Book of the Week: Sneezy the Snowman

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It feels like FOREVER since I've actually had the chance to sit down and share with you what I've been doing in my speech room!  Before Christmas, my son came home telling me about a book that his preschool teacher read to him.  It sounded fun!  The next week, a co-worker had it out in her pile of snow themed books and I had to check it out.  Sneezy the Snowman is now one of my all-time favorite snowman books!

I encourage you to head over to Amazon and use the "look inside" feature. You won't be disappointed!  In the story, Sneezy keeps looking for things to make him less cold.  The first thing he does is drink hot cocoa. Many of my students can relate this...it is a fairly common activity post-snow play!  If you follow me on Instagram, you may have noticed that we used Hot Cocoa Speech (a very fun freebie) by Lauren over at Busy Bee Speech:

I used cotton balls because we're not supposed to give food to students...well, technically there is a loophole. A permission slip must be signed by the parent of EVERY student in the group.  It just so happens that one of the teachers with whom I work had already sent home a permission slip for marshmallows!  So, after reading the story to that class, we discussed ways to warm up and what we like to eat with our hot cocoa.  The kids made this craft (the pattern is from Mailbox Magazine) to bring home:

Every January, I target /s/ blends with my articulation students.  Why January? Well, it's the perfect opportunity to target the sound in a naturalistic way!  There are just about 100 ready-to-go target words!  Here are just a few:  snow, snowman, snowball, skate, scarf, sled, slide, slip, slippery, skid...You get the idea!  So, with my articulation groups, we made this snowman craftivity:

For the snowman, I used a printable page from Tales of a First Grade Teacher.  I got the photos from Phonology Roundup by Super Duper (I got the book that comes with a CD ROM). I printed 2 pages per sheet of paper so the pictures would be smaller.  We glued the target words on and, in some cases, added some bonus words (sticks, snowflakes, scarf)!

And that pretty much sums up my week last week!  I'd love to hear from you.  Have you read "Sneezy the Snowman"? If so, what do you think of it?

Book of the Week: Skeleton Meets the Mummy

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links to Amazon.com for your convenience.

I think this book is becoming one of my Halloween Favorites! Skeleton Meets the Mummy is the story of Sammy the Skeleton.  His mother asks him to bring a thermos of soup to his grandmother since it's chilly.  Sammy tries to hurry because he's meeting his friend Derek to go Trick-or-Treating, but he is being followed through the woods by a mummy!  This book is not too scary for the little ones and is great for having kids make predictions (Did you predict how the book will end???).

After reading the story, answering wh- questions, and making predictions, we made mummies:

We used a gingerbread template to make the bodies and added strips of masking tape and googly eyes.  For this particular group, we worked on following directions and body parts. But you can adapt this craft to any speech target...Kids can earn strips by answering questions, by saying an articulation word, by using a target word in a sentence, etc.  You can even write articulation words on the tape strips and have students bring home for carry-over practice!

I did try to create a mummy using the paper doll pattern done on my Cricut (I used the Paper Doll Dress Up Cartridge), but it really wasn't sturdy enough for the younger kids to use without ripping. The tape tends to stick to the table when you do this craft.  When the kids tried to lift it, the pattern ripped.  Fortunately, it could be fixed with more tape!

I would definitely recommend using the gingerbread shape for younger kids though.

What do you think? Would you use this book and/or activity in your speech room?

Articulation Frogs ~ A Craftivity

I was flipping through a recent edition of Mailbox Magazine and saw this adorable frog template.  The magazine featured a different activity for the frog, but I thought it would make a great articulation craftivity!

Here's what you need:

• Frog Template (HERE is a cute one from DLTK kids.com if you don't get Mailbox)
• Small articulation (or vocabulary) pictures 
• Red construction paper, cut into strips
• Scissors
• Crayons
• Glue
• Paper clips (optional)

To create the small articulation pictures, I used Lesson Pix.  If you haven't used Lesson Pix yet, head on over and try it out (you can give it a test run before subscribing, but it's well worth the $36.00/year subscription fee!) Lesson Pix has a sound finder feature, which I used to get target words for my articulation groups.  I created picture cards with the 35 pictures/page option:

I colored the frog and lilypad and cut the frog's mouth out.  Then I attached the strip of paper to the backside of the frog and glued the pictures on his tongue.

You can roll up the frog's tongue and hold it together with a paper clip.  This will give it a curly shape even after you remove the paper clip.  Kids can practice their words as they unroll the frog's tongue.

Other Ways to Use This Craft:

• Open Ended - You could get some bug stickers and have kids stick the stickers on the frog's tongue for each X number of desired responses (language or artic).
• Patterning - Use the frog's tongue as a pattern strip (e.g., fly, beetle, fly, beetle)
• Concepts - Start with a bug in the center of the frog's tongue.  Have students glue more bugs "above" or "below" the first.
• Sequencing - Find small pictures (or use your photocopier to reduce) of steps of a sequence.  Have students cut out and glue to the frog's tongue in the correct order. I found some frog life cycle sequencing pictures on Enchanted Learning and Making Learning Fun.

What else would you have kids glue to the frog's tongue?  I'd love to hear your ideas!

Scented Play Dough Recipes with Visuals

Hi Everyone!  I have to apologize for being a bit absent lately.  I have been absurdly busy since the middle of February.  I'm hitting a little break in the craziness, but things are going to pick up again come April.  Until then, I'm going to try to get in a few posts for you.

If you're a regular reader of my blog, you may remember that my current school district does not allow teachers/therapists to use food products (other than those that come from the cafeteria).  Well, I was going through some of my files recently and found some recipes for scented play dough that I used a few years back (in another school district) and I thought I'd share them with you!

Because I used this activity as a whole-class language lesson in a preschool classroom, I used visuals in the recipe:

The recipe above is the large quantity version.  There is also a smaller quantity version to be used with one or just a few students.  I used the smaller quantity recipe with my son after work today:

I only had one packet of red Kool-Aid (watermelon), so our play dough turned pink rather than red.  He didn't mind though!  I think we played with the dough for about an hour and a half!  We made snowmen, pancakes, birthday cakes, hot dogs, snakes, Easter eggs, and an Easter basket!


I really do miss being able to use recipes (play dough and food) in my therapy sessions.  They really are a great way to target so many different language objectives.  With this recipe, you can target:

• Vocabulary (ingredients, recipe, flour, measuring cup, squishy, scented, etc.)
• Sequencing (First, next, then)
• Verb tense (I am pouring the water, I poured the salt)
• Following directions ("find the salt and pour it in this cup," "make a play dough snowman")
• Executive functioning/pragmatic language (use with a group of students. Have them make a plan, give each other instructions)
• Expressive language (have students describe the procedure after you are finished; students describe what they make)
• And so many more!

If you'd like a copy of the recipes, you can find them HERE.  Do you use recipes in your therapy session? If so, what's your favorite thing to make?

Spreading Some Bloggy Love!

Wow!  I just have to say that last week was busy and eventful in many ways.  Because of that, I haven't had a huge amount of time to plan and create materials.  So, this week I'm planning on using some of the AWESOME ideas I've seen on other speech blogs...

With my articulation groups, we're adapting this activity from Crazy Speech World:

Jenn had her students describe a target word (written on the tree) and add those words to leaves that were then glued to the trees.  I'm having my students glue pictures of target articulation words to the leaves...

final /k/ tree

I have a couple of language kiddos mixed into articulation groups, so they are making fall vocabulary trees using fall vocabulary pictures I found on Pinterest.  I tried to get you the link, but it now says the page does not exist :-(

Fall Vocabulary Tree

I also have a group of articulation students who are working less on specific sounds and more on sound sequencing within multisyllabic words.  For those students I'm  using Grammar Gum Balls by Jenna over at Speech Room News:

In my higher functioning (older) language groups, I'm planning on using Trick of Treat Pronouns created by Brea over at Let's Talk Speech-Language Pathology.

from Let's Talk Speech-Language Pathology

For my younger language groups, I bought Halloween Bugs: A Trick or Treat Pop Up Book, that was recently highlighted by Chit Chat and Small Talk.

Pam included an adorable craft to accompany this book - a DIY lift the flap book using paper bags!

from Chit Chat and Small Talk

I went to drag out my paper bags to make this book, but couldn't find any.  I realized that I had actually donated them to my son's classroom because "What do I need paper bags for?"  I ended up using card stock for my version:

8-1/4 x 5-1/2 inch rectangle, folded to make a 5-1/2 inch square

PS, My son loved the book!

I think I see knock-knock articulation books in my future!


Thank you, thank you, to all of you wonderful bloggers for posting these GREAT ideas!!!  Have you tried any of these ideas in your speech rooms?