Tech N’ Talk SLPs on Teachers Pay Teachers. The Halloween themed ones offer various candy corn for the children to cover with magnetic chips as they practice their target sounds. I then give them their “magic wand” and the love picking up all the chips!

This is an easy and relatively inexpensive way to create a cute weighted lap pad for your child! Even better–there’s no sewing involved! Anyone can do this! The entire project took me less than 10 minutes!

MATERIALS: 

• no stuffing dog toy that allows you to add a water bottle (example here)
• duck tape
• 1-2 gallon ziplock bags
• 1-5lbs of rice

ASSEMBLY: 

1. First gather your materials. I found my dog toy at Home Goods for $5.99. They had a few different animals but I ultimately settled on this cute yellow duck. You want to make sure you’ll be able to fit 2-4 lbs of rice in it, and that it has a velcro closure. I bought my 5 pound bag of rice at my local grocery store for $1.29. Then you’ll just need some duck tape and 1-2 gallon ziplock bags.

2. Next, pour the rice into the ziplock bag. Remember: the weight of the lap pad should be equivalent to 5% of the child’s body weight. I had to use two ziplock bags so that they were skinny enough to fit in the dog toy opening. You may want to try putting them in the toy to make sure you like the way it feels.                                                                             

3. Then, once you have determined the proper amount of rice in the bags, add a strip of duck tape to the top to prevent the bags from bursting open. I made sure they were sealed tight!

4. Finally, place the bag(s) in the toy and seal the toy up! You now have your completed weighted lap pad!

Weighted lap pads are great to help children remain in their seats and stay focused. I use them for children with sensory processing difficulties who benefit from the proprioceptive feedback of the weighted lap pad. They are also great for children with ADD/ADHD who have trouble focusing on table top activities or who have difficulties sitting for longer periods of time. Keep in mind the recommendation for a weight is typically 5% of the child’s body weight!

We’ve been pretty lucky here in the northeast with not a not too crazy Spring so far! I always love seeing those first flowers bloom and the colors slowly emerge from the trees and plants outside. Theres something about spring that puts such good energy in the air!

Throughout the spring I continue to do many crafts with my little friends to keep them busy while introducing some spring-themed vocabulary! Check out my ideas below!

Articulation Frogs

Aren’t these frogs so cute? I got this cute little creativity from Carrie over at Carrie’s Speech Corner. You can find her post all about it here. I printed a bunch of the frog clip art and then cut out a bunch of lily pads out of green construction paper. Before each session, I pre-cut the frogs, the red construction paper “tongue,” and the target pictures so there was no cutting for my little ones.

It’s Raining It’s Pouring!

I’ve used this craft for a few years now. I typically like to break it out when we’re having a few rainy days in a row so that we can talk about the weather while we create this cute little project! I used this craft for a variety of language goals. I primarily used it for articulation, but I also used it for language goals such as vocabulary, following directions, and increasing expressive language. You can find an umbrella template here. I just roughly cut out the raindrops out of various shades of blue construction paper.

Mother’s Day Flower Pots

I had these cute flower pot cut outs and wasn’t sure what to do with them. I decided it would be a cute and easy craft to make for mother’s day. My little friends used various colored hexagon cut outs as the “flowers” and I had them draw the stems. I used this for all of my friends! It was a great way to work on colors, requesting, and following directions. To target more specific goals such as pronouns, verbs, or articulation, we added smaller target pictures to the individual “flowers.”

Other activities keeping us busy this Spring: 

• Spring WH question game
• Spring Pronouns
• Spring Following Directions

What fun things are you up to with you little friends this Spring?