End of the Week SLP Blues-Halloween Edition

Seeing as I'm working in a pre-school, I'm doing way more hands-on sensory activities.  Card games rarely work for me, unless there is a gross motor component to it.  That's why I liked this one below.  Have the kids all around the room and then they have to walk around and ask friends if they have the picture they're looking for.   

 "I have. Who has?" game from Carrie over at Carrie's Speech Corner.

 

Lessons for Little One's Blog has all kinds of Halloween activities.  I would use this tissue paper candy corn activity with my kids working on articulation and think about your kids with Apraxia...Holy drill practice! Give them a piece of tissue paper for each time they say a word/word in a sentence etc. 

Here's another fun (and edible) activity to get lots of practice.

link

Over at No Time For Flashcards, she's also making spider webs out of tape.  I would put targeted sound cards or different verb cards all over the spider web.  Then they have to stay on the lines to pick up the card, say the word or put the verb in a sentence. 

 

I'm thinking 10 target sounds/words and they get to pop a balloon.  I would LOVE to do this in a classroom!

 

I'm for sure doing this! A sensory bag with eyeballs in it.  I'm also thinking it would be fun to add little spiders and worms.  Think about all the wonderful spontaneous language you'll get.  My kids are going to flip over this!

 

I love Halloween and am excited that my school has a "Halloweenie Roast" every year.  The whole school is turned into a fun haunted house and the kids go around to their classrooms and trick or treat. 

 

 

Has anyone else been eating way too much candy to prepare for the holiday or am I the only one? Anyone, anyone?!?

 

Appy Hour-ARTEL Larson

Phrase Stress

Students I use this with:
Children working on pragmatics that have difficulty understanding idioms.
Children with auditory processing needs. They can determine what word the stress is on.
Children who have difficulty with suprasegmentals

Details:
Phrase stress presents you with an idiom. You can choose to have the sound off or on when using this app.  Then you are given 3 choices to choose from to solve the idiom.
Specifically, I initially used it to take baseline data. Then I taught the skill targeted whether it be idioms or stress.  At the end of the data taking period I went through the app again and took post test data to see whether there had been improvement.
One aspect of the app that I really like is that you can use it as a teaching method as well as to take data.  If you click on the book icon it has every idiom targeted, what it actually means and how it could be used in a sentence. Again, I've mentioned before I like versatile products and this is one of them .

Word Balloons

Students I use this app with:
Kids working on carryover articulation skills
Kids working on syntax
Kids working on fluency

Details:
Word balloons is an app that has the 500 most commonly used words in the English language. On the screen there is a word presented at the bottom.  You have to find the balloon that matches that word as the balloons float across the screen. For children working on carryover of articulation, I have them repeat the word. For children working on syntax I have them tell me whether the word was a noun, verb or adjective.  For a child working on fluency I have them say the word using a specific type of disfluency or have them say the word in a sentences using smooth speech. 

Word Stress

Students I use this app with:
Kids with auditory processing disorder
Kids with attention and memory issues
Kids working on articulation and phonology
Kids working on producing multi-syllabic words

Details:
Word Stress has a dictionary of 5,000 most commonly used words in the English language.  You can choose to have a maximum of 4, 5, 6, 8, 10 or 10+ letters in the words.  I used this app with a child working on auditory memory tasks and so I chose 4 letters and he had to listen to the word while looking at the screen and then fill in the blank.  If you wanted to work on multi-syllabic words, I'd choose 10+ letters in the words and then we would practice clapping out the word and work together to fill in the blanks.  This app is difficult to use with younger children because it helps to be able to read and have phonemic awareness to complete the tasks. 


All in all these were fun apps that engaged the kids and helped them attend to the activities. 
Have you used these apps? Did you use them differently than my suggestions? I'd love to hear how! Please leave a comment so everyone can benefit from your genius :)



**Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this post are Speech Lady Liz's.  The companies are nice enough to provide materials to try out, but provide no other compensation.

Halloween Prep & Appy Hour

My Halloween outfit is coming together (I'll be a ballerina) and I'm reminiscing about my Halloween post last year.  I haven't decided yet how I'll incorporate Halloween into my new class.  Pretty sure it will involve some pretty hands on activities.  I'll keep you updated on that through Facebook or Instagram.

Make sure to check out what I used last year in my classroom.

Here are some fun and free apps to use for the holiday.

Holiday Pic it!-Free

Take a picture of you or your student and they can choose to put Halloween items on certain parts of their body or face (i.e. Put the pumpkin on your head). 

Carve-A-Pumpkin -Free

I modeled what I wanted the kids to do by saying, "Put the triangle eyes on the pumpkin." Then they got a turn to give me the directions. 

There are so many awesome Halloween activities out there.  Make sure to check back on Thursday for "End of the Week SLP Blues". 

Speech Lady Says...

The good news about my job is that I can be completely ridiculous and over the top.  My boss always says to keep kids engaged you have to be engaging.  What other job can you make up silly songs, dress-up for themed lesson plans and play in the mud? I try and live in that moment and remember that no other job allows you to play in a ball pit, have an entire conversation through animal crackers and jump in a bounce house.