Love it and List It: Favorite Techonology

So last month's Linky was all about Fluency. If you missed that one, click here to read about all of my fav fluency materials.

March's madness is technology - and basketball, but I'm not a big sports fan so we'll still with technology here at Sweet Speech.

Click to see the other posts on this linky party

I love my iPad. We were really lucky to be able to buy an older first generation iPad from a friend for $100. (Thanks, Jeff!) I love that I didn't pay too much for it so that if it breaks I'm not out a lot of money. I'm not so thrilled that I've maxed out the operating system and many of the new apps I'd like to have are not available to download. SO, I can confidently tell you there will be a new purchase happening here in a few months.

I've read through all the other links and it seems that the iPad is a strong contender for the
"ALL TIME Favorite Techonolgy" award.
I've not been fortunate enough to have access to the SmartBoard for speech therapy, but I've played around with them enough in the classrooms to be more than a little jealous of those of you who do get one in your treatment rooms! I'm also very excited about being back in the "I own an iPhone" club in a few weeks. YAY! I'm really curious about these QR activities I've been reading about online. More on that later...  Since it seems I'm a bit behind on the technology in the classroom game, I'm going to take some time to share a brand of apps that have been amazing for me this school year.

Some of my new favorite not-meant-to-be-speech-therapy-apps-but-actually-are-GREAT-speech-therapy-apps are the games from TocaBoca.

The best money I've spent this school year has been on these apps! 

My preschoolers love the TocaTrain. 

My intermediate school students adore the TocaTeaParty and TocaBirthdayParty. 

I personally enjoyed the challenge presented by the TocaLabs app. 

My gifted artic kiddos would work so hard for just a few minutes with TocaBuilder

and my best friend's little boy begs for TocaHouse, though he's not so keen on doing house chores in real time. ;-)

What's great about these apps is that they're open-ended. There's no objective, no score, no limit to the amount of language you can use to enhance the game play. 

I just had a session this week with the TocaStore app where one of my kiddos with a turn taking skills goal was able to complete the whole game with minimum assistance AND he requested items appropriately, responded to questions in complete sentences and asked for more!! 

SUCCESS!

Most of these games retail in the app store for $2.99.

I use them for reinforcement after the session, eliciting language from preschoolers, cause and effect for my grade schoolers, sequencing, predicting, conversational skills, pragmatics, and so much more. 

Have you tried these out? Which one is your favorite? 

Space Race - Grammar

This is the third posting in the Space Race series. 

Click the pictures below to be taken to the Receptive and Expressive postings.

Today, I'll be sharing the Grammar Section of the Space Race Super Bundle.

This one has just about everything you could want to target including:

• 36 pronoun cards (subjective, objective, possessive and reflexive) + four bonus cards
• 12 irregular verb cards + four bonus cards
• 12 irregular plural cards + four bonus cards
• 36 subject-verb agreement cards with sorting mats for is/are, has/have, was/were + four bonus cards
• 2 token boards for reinforcement

You can find this one in The BonBonSpeecher Store at TN or TpT.

Check in soon for the Social Skills Section of the Space Race Super Bundle

Space Race - Expressive Language

Yesterday I posted the section of the Space Race Super Bundle. If you missed that information, you can go back by clicking on the picture below.

Today I'd like to introduce the Expressive Language section of the Space Race Super Bundle.

Here's what you'll get:

• 6 cards targeting asking each WH question type
• 1 card for each WH question type with suggestions about the kinds of questions your students can ask - I found these to be helpful with my language kids as they has some trouble with this skill
• 18 cards targeting compare/contrast skills
• 4 pocket sized Compare/Contrast Sentence cards
• 10 cards with an action the students can describe/retell
• 12 cards with multiple meaning word to be used in a sentence
• 1 "Blast Off!" Board for reinforcement

You can find the Expressive Language section of Space Race at The BonBonSpeecher Store on TpT and TN now, or you can wait until Saturday for the bundle. 

Tomorrow I'll be adding the Grammar section!

Space Race - Receptive Language

If your caseload and scheduling problems are similar to mine, you've noticed that the only time you can happily pull students for treatment is during science and social studies...but wait.
That's not really true, is it? 

My science and social studies teachers are not always happy to have our shared students consistently miss out on their classes in exchange for speech therapy. I've always told my teachers that I love to incorporate curriculum into therapy sessions and that if they'd send me vocab lists and worksheets I'm happy to make those into therapy stimuli whenever possible. How many teachers have taken me up on this offer? Maybe three in over three years of therapy. But, I could see that my language disordered students were having issues in science class especially.

Have you reviewed a science textbook lately? No? Well, let me tell you what you'll find. Ready? High level language skills, reading/auditory comprehension, comparing and contrasting, predicting and inferring, multisyllabic words, prefixes and suffixes...
In short - 

It's all speech, baby!

So, I've begun using the textbooks to inspire me. 

Introducing... 

Click here to go to The BonBonSpeecher Store at TN

This one is designed to target vocabulary and speech language skills at the fourth and fifth grade levels using the Pearson texts.

Eventually the whole bundle will include all of the units pictured below.

But tonight, I'm only publishing the Receptive Language portion.

Click here to go to The BonBonSpeecher Store at TpT

Here's what you'll get:

• 4 pocket sized question reminder cards
• 6 cards targeting each WH question type
• 6 cards targeting one step directions
• 6 cards targeting two step sequential directions
• 6 cards targeting three step sequential directions
• 6 cards targeting conditional directions
• 10 cards with short passages and questions for listening/reading comprehension
• 10 cards with actions and 3-4 steps that can be put in order for sequencing goals
• 12 category cards where students listen to the items and name the category
• 1 "Blast Off!" Board for reinforcement

That's a whole lotta bang! You can find this first section with images of the cards and a preview of the file at The BonBonSpeecher Store on TpT and TN now, or you can wait until Saturday for the bundle. 

Milestone: Twitter Official

I'm a little behind in the world of social media, so you'll have to excuse my excitement over the breaking news here at Sweet Speech.

I'm on Twitter!!

You can follow my by clicking on the birdie button to the right or by clicking HERE.

It's still a work in progress so stay tuned for updates and such.

How are you using Twitter? Got any tips to share with beginners like me?

Fluency Linky Party

This is my first ever Linky Party blog posting!
AND it's all about one of my favorite areas of Speech-Language Pathology - 

FLUENCY!

So without further ado...ahem...

"These are a few of my fluency things..."

1. Focus on Fluency by Kristin Chemela at SuperDuperInc.

If you're new to the SLP world and are looking to make an investment I'd suggest the Focus on Fluency kit. You can find it at SuperDuperInc.com

The kit has everything you'll need to begin a fluency treatment program with elementary and middle school students. The website says grades 2-8, but I've adapted it and used it successfully with younger students as well.

Benefits: 

• The high quality materials are all there, nicely laminated and contained in the box
  (which has pull out drawers!). 
• The instruction book is easy to implement and comes with a CD for easy reproduction. 
• The icons are simple and easy for the students to remember.

Drawbacks: 

• The cost of the kit is a large factor, especially for those of us with small (or even non-existent) materials budgets, but that is why it's an investment.

I am not all about reinventing the wheel, so if you'd like more info and lots of picture previews for this product go and see Jenna at Speech Room News.

2. Easy Does It for Fluency (Preschool/Primary and Intermediate) by Barbara Roseman and Karin Johnson at Linguisystems

These books are also great resources, especially if you work with the little ones at the pre-school level. 

The Preschool/Primary version takes special care to discuss and provide suggestions on how to incorporate phonological processing therapy with fluency therapy. There are also great ideas on how to help parents become involved with fluency therapy at home, since that's where our little ones spend most of their time.

The Intermediate level is designed for grades 1-7, so this edition will cover a wide range of students on your caseload.  That's always nice, especially with fluency materials since you never know when a student will appear with fluency needs. This one book could give you everything you need to target all your students' fluency goals from analyzing their speech to desensitizing all the way up to maintaining.

Benefits: 

• Both sets come with very informational manuals and materials books.
• The materials books include a CD for easy reproduction. 
• Two levels are appropriate for target audiences.

Drawbacks: 

• There aren't many hands on, ready to go activities with these. They will require a bit of prep time on your part, but overall the efforts will be well worth the energy. 

3. Fluency Scenes (Elementary and Adolescent) from Linguisystems

These are card sets with colorful and detailed pictures on one side and prompts on the other side. The two levels present age-appropriate social situations which I find incredibly helpful with my older students who are "too cool for school" - you know the ones I mean!

Benefits: 

• Cards are laminated and durable. 
• Cards are grouped together to target stages of fluency therapy from establishing fluency to transfer and maintenance. 
• The cards are really all you'd need to complete a whole fluency session which is a nice bonus for those of us who travel.
• The pictures scenes could be used in mixed groups to target language goals (WH questions, problem solving, inferencing/predicting) and articulation as well. 

Drawbacks: 

• The cards come in a nice vinyl folder, but I'd prefer a box for storage.

***THIS JUST IN*** 

Linguisystems offers a Member's Only Sale twice a year. Membership is FREE and once you've signed up you'll get 20% off your purchase during the sale. Guess what, Speechie Friends?   It's SALE TIME! 

4. "Speech Guy" at TheraSimplicity

I've not seen a lot of people posting about TheraSimplicity and that's a shame! I first discovered them at an ASHA convention years ago. They have an amazing site FULL of beautiful resources. The one that I've used for fluency therapy is "Speech Guy."

Isn't he cute?!

There are multiple files for "Speech Guy" including his pal "Speech Girl" and multi-cultural options as well. Each one has a full color option or a black and white version. There are also blank bodies with the speech helper pieces on a separate page so you can have the students cut and paste them. 

I printed one for a student in my first year doing therapy. I laminated the pages and put Velcro on the back of each piece to make it interactive (and reusable). I would love to show you a picture of it, but my husband and I are in the middle of a pack-out to move back home from overseas, so there's no telling where it's located! I promise I'll upload a picture when I find it.

When I contacted TheraSimplicity for permission to use "Speech Guy" in this post they were so helpful and generous. They want you all to have one and gave me some great links to share with you. 

Click HERE to go to the website where you can 

- Download a pdf version of the Speech Guy and other samples

- Watch 2-3 minute videos on the basics of TheraSimplicity

- Create a 14 day trial which will allow you to print up to 10 items of your choice

Sounds great right? But here's the best part! 

If you use the code "sweetspeech" by April 1st
(no foolin' here) you can have a full year's access to TheraSimplicity for $49! 

That's a small price to pay for all the customized materials you can create. I'm pretty sure I'd have paid that just for Speech Guy and his friends! So don't miss out. Check out the free trial and I promise you'll be hooked!

Thanks for reading all this. I did warn you that Fluency therapy is my favorite! There are loads more resources and links to follow out there. Get on over to the linky and see what you can find.