For the last four or five years, I have made a little garden in my back yard.  I grow tomatoes, zucchini, herbs, cucumbers, peppers, eggplant, garlic, and a variety of lettuce.  Over the past two or three years, my little helpers have actually gotten quite into it.  Today, my five year old was helping me weed the garden, and I realized how many language concepts we were using in an everyday activity.  As we were weeding, he made sure to tell me that he would, "only pick the little ones, not the big ones."  I thought, "wow! We could be working on basic concepts!"  After that, I started thinking about all of the different speech or language skills we could work on as SLPs, and what we could advise parents to work on at home too.  Gardening is a great way to bond as a family, and a great time to take a moment out and just talk without other distractions. Here are some pictures from my garden.  I have pots of some tomatoes, peppers, and flowers. I also have a bi...

I hope everyone is having a great start to their summer!  I know I am loving being home with my boys.  We have been swimming, running around to baseball games, and generally just loving the great weather we have been having here.  In some of our downtime, I started working on a set of activities with a summer theme: Summer Camp Expressive Language Game , Summer Camp Receptive Language Game , and Summer Camp Grammar Game .  These packets would be great to use if you are in a clinic this summer, or doing Extended School Year programming. The first in the set is Summer Camp Expressive Language Game: There is a board game that is used for each packet: There are four sets of cards that focus on specific skills.  The skills include: categorization compare and contrast functions if/then statements  You can pick one set to use with a group of students, or you can differentiate instruction and use separate sets for each student based on their needs. I have included a...

At the end of May, Smarty Ears released a new app called Phono Learning Center .  This app is based on the Hodson Cycles approach which is used specifically for those children who are unintelligible due to a sound-system disorder.  I found this article by Caroline Bowen at Speech-Language-Therapy.com that has a great explanation of the Cycles approach.  Smarty Ears contacted me before the end of the school year to do a review of this app.  I was able to download it and try it out with a few students before the end of the year.  I haven't given it a whole "cycle" yet, but did get some great feedback from my students!  I'm just now sitting down to write this review because, lets face it, now I have some more time!  The end of the year was crazy!   Phono Learning Center (PLC) starts out like most Smarty Ears Apps.  You add players and select participants.  You can import from Therapy Report Center if you use it.  You can select multiple players at a time.   ...

I was recently given the chance to review Prepositions Journey by Virtual Speech Center Inc.  I was so excited!  I have so many students who are currently working on prepositions, and I never feel like I have enough engaging activities to target these goals.  I try to make it fun for my students, but some days I just don't feel creative enough, and out comes the iPad.  This app is a great addition to my iPad!   Prepositions Journey starts like most data collecting apps, by adding and selecting students. Next, you select the category (scene) that you would like to use.  The choices are Lake Camping, Island, and City.  You also select the prepositions that you would like to target.  There are 20 different prepositions to choose from, and you can choose to work on all of them either receptively, or expressively- which I think is totally awesome!  The prepositions included are: in, on, under, next to, in front of, behind, in the back, between, above, below, beside, in the m...

Laura, over at Oh, How Pintearesting!  has started a monthly SLP link up.  This month's theme is Fathers Day (notice the mustaches?).  You can participate in this link up by visiting Laura's blog. Here is what I am up to:  Jamming to : The Black Eyed Peas.  I am trying to find more music to run to, but I always come back to these guys (and girl).  Anyone have some good ideas for music to run to? Unwinding: By running.  Ok, so I haven't been great at this lately, but I am really trying to get back into it.  I've also been spending a lot of time sitting at baseball and soccer fields watching my little guys playing their favorite sports. Needing:   To finish my end of the year reports.  I haven't even started my progress reports for all of my students.  Need to get on that this week!  I am also super excited about all of the great products I snagged in the SLP's Care for OK bundles that I purchased this week.  I need to start printing and laminatin...

On May 20, 2013, a major tornado ripped through the community of Moore, Oklahoma.  Unfortunately the damage was just unthinkable.  24 people lost their lives.  My heart grieves for those families.  In the path of the destruction were two elementary schools.  The students and teachers lost their school, along with all of their valuable tools for learning.  Four of the SLP's in the district lost all of their years worth of speech and language materials.  A large group of SLP bloggers have put together two bundles of activities to raise money for the SLP's in Moore, Oklahoma.  You can read all about this awesome opportunity to help by clicking here:  (Graphic courtesy of Mia owner of Putting Words In Your Mouth)   All of the money from the sale of these bundles goes directly to the speech-language pathologists affected by this disaster.  If you purchase either bundle, you will be helping a fellow SLP as well as snagging some awesome activities for yourself!   I contr...