Puerto Rican vs. Mexican Spanish

This will probably be a semi-short post but I wanted to take a second and comment on something interesting I have been looking into the past week; that is, the importance of identifying the home dialect of any non-English speaking clients. You know it's important to identify whether the child is bilingual, but in the case of many languages, dialects MATTER!

An example: I recently started seeing a new 4-year old friend in Spanish who had goals written for plurals. In informal conversation and play, I noticed final /s/ omissions and some gliding (/l/ for /r/), as well. Ironically, in some instances she used the plural form appropriately and in others did not. After speaking with her mother, I noticed that the mother was also not only deleting final /s/ in some instances but was demonstrating other atypical sound substitutions, like /l/ for /r/.

Hold on a second here. "Where is your family from originally?" I asked. "Puerto Rico."

Ah HA!

Okay people. Here's the thing. Phonemic inventories and sound patterns can and do often vary across dialects. After going home and doing a little research and digging into my old linguistics textbooks, I realized that this child probably doesn't need a goal for plurals (but I will give a receptive ID test to check for comprehension). She is just a speaker of Puero Rican Spanish. I don't see many of these on my caseloads, as most of my kiddos speak the Mexican dialect.

Here are some helpful sound distinctions of Puerto Rican Spanish to be aware of:

Although this rang a bell for me from undergrad I definitely needed a refresher! What kinds of dialectical variations of Spanish are you finding on your caseload?

Scrambled Sentences! {no prep therapy}

If you're like me, you love therapy activities that require minimal to no prep, especially on Fridays! I wanted to share one of my favorite go-to language activities called "Scrambled Sentences". All you need is a piece of paper and a pen!

This activity can be used to target the following goals:

- Sentence structure; (duh)

- Judging whether a sentence is grammatically correct or not;

- Expanding basic sentences using modifiers and the like;

- Tense and other parts of grammar;

- Sight word recognition; AND

- Articulation practice depending on your choice of words

This activity works best for children kindergarten and up who at least are beginning to decode words and utilize sight words for reading. The first-grader I use this activity with loves using his emerging literacy skills and I will usually prompt non-frequent words after allowing him to attempt to decode the word initially. You could also do this activity using Boardmaker pictures cut up and scrambled for non-readers. :)

All you do is simply:

1) Write a sentence on your paper containing either language or articulation targets and then tear off the words one by one. 

2) Allow the kiddo to "shake, shake, shake!" them up in their hand and then let them re-order the words into a complete sentence. In the picture above I used sentences to help my friend describe his day at school using past tense words. After we order the sentence correctly we usually read it through 1-3 more times.

That's it! It's like a puzzle you can make on the fly and it really gets kid's brains thinking on multiple levels. Hope someone else can make this activity work for them!

Things I Swore I'd Do With My "Free" Time Tonight

*Taps mic* Is this thing on? *squeal*

Oh. Alright well I guess you guys can still hear me! Google has been sending me pleasant emails notifying me that I'm still acquiring new readers to this blog despite my absence and well, I'm flattered. And slightly embarrassed. I swore I'd write a new blog post soon. I swore I'd make and take pictures of my new creation, "Fall Choice Trees", to use with my kiddos in therapy and to show you guys here.

It's a set of leaves with various "choices" in both English and Spanish kids can add, remove, or choose from their "tree". It's cute. It's autumn-y. It's...something I still haven't gotten around to doing.

Not that anyone is dying for any explanation, but recently not only have I moved but I am recently engaged to the love of my life and am a bride-to-be!:) So excite. 

Surprise surprise!

I actually painted the nails on only my left hand to take this picture. (No shame.)

Mr. L and the soon-to-be Mrs. L :)

 And of course, what's an engagement without a showing of the best wedding movie ever, "Father of the Bride". So we did that.

Tonight though, I told myself I'd come home from work and DO something. AKA, more work. HA.

This included the following:

- Do the dishes in the sink! My fiance lovingly packed most of it for me while I was gone, except for the silverware, which when I asked him why not, he claimed because it's "miscellaneous". I love him and he's hilarious.

- Fill out the rest of my August paperwork and send emails!

- Hang my degrees up on the wall in the new office!

- Take a shower and re-apply my fake tan to diminish the appearance that I haven't been to the gym in weeks! Which I haven't.

- Look up wedding venues!

- Re-paint my nails!

- Spend time cuddling with Mr. L! (the only thing that got done). 

Amazingly, writing this blog post wasn't on my mental list, but it got done, too. I've had a migraine all day and well, it's felt pretty good to get words out on this page and shout "hi" over the canyon of the SLP blogging world. Hi. Thanks for sticking around if you're reading this. And I hope the new school year is treating you well!

Stay tuned for some new SLP posts. I've got content, I swear.

I can't be alone here- what did YOU swore you'd do tonight that didn't get done? I promise not to tell.

Scoopin' Up Final Consonants! {+ cat-assisted therapy organization}

Hello, all!

It's been a minute, I know. I'm sure you guys are all caught up in summer-time therapy as am I! What have I been up to exactly? Well for one, I have been organizing the mountain of therapy activities, worksheets, and resources in my bedroom. It isn't the most convenient set-up, but hopefully in a few months here I will have a second bedroom to transition into an office. Until then, I work/sleep/watch Gilmore Girls all in the same place.

Ava, my kitty cat, helping me organize my Spanish articulation worksheets.

How are cute are these folders?:) 

Part of organizing my Spanish articulation materials was challenging in that I had to re-research all of my Spanish phonemes and organize them in order of typical acquisition, which was confusing as I usually have English on the brain. 

At one point in going through all the paperwork, I found the therapy plan I wrote from my first day as an SLPA back in 2011. I had a moment thinking about how far I've come. Also thinking about how much more prepared I was back then, haha. 

Last week my theme for therapy was ICE CREAM!:) 

We talked about related verbs (melt, freeze, lick, etc.), watched Youtube videos of ice cream melting, and used my new "Scoopin' Up Final Consonants!" packet! 

Find it HERE on TpT:) 

I created this packet because I have a couple kids with several phonological processes right now, namely final consonant deletion across multiple sound classes. They are able to focus on suppressing one final consonant in a given phrase but when multiple final consonants come into play something gets left out. I created an activity where the kids can combine words with various final sounds and then pronounce them one after the other in a phrase structure ("On this cone...") with increasing speed to aid in development of motor planning. 

The packet contains stimulus pictures for phonemes /n/, /t/, and /k/ on vanilla, strawberry, and chocolate ice cream scoops. The stimulus pictures range from 1-3 syllables for the greatest variety of targets and difficulty. 

Overall, there are three parts to the packet:

1) Auditory Discrimination: 

    The packet comes with 3 sorting mats for phonemes /n/, /k/, and /t/, which you can see above. I mixed all     the stimulus pictures up and then produced each word and asked my kiddo to identify the final sound by       adding it the correct cone. I also purposefully deleted final consonants in several of my own productions to     see if my kiddo could catch it to help foster self-monitoring skills.

2) Production Practice: 

    When all the cones were finished, we drilled all the words at phrase level using the cones. Then, my kiddo    received his own "final consonant cone" for which he requested ice cream scoops from all different final     

   sounds to glue to his paper. After he was finished, he "read" his entire cone while self-monitoring for final 

   sounds in connected speech.

3) Pattern Practice:

    There is an additional worksheet that includes 4 cones that have various ice cream scoop "patterns"         

    (pink, white, pink, what comes next?) that the kids can complete and then produce the colors of the               scoops in order for more motor planning practice. 

My kiddo had a lot of fun writing the final consonant in each word on each scoop as he went to help prompt himself. :)

I also used this packet for my language kiddos in that we worked on naming each stimulus picture/scoop, requesting them to glue to our ice cream cones, using expanded language to describe objects, talk about preferred flavors, etc. It's just an all-around win in my book in that I can take it to nearly all my sessions and make it work.

That being said, I am having a FLASH SALE on this packet right now along with my Summer "On the Road Again: Beach Edition Activities for Artic and Language" in my TpT store until the end of the day tomorrow! 
That means you can get both of these great packets for only .80 each and have activities for next 2 weeks ready to go. :)

I'd love for you to check them out!

What products are you loving for summer? Did anyone else utilize an ice cream theme?:)

Rise & Grind {+ summer multipurpose "Go-Fish" freebie}

Hello, hello. Wakey wakey! It's Thursday and we only have one more day left this week; almost there!

I literally have 15 minutes to type this before I have to start getting ready to be out the door for sessions so here was yesterday in a nutshell.

I did 7 sessions and spent the morning starting to organize my ish at home. Which consists of about a bazillion worksheets and resource materials that are finally starting to have a place in their own labeled file folders, making life way easier for me.

Protocols and artic materials.

Soon enough, as it always happens, I ran out of time and jolted for the door, where I had some new stickers, a PLS-5 Spanish and my favorite chocolate chip, bunny-shaped graham crackers by Annie's Organics waiting for me. I literally shove these in my mouth as I'm driving around town. 

Today I have 6 kiddos and a lot of different goals to target; that's why I made these new multi-purpose Summer "Go Fish" cards. You can target color recognition, bilabial/alveolar/velar letter and sound recognition (or letter recognition), "do" questions, social interaction skills, blah blah blah. And I made 'em free in my TpT if you'd like to give 'em a try! Let me know how they work out for you. Click the pic below to find them in my store. 

Multi-Purpose Summer "Go Fish" Cards

That's all I got for ya today! Stay cool out there. 

- LD

Sank/Sunk, Whatever

Okay I'm back for a second post of the day with a really easy activity and FREE printable you can do to work on summertime verbs and past tense!

Sometimes you get really excited about an activity and then begin second-guessing it completely, like I did today. Whew. Dodged a bullet there.

The game is basically the whole "throw stuff in a bucket and see whether it sinks or floats" situation, and very simple to tote around.

All you'll need is:

A bucket
Water
A "surprise" bag filled with various age-appropriate toys; I included balls of different weights, cars, plastic eggs, pennies, etc.

I first introduced the visuals (flashcards included in the download) for "sank" and "floated" and explained the difference, how some things stay at the top of the water and some go to the bottom. We talked about how generally things that are heavy will sink and things that are lighter will float. Which led me to a very philosophical question...am I holding on to things that are too heavy that one day may cause me to sink? 

Alright, LD. Let's take a moment. Refocus.

Anyways, my kids thought it was hilarious to drop things into the bowl and pull them back out while getting their hands and clothes a little wet (which I attempted to minimize). I mostly focused on language scripting with my little ones such as "put it in", or with a more advanced kiddo, "I put it in the bowl." I also let them play in the water with the object and just have fun while exploring the different properties going on in there.

For my oldest kid (who is exiting kindergarten), we filled in the following worksheet and then read each sentence back. He loved being able to spell several of the words independently (car, ball, etc.) and then it was great to work on sight words/sound correspondences as part of targeting past tense for my own purposes. Triple/quadtruple win!

Grab the visuals and sentence structuring worksheet for free HERE in my TpT store! 

*Updated June 3rd to include Spanish versions of both the worksheet and visuals!*

And just for the record, it's definitely "sank". 

Guess Who's Back, Back Again

It's not Eminem. It's me!

Yes, I know you can hardly believe your screen but it is I, LD, CCC-SLP, coming to you in the flesh...in the form of a blog post. I took a self-imposed blog vacation because simply I was burned out. And that's okay, and to be honest I don't feel bad about it. As all of you home-health therapists know, end-of-the-month is a little bit cray. Here are some of the things I have been doing therapy-wise lately:

Watermelon Week
- Classic color, cut/glue seeds to a watermelon slice found on Google images;
- Integrated language and fine motor activity of scooping watermelon "seeds" from a bag using a spoon and walking them across the room to put them in a bowl without spilling them;
- Language activities related to "Mouse's First Summer", in which they eat a giant slice of watermelon.

During one session, I experienced this little gem:

"Uh oh! What did she do?"

"She's drowning!" 

Lol I mean let's not get ahead of ourselves, I'm not sure the situation is that serious.

Other than that I've been piecing together the most random activities, from using alphabet puzzles to target final consonant deletion by sorting them into groups of final sounds, to frantically searching for Barney songs online during a session on my phone to quiet a screaming child. It's been fun.

I also put together a new all-in-one articulation and language packet for the Summer! Rather than re-state myself completely, here's what I had to say about it on TpT:

On the Road Again! (Beach Edition)

This summertime speech packet is part of a vacation series! In this "Beach Edition", you'll receive 10 pages of easy-to-implement themed activities for preschool and elementary including:

- Visuals for transportation/locations: "what", "where", and "how" questions;- "What Should I Pack?" cut/paste game for categories, wh- questions, different/same/sorting, attributes, negatives;

- "Beach Ball Past Tense Flashcards" for regular/irregular verbs related to playing with beach balls (easy functional activity) along with matching for colors or requesting using 1-2 attributes in a Go-Fish-style game;

- "Shell Search"- Using a shovel for a "viewfinder", kids can search for shells in the sand and then produce their target word the number of X pictured on the shell;

- Cut/Paste Bucket for corresponding cut/paste to "Shell Search"; provides choices for the child to analyze their own speech and need for prompting such as: "I feel like using my speech sounds was ___ easy ___ a little hard ____ tough today." Great for /sh/ kiddos, obviously. :)"Shell Search" can also be used as a simple cut/paste activity. I recommend laminating it, however, if it will not be used in that fashion.

Stay tuned for the "Camping Edition" coming soon!:)

Yes, I was quite excited upon putting together the packet. Hence the exclamation marks. But for real, this packet will stretch me all week and I hope at least one of you can get some use out of it, too.

In non-speech news, I have been:

- Working out more frequently. I just joined FitFusion.com which is a subscription-based service that is essentially Netlfix for workouts. And I love it. All of Jillian Michael's workout DVDs are there, including her new "1-Week Shred." I did the strength workout for the first time last night and it kicked my ass.

- Eating enchiladas like they're going out of style. I just learned how to make them. I won't shut up about them. Ask my roommate. 

Grass-fed beef enchiladas and a very frozen margarita. My manifesto.

- Enjoying these screen caps/quotes from "How To Lose a Guy in 10 Days". One of my all-time favorite movies that I would integrate more in daily conversations if I could.

- Feeling this tweet. Even though the handle "The God Light" is a little much.

And that's all I got. For now. :) Have a great week, ya'll.