A Little Final Consonant Deletion Karma

This year the majority of my 3-year old articulation students have a little final consonant deletion going on.  Not surprising, I know.  Well, I've been plugging away at getting them to mark those final consonants and they're doing great!  Next step?  I pulled out the FCD story from Read Aloud Minimal Contrast Stories With Activities from Super Duper.  This one is about a monkey who finds all sorts of strange things in her mailbox.  I got the story printed for my group and grabbed some markers.  And then it occurred to me...Hey! I have a monkey!  I got him with my Talk it, Rock it (formerly Kids Express Train) CDs.  Wait a minute! I also have a mailbox!  (Thanks Target Dollar Spot!)  My kids had a blast making the monkey look in the mailbox for their target words!  

Don't you love it when your therapy plan ends up being even better than you had planned??  Have you ever planned something and had it transform into something even better?

New Year, New Venture (and a Giveaway)

So I have recently been introduced to Jamberry Nails.  If you follow me on Instagram, you may have noticed this! :)  Have you heard of them? Jamberry wraps are heat activated vinyl wraps that adhere to your fingernails (as well as gel, acrylic, shellac, etc.) and last on your fingernails for up to 2 weeks and your toenails for up to 6 weeks! They do not chip like polish and there's no drying time!  Did you notice I said "heat activated"?? Here's the official Jamberry Application Video. FYI, I skip the cuticle oil. I found that my nails started to lift at the cuticles the one time I did use it. I also do a slightly different removal process (see below).

This was my first attempt at applying them:

Way neater than I ever could have done with polish!  BTW, I almost NEVER polish my nails! I'm just terrible at it!  Also, when I was little, I used to bite my fingernails. My mother told me "If you bite your nails, they'll never grow long!"  So, I started biting/picking at my cuticles instead, lol!  This is a horrible habit to have and nail polish remover is just plain painful!  Anywho, I've tried nail "stickers" before, but none have lasted as long as the Jamberries!

This is the next wrap I chose, just in time for the holidays!  How cute are the candy canes???

I loved these so much, I did them twice!  Here's the 2nd set on day 14, and after I broke 2 nails cleaning the house:

Not bad, huh?  You can see some nail growth, but they still look awesome!  On day 14, though, I was hosting a demo at my house and wanted to show my guests how I remove my "jams."  I don't have pictures, but basically I dip my fingertips in a small bowl of olive oil (about 1 1/2 - 2 Tbsp) and work the oil under the wrap from the cuticle to the tip. No Chemicals!  I totally love that!

This "Jamicure" has been on my hands for about a week now.  I'm not typically one to "mix-and-match" patterns, but I really like this combination!

I have to add something speech related to this post...My preschoolers love the patterns! They've been a conversation starter since I've started wearing them.  Some of my kids are even paying more attention when I point to things, lol!

So why am I telling you about Jamberry?  Well, I love them so much, I decided to become a consultant!  I started this blog and my TPT store, not as a way to make money, but as a way to share my ideas with the rest of you.  I have been SOOO fortunate to make a little bit of money from my TPT store and I am unbelievably thankful to each of you who has made purchases!  A few years ago, my husband went back to school. 

The short version of a long story is that, to supplement our income while he's in school, I have been thinking about joining a direct sales company (e.g., Pampered Chef, Thirty-One) for a while now and along came Jamberry! Talk about right place, right time!  I can host virtual Jamberry parties right on Facebook with my son in the same room!  

If you're interested in hosting a party right on Facebook, January is the perfect time to do so!  Check out the AWESOME bonus hostess rewards for January!  I still have a few spots left, so email me if you're interested (I'm using cmanchester1@yahoo.com for Jamberry related emails)

If you're interested in finding out more about Jamberry, I invite you to check out my website (www.cmanchester.jamberrynails.net) and/or Facebook Page.  

I'm so excited about this new venture! I'm going to do a giveaway because I believe that once you try Jamberry, you'll love it as much as I do! I'm giving away a half sheet of nail wraps!  Each wrap is meant to be used on 2 fingers (right hand, left hand).  I cut them down the center, but if you have short nails, you can get up to 2 manicures out of this sheet (right side of wrap, left side of wrap, center of wrap)! The wraps I have available are pictured above (Midnight Celebration, White Stars on Pink, Heartstrings, Sealed With a Kiss, Dizzy Blue, and Cool Blue Sparkle). Enter using the Rafflecopter below!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Mitten Mania!

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

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?

SLP Secret Santa Exchange

Throughout the year and half that I've been blogging, I've made some pretty amazing friends along the way!  When I started this journey, my main goal was to "give back" to the field. I've found and used some awesome materials that have made my practice more fun and my planning much easier and I wanted to do the same for other SLPs.  I never would have imagined how close I would have become to other SLP bloggers, but I'm happy to count so many of them as friends!

In fact, a few of us got together and decided to do a Secret Santa gift exchange!  My Secret Santa was Maureen from The Speech Bubble!  Here's what I got:

A gift set from Crabtree & Evelyn in one of my all-time favorite scents - Pomegranate! And...

...How cute is this SLP wreath?!?!  I've seen burlap wreath tutorials on Pinterest and have always wanted to do one!  I was so excited to see how this one made by my crafty Secret Santa came out!  I'm definitely taking this one to work, but I may just need to try to make one for home!

Thank you so much Maureen! I LOVE my gifts!!! <3

I had Jessica from Consonantly Speaking.  If you don't know Jessica, she is a HUGE Lego fan and she's getting married soon!  I found these cute Wedding Legos at Amazon and I thought she and her fiance would get a kick out of them! While searching Amazon, I came across these Speech-ified Legos that I thought were pretty fun too!

Did you do a secret santa exchange at work or with friends? What was your favorite gift (that you got or that you gave)?

Hello, 2014!

Happy New Year!  

I hope everyone had a fantastic ending of 2013 and I wish you nothing but wonderful things for 2014!  If you are back to work this week and need something quick to do with your kiddos, here's a simple worksheet...

First we talked about our time away from school and I asked the kids to tell me about their Christmas (for the ones who celebrate).  Inevitably, this lead to a discussion about their presents, so I had each child tell me about their favorite gift and the reasons they liked the gift.  Finally, they drew a picture of the gift.

Here are some examples: 

I did this with preschool kids, so I wrote in their answers. If you work with older children, you can have them write their own responses. You can download a copy of the worksheet HERE.

Enjoy!

2013 Edublog Awards Nominations

Talk about last minute! Just in time for the midnight EST deadline, here is my Edublog Awards Nomination Post!

• Best individual blog: Playing With Words 365. Katie does such a great job providing information that is useful for both parents and professionals!
• Best group blog: Speechie Freebies. Everyone loves a freebie and this site has a ton!
• Best student blog: Speechy Musings. Such great information and materials that I sometimes forget that Shannon is still a student!
• Best ed tech / resource sharing blog: PrAACtical AAC. This is your one-stop shop for all of your AAC needs.
• Most influential blog post of the year: If Only I Had Superpowers, Dear Prospective Adoptive Parent (I was on my way to grab a link to nominate a different post by CC and ran across this one. I can't believe I had forgotten it because I was very moved by it!)
• Best twitter hashtag: #SLPeeps of course!
• Best free web tool:  Picto4Me. Great for making communication boards!
• Lifetime achievement: Speaking of Speech I believe this was the first speech therapy materials sharing site.

Good luck to all the nominees!!

What's in Your Cart? Linky Party

I hope everyone is enjoying their Thanksgiving break! I know I am! I haven't done anything work or blog related...Until now that is ;)  You probably already know that the big TPT site-wide sale is coming up Monday and Tuesday.  

Today I'm linking up with Jenna over at Speech Room News for her "What's in Your Cart?" Linky Party!

Here's what's in my cart for the big sale:

• Naughty or Nice List Social Skills for Speech Therapy by Whitney of  Let's Talk!
• L Listening Center Power Point by Kristin of Simply Speech
• Christmas Grammar Activities for PK/K by Expressly Speaking
• Winter Themed Speech and Language Packet by Speechy Musings

Now that I've shown you what's in my cart, I want to share some of my recent best sellers:

Seasonal & Thematic Dot Reinforcers: Print out the Christmas and Winter pages and use in conjunction with your trusty artic and language cards.  Here are a few sample pages:

20 Seasonal & Thematic Game Boards: Here's another packet designed to be used to spice up your drill work!

If you're torn between these two, I've placed them in a money-saving bundle...and YES! Bundles are included in this sale!  Check out the Seasonal Open Ended Bundle here.

Last, I wanted to share some of my all-time most popular. These are the items that are best selling and/or most wish-listed:

• Feed the Penguin Articulation Pack, Feed the Penguin Language Pack, and Feed the Penguin Bundle (containing both the Articulation and Language versions) have been consistently popular - even in the summer months!
• Mouse Gets the Cheese: A Following Directions Game is my #1 most downloaded item.
• Out of This World Vocabulary Fun is a companion for the first three beads on the EET strand.
• Receptive Language Bundle: This money-saving bundle contains Mouse Gets the Cheese and my #1 most wish-listed item, Snappy Snapshots (not to mention Greetings from Summer Camp and Receptive Detectives).
• Gingerbread Speech and Language Unit: My #2 most wish-listed item. 

What's on your wishlist???

S...Peachy Feedback Linky

I feel like I haven't written a blog post in a long time.  Here are my excuses reasons for that:  I'm in the middle of writing progress reports. You know how that is!  As if that isn't bad enough, I've also been sick with a cold that just won't go away (and my son and my husband both caught it too).  Also, I feel like this has been my busiest school year yet. I hope to write a post on that in the near future.  Anyway, you know how Nicole from Speech Peeps hosts a monthly S...Peachy Feedback Linky?

Well, I'm a little late to the party (the linky is closed), but I still wanted to participate.  The purpose of this linky is to reward TPT users for leaving feedback that is detailed and helpful to other buyers!  This feedback was left on my Out of This World Vocabulary (An EET companion):

TPT user jztjzt, you won a free product from my TPT store (bundles excluded)! Send me an email at cmanchester57@gmail.com to claim your prize!

If you didn't win my prize this month, head over to Speech Peeps to see if you were the winner for another blog/store!

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?

Book of the Week: Acorns Everywhere!

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

One of the books I'm using this week is "Acorns Everywhere!" by Kevin Sherry.  This is a VERY simple book that I picked up from one of the Scholastic flyers for $1.00 last year. There really aren't a lot of words, so this is a great book for having students "read" the pictures!

We discussed why the squirrel is burying acorns, whether or not students have seen squirrels gathering food in their yards, as well as the emotions of the different animals we see on the pages.  After we were finished, we worked on following directions using acorns (put them in the the cup, give three acorns to Mrs. Smith, put one one your toes, etc.).

In my next sessions with the kids, we used this Roll & Cover Game to target their individual language and articulation goals:

If you'd like a copy of this game, you can download it HERE.

Enjoy!