Holiday Pacing Sticks

'Tis the season for giving so I created this little Holiday gift for you! These December Holiday Pacing Sticks are a fun addition to your therapy room. They can be easily assembled by simply laminating or gluing onto paint stirrers or giant craft sticks.  

Ideas for use:

•Have the child travel down the stick as (s)he says each word in a self-generated sentence.

•Have the child segment syllables, touching a picture for each syllable.

•Have the child segment sounds within a word as (s)he touches a picture to represent each sound.

•Have the child travel down the pacing stick saying the stimulus word each time (s)he touches a picture.

Alternate Uses:

•Use a clothespin on the stick to track “points” or turns taken within a session.

•Use the stick as positive reinforcement to recognize when a targeted social skill is observed in a session.

•Use small pieces of play dough to smash down along the stick in lieu of pointing or moving a clothespin.

To Assemble, print image pages on yardstick. They are offered in both color or B&W.

At this point, you can then select to use the speech sticks in various manners. You may choose to:

1) Laminate them as is, cut them into strips

2) Glue or Mod Podge the pacing strips onto paint stirrers or wide craft sticks for extra stability. Then paint an extra layer of glue/Mod Podge over the strips to seal them or use clear spray paint. This is personally my preferred method for long term use. I have had great success with having paint stirrers donated when I explained that I was using them with my students. (Extra tip: Home Depot also offers blank paint stirrers for purchase. A 10 pack costs $0.98).

3) Laminate the strips and apply Velcro to the back of the strips and to paint stirrers so that you can use the paint stirrers for extra stability but you can switch out what strips you adhere to them. I find that attaching one Velcro dot to each end of the strip does the trick!

Thank you for stopping by! I hope that you enjoyed my little holiday gift to you! Please feel free to share this with a colleague if you think it may be useful for them so they can download their own copy I hope that you enjoy a magical holiday season!

P.S. If you like these, you may also love my Articulation Speech Stick Bundle or Sight Word Sticks Craftivity Bundle. (Can you tell I like an alternative to playing 52 card pickup with cards?). You can find them by clicking on the photos below.

 

Top 10 Playlist of ASHA

As I sat on the plane on the way home from the ASHA convention, I reflected on my trip, listening to music and hence this playlist was born. It contains some songs that you know and may some introduce some that are new to you that you will grow to love. Whether you were in Philadelphia with the over 16,000 (wow!) attendees or living vicariously from afar, I hope that you enjoy this playlist.

I Am by Vinyl Hearts

Be you. Embrace the unique gifts that you bring to the field of speech-language pathology. Embrace them and share them with others. We want to learn from you.

Man in the Mirror by the Glee Cast

Change begins with you. Take one tip or trick that you learned and take it from there. The first step is the hardest. Take it.  If you were unable to be at the convention, think of the last professional development you attended and actively use something that you learned. Use evidence based practice to advance your practice.

Brave by Sara Barielles

Advocate, advocate, advocate. What is really best practice and will advance your student/client’s progress? Does practicing in a closet restrict the treatment you can provide? Are there programmatic interventions you could use your communication expertise to develop or model that would address the needs of your student body?  Can you advocate for changes that would lead to increased accuracy in appropriate referrals/identification through dynamic assessment? What would you want for your own child? Be brave and take the steps you need to be the best SLP version of you.

Imagine by John Lennon

Not only can you make a difference, you will. You are the voice for those who need you the most. What do they want you to say? Imagine the possibilities when we all come together. I met so many beautiful people this week and felt the positive energy. That energy is exactly the energy the world needs. Keep it going.

Lean on Me by Club Nouveau

Collaborate with your colleagues. Sure, we all need to vent sometimes, I get it. Next time someone vents to you and needs you to be their person take it as a problem solving opportunity. Don’t simply commiserate. Create a positive outcome.

Human by Christina Perry

Take care of you. Put on your oxygen mask so you can help others. For me, this is not an innate quality but one I need to make a conscious effort toward. I feel very fortunate to have crossed paths with Sharon Rice of speechceu who is helping SLPs take care of themselves as well as their student/client through evidence based continuing education courses. 

Stompa by Serena Ryder

We work hard, often far beyond our scheduled hours. In this week alone, I had 4 evaluations, 7 IEPs and progress reports for my entire caseload before traveling to attend the ASHA convention. We need to refuel, recharge and reenergize. The ASHA convention offers opportunities to cut loose with those who get you and what you do.

Dreamer by Elizaveta

Think big. Dream big. Your biggest regrets likely aren't what you did do but rather what you put on the back burner for too long. Push your limits. Even if you just dip your toe in the pond, you will create a ripple.

We Are Going To Be Friends by Jack Johnson

The connections made at the ASHA  convention are priceless. The ASHA convention offers countless opportunities to make new friends, establish deeper connections with those you know from afar and opportunities to reminisce with old dear friends. 

Send Me On My Way by Rusted Root

I remember my first ASHA convention vividly and fondly. It was fall of 1997, I was a bright eyed college student, starstruck in Boston as our profession came to life before my eyes. Your first ASHA convention is one that you will always remember. Meeting so many students who are just making their way into the field and learning from the research that is executed due to the countless hours of data analysis by graduate students turned SLP warms my heart as we send the next generation of SLPs on their way. 

Now as much as I would love to rock it out some more, I do believe that a lullaby is in this tired SLP's future! 

Rock on my fellow SLPs!

SLP Vinyl Label Application

Thank you for stopping by and visiting my booth at the ASHA convention!  There is something to be said about the energy of so many SLPs in the same place at the same time, isn't there? I'd love to hear how you've put your new SLP vinyl label to use and what you learned at the ASHA Convention this year. Feel free to comment below, email me or tag me on social media with a photo of your new SLP swag so we can keep in touch!

Enjoy the rest of your trip and safe travels home!

Using the Seesaw App in Speech Therapy

What is Seesaw you ask? Seesaw is a free app that gives parents a peek into their child's therapy session and involves them in the process. I use Seesaw to communicate with parents as well as to archive student present levels of performance. It allows me to capture a photo or video of the student in action or add a pdf or link. I am honestly just scratching the surface with all that this app has to offer. Students are eager to show off what they know. Of course, proceed with caution: remain sensitive to student privacy and permission to be photographed/filmed. In my speech therapy sessions, I am careful to film only the student that the video/photo will be filed under. For example, if I have three students in a group, I will allow each student a moment during the session to film their individual segment.

What do I love about it?

• It gives parents immediate access to their child's learning. Parents can comment on their child's photo/video if they would like (and you permit it in the settings). This past week, my students were eager to participate in Bottle Flipping for Articulation and Language. I was able to film a segment of our session which showed the parents how the students were targeting their speech/language goals and the students were then more than eager to take home their completed bottle and target page to practice at home. The video modeled prompts or cues that parents could use at home to help their child carryover what they had learned to the home environment in a fun, motivating way.
• It archives student progress and allows for a great reference point to analyze growth. Video a student practicing articulation in the beginning of the year and then compare the end of the year. You may be amazed at the progress that you see.
• Teachers can have access to their student learning as well! Teachers can see what their students are working on in speech and encourage carryover to the classroom setting.
• You can add photo, video, drawings, links, etc. from your device or students can use shared devices to scan your class QRCode and upload it to their account.

How do I set it up?

• First, you will need to download the Seesaw Class app and create an account. Parents will download the Seesaw parent app.   Seesaw is available on iOS, Android devices, Kindle Fire and Chromebooks.
• Next, you will create a class. I recommend creating one class to represent your caseload or one class per building that you serve. I initially created 2 classes K-3 and 4-6 but have found that is not really necessary and a bit of an inconvenience to toggle between the two.
• Under Manage Class, you will want to change the default setting so that students can only see their own work. Classroom teachers may allow students to view each other's work to comments, etc. but we need to remain sensitive to confidentiality with the nature of the service that we provide our students.
• While in the class settings, you may also want to change the setting to allow parents to view their child's work. 
• Add your students to your class. You can paste your caseload list directly into the app to avoid manually entering each one.
• Invite parents to join. You can do this in 2 different ways. You can email the parents directly or print off individualized QRCode pages that the app generates for each student. I send home the QRCode pages so I could simply make a copy of them to have as a reference if someone needed another copy. 

What can I add?

• Photos/Videos taken within the Seesaw app
• Photos/Videos from your camera roll
• Drawings 
• pdf
• links
• notes

If you would like more information or tutorials, you can find more information here. The Seesaw site illustrates many more ways that the app can be utilized, such as in formative assessment, a recordable whiteboard, student blogging and more. If you use Seesaw and have any ideas that you would like to share, I would love to hear them!

UPDATE: See what other benefits I have witnessed after using Seesaw for two years!