Mitten Mania!

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BRRR!  It's been so cold all over the country this week that I bet even in the south kids are wearing winter clothing they've never seen before!  This week in my speech room, we've been doing activities related to MITTENS!  Here's the run-down:

The Mitten:

In many of my groups, we read "The Mitten" by Jan Brett. Who doesn't love this book?!? Believe it or not, I drew the animals from the story when I was in college (in the mid to late 90's) and they are STILL hanging in there!  This still shocks me because I didn't even think of laminating them at the time!  

Here's a closer look:

We worked on sequencing the order in which the animals went into the mitten and I found this printable emergent reader take-home book from Jamie Mayas on Teacher's Pay Teachers. What a great way for my preschoolers to practice the vocabulary from the book!

Noisy Story:
In some other groups, we read the Noisy Story "The Mitten." (Click HERE to see more information on the Noisy Stories program).  This story is about a lost mitten.  I begin the story by wearing one mitten and telling the kids that I'm going to tell them a story about something you can wear in the winter.  Believe it or not, they don't ALL clue in that the story will be about a mitten! Once they do figure it out, I tell them that there is a BIG problem in the story (mind you, I'm still wearing ONE mitten).  Eventually someone infers that there is a missing or lost mitten in the story...

At the end, the mitten is found on a snowman! My preschoolers love when I pull out my snowman (above) with the mitten stuck to his belly.  (Sometimes they make me feel like a magician!)  The younger kids worked on same/different using real mittens (see photo below) as well.

PS, If you want a similar type story for older kids, check out "The Missing Mitten Mystery" by Steven Kellogg.

EET: Mitten style!

I have rounded up a ton of mittens over the years.  I usually pick them up at the end of the winter in a clearance bin. We focused on the "eye" bead of the EET strand and described what the mittens look like.

I don't know if I mentioned this before or not, but I'm doing my Student Learning Goal for my Educator Evaluation on the EET.  Based on my mid-year data, my kids are just NOT getting the eye bead!  Here's an example of a very typical response from my kiddos during mid-year data collection:

Me:  What's this?
Student: A carrot.
Me:  Right! {shows green bead}Green-group. What group does a carrot belong in?
Student: Food group.
Me: Nice! {shows blue bead}Blue-do. What do you do with a carrot?
Student: You eat it!
Me:  You're doing great! {shows eye bead} Eye ball!  What does a carrot look like?
Student:  It looks like a carrot!
Me: {face-palm!}

We spent about 2 weeks on describing appearance, but I guess we need some more time with that!  So, we grabbed the EET strand and worked on describing the appearance of the mittens.  If you don't have a ton of mittens like I do, you can always make them out of paper.  

I used a pattern similar to the one below and printed them on letter size scrapbook paper, then cut them out.

Want a copy of the mitten patterns? Click HERE.

And there you have my week of Mitten Mania!  What are your favorite Mitten activities?

Acorn Craftivity

This week, we're sticking with the theme of squirrels and acorns.  On Tuesday, I posted about the book "Acorns Everywhere" and included a free Roll & Cover activity. (You can find that post HERE.)  I had mentioned that I run a group with an Occupational Therapist.  We came up with this activity to promote fine motor objectives after reading "Acorns Everywhere."  Well, some of my groups absolutely LOVE doing crafts so I adapted the activity to meet the needs of my students!

I printed the acorn top and bottom on cardstock and had kids color them in and cut them out. Then I punched holes along the adjoining edges and had them lace together with yarn:

You could modify this activity for pretty much any target:

• Articulation: Write sound on the top portion and have students brainstorm words to write on the bottom.
• Categorization: Write a category on the top and have students brainstorm members of that category to write on the bottom.
• Describing:  Write a word at the top. Have students write describing words on the bottom.  OR...
• EET:  Write a target vocabulary word on the top. Use your EET stickers along the bottom and have students follow the strand to describe the word.

You can find the acorn pattern HERE.

Let me know what you think! What other ideas do you have for using the acorns?

More EET Fun: Beads 2 and 3 {Out of This World Vocabulary!}

Over the summer I broke down and bought the Expanding Expression Tool.  I had been skeptical about purchasing the EET because I wasn't sure how well my caseload of preschoolers and kindergarteners would get it.  We've been going through each bead on the strand one at a time.  (If you missed my post about the first bead, Green-Group, you can see it HERE.  Two weeks ago we did the second bead (Blue-Do), but I never got a chance to write about it before now.  This week we're doing the third bead (Eye - What does it look like?).

Blue-Do:
Essentially, with this bead you're working on object functions.  We worked on (1) describing the function of common objects that you might find around the house or the classroom, and (2) listing objects you might need to perform a specific task.  Here's a preview:

"What do you do with...?"

"What do you need to...?"

I used the space-themed game from my Seasonal and Thematic Dot Reinforcers to make the activity more fun!

Eye - What Does it Look Like?
Not going to lie...I've been doing a lot of ground work in my sessions for this activity.  This is an area my kids really struggle with - using more than one attribute to describe.  So, we've been doing some fun activities to target using attributes of color, shape, and size to describe.  Here are some of them:

• Orange Pumpkin, Orange Pumpkin by First Grade a la Carte (using color + object)
• Shape Monster Book by Chit Chat & Small Talk (using color + shape)
• Shape Monster Craftivity (using color + shape + size):

Basically for this craft, I pre-cut shapes (large for bodies, small for eyes, nose, mouth) and used my Cricut (Paper Doll Dress Up Cartridge) to make small and large hands and feet.  The students had to request their parts using color plus shape and/or size descriptors.

Now that they have the idea of using those attributes, we are pulling out the cards from my Out of this World Vocabulary packet.  Here's a sample:

PSSST! I included poster charts for kids to use to help them remember colors, shapes, and sizes:

Green-Group:
Since I was creating a packet to accompany the EET, I added a category activity. You can use this activity for category naming and sorting:

And there are some game play cards to increase the fun/competition/motivation!

If you missed my last post, we're creating an EET "caterpillar" as we go through the beads. Here's what it's looking like these days:

The activities described above can be found in my TPT store:

Out of this World Vocabulary Fun

Seasonal and Thematic Dot Reinforcers

Are you using the EET with preschoolers and kindergarteners?  What activities/strategies have you found to be most helpful?

Introducing the EET (Expanding Expression Tool)

I'm guessing that you've heard of the EET before (Expanding Expression Tool). I first saw the EET described in a catalog from Northern Speech Services and thought "This looks cool!"  I couldn't imagine that it would be appropriate for my caseload that is largely (maybe 90%!) preschool.  Still, I kept coming back to it...reading reviews from other bloggers, checking out materials developed by other bloggers to use with the EET, and checking out the EET website itself.

If you haven't done this yet, head over to the EET website and watch some of the videos. I couldn't believe the four year old little girl! I thought, if she can do it, my kids can do it!  I finally broke down and bought my own kit.

I was so excited to get the EET, you'd think I was a kid on Christmas! I ended up ordering the kit, some small student strands, and the EETCHY steppers.

I started using the EET in therapy this week (yes, with preschoolers!) and I wanted to share with you.  I "introduced" my students to the large EET strand and drew their attention to the different parts of the strand.  We paid particular attention to the head, which is green. The manual and poster will tell you that GREEN=GROUP.  Many of my kids weren't sure how to define "group," but they were able to make groups!  I gathered some items and put them in a "mystery bag."  (I recently bought some new sheets and they came in a bag that is made of the sheet material and has a flap with velcro closure at the top. We used that).  Then I gave them baskets and I placed an item into each basket and told them they would make groups.  Some of the kids needed some supports and assistance, but most were able to sort the objects into groups:

We had the food group, the crayon group (aka the "colors" group), the animal group, the block group, and the dishes group.  I know some of these aren't "real" groups, but the activity helped the kids understand the concept!

My plan is to introduce the strand one ball at a time.  As we go, I'm going to create a caterpillar on the wall.  This pin was my inspiration, but I don't think I'm going to get that fancy.

Overall, the kids seemed to enjoy the activity and the "caterpillar"!  I'm hoping they will continue to have fun with this and expand their language at the same time!  If you're looking for more EET ideas, I've started an EET board on Pinterest.


I would love to know...I've heard people call the EET strand a caterpillar and a worm, but do you have a special NAME for it?

Update: Since writing this post, I've added a product to my TPT store that targets the first three beads of the strand. You can find that HERE.