Fun Speech and Language Activities for the Car!

Are you planning a road trip during Spring Break?  Does is seem like you spend hours in the car every week driving kids to school, sports, appointments, etc.?  Here are some fun activities for the car with special speech and language twists:

• I Spy - A classic passing-the-time game.  Try mixing it up by spying categories of items, objects that start with a specific sound, or items based on function
• Speech & Language Twist: If your child is working on pronouncing certain sounds, try looking for items with that sound in the beginning, middle, or end of the word.

• Scavenger Hunt - This will take some prep work before your trip.  Put together a list of things you might see along the way and have your child check them off as you go.
• Speech & Language Twist: Don't forget to add adjectives and verbs to your scavenger hunt.  For example, have your kids look for something shiny, flat, or round and someone who is eating, someone who is singing, and something that is flying.  

• License Plate Search - How many different states can you find?  Keep track with a checklist or printed map.  Count how many of each state you can spot and see which one has the most. 
• Speech & Language Twist: Discuss the license plate design and talk about why that picture or saying was chosen.

• Find the Alphabet  - Look for the letters of the alphabet, in order from A-Z, on signs, billboards, cars, or anything passing by.  Take turns being in charge of different letters or see who can find one first.
• Speech & Language Twist: Don't just look for the letters, look for words that start will the letter.  You might have to get creative to cover all the letters.  Can you spot a Quacking duck or a Zipping car?

What's your favorite road trip game? Share it with us in the comments section below!

~Kimberly

SLP Terms and Acronyms: Understanding Speech-Language Evaluation and Progress Reports

SLP Terms and Acronyms: 

Understanding Speech-Language Evaluation and Progress Reports

Evaluation and progress reports can be tough to understand if the terms used to describe speech, language, feeding, and social delays, disorders, and concerns are unfamiliar to the reader.  Here is a list of my most commonly used terms in these reports as a pediatric SLP to help you understand the nature of the pathology and its treatment. 

AAC: stands for Augmentative and Alternative Communication.  Candidates for AAC include non-verbal children and individuals, those with degenerative diseases, and for aiding or replacing spoken language.  AAC can be low-tech like communication boards and PECS (Picture Exchange Communication System) or high-tech using a specialized device or program on an iPad.

Alveolar ridge: is the bumpy area of the hard palate behind the front teeth.  The alveolar ridge is often referenced in articulation therapy when teaching tongue tip placement for /d, l, n, s, t, z/.

Apraxia or CAS: Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS) is a motor speech disorder which occurs when the brain cannot coordinate the movements necessary to produce consistent articulation of speech sounds

Expressive language: using words (or AAC) to communicate needs, wants, ideas, and feelings.  This also refers to how well one is able to follow the rules of language (like including past tense endings on verbs, plurals, put words in order to make a complete sentence.)

Oral hypersensitivity: can occur when a child has difficulty tolerating, chewing, or swallowing certain textures, flavors, or temperatures.

Phoneme: means sound.  When you see slash marks around a letter (like /s/) it means I am talking about the phoneme /s/ sound (actually sounds like /ess/).   For example /th/ is really one phoneme, although it is two letters.

Phonological process:  is a pattern of errors that children produce to simplify language as they are learning.  Some patterns are typical (like reduplication which happens when a young child says “baba” for “bottle”) and then fade as a child’s speech develops.   When processes do not resolve on their own, intervention may be necessary to help the child catch up with peers. 

Receptive language: means understanding others and following directions

Speech: means verbal communication.   Articulation, voice, and fluency/stuttering therapy fall under this category.

SLP:  Speech-Language Pathologist, one who provides treatment intervention for a variety of speech, language, feeding/swallowing, voice, fluency, and social therapy.

Keep in mind that these are the terms that come up most often for me, this is not an exhaustive list.  There are countless others.  If you’re unsure or unfamiliar with any of these terms as they pertain to your child, I encourage you to ask what it means.  You’re welcome to leave your question in the comment area of this post if you’re unable or uncomfortable asking your SLP.

St. Patrick's Day and a birthday!

To start I want to wish Paige, one of our speech therapists, a very happy birthday tomorrow!  We all enjoy working with her and hope that she has a wonderful day.

I really enjoy how many events and activities that go on in our area and especially around holidays.  St. Patrick's day is coming up and there is no shortage of fun events to attend.  New activities and events are a great way to foster new language and build vocabulary.  Below is a great article detailing family events for the holiday.

Go Green: Your Guide to the Best St. Patrick's Day Events

To continue in the holiday festivities I will also post a cute craft that I found on Pinterest.  It has the potential for a lot of language opportunities!  Please see the link below the image.

Rainbow Binoculars

You could target practicing specific sounds as you make the craft or target language building by playing "I Spy" with the binoculars.  Either way many children love to look and search for things!

I hope everyone enjoys the holiday.

-Cassee

Mark your calendar……..WAAAlk for Autism on April 2, 2016

Saturday, April 2, 2016

Come join us at the Marina Park in Kirkland for Washington Autism Alliance & Advocacy’s WAAAlk for Autism! Rock Therapeutic Services will be a resource booth at this wonderful upcoming event. We would love to see you there!

WHEN & WHERE?

Saturday, April 2, 2016

Marina Park

25 Lakeshore Plaza Drive

Kirkland, WA 98033

10:00am – 2:00pm

WHO and WHAT?

“Everyone! WAAAlk for Autism is a day for our community to come together to honor and recognize the 2,800 families and 12,000 individuals that WAAA has helped Statewide. It is a day to celebrate the unique gifts that each individual and family touched with Autism brings into our lives.”

HOW?

“We are gearing up for our WAAAlk for Autism event coming up on April 2^nd, 2016 with our goal to raise $100,000 so WAAA can continue to help and support families and individuals touched by Autism throughout our state. Each Champion and their team will set their own goal in honor of the families that WAAA continues to support.”

To join a team, form a team, and for more information visit:

http://www.washingtonautismadvocacy.org/updates/waaalkforautism/

For more resources check out the following links:

http://www.asha.org/public/speech/disorders/Autism/

http://www.featwa.org/

http://www.autismsocietyofwa.org/

https://www.autismspeaks.org/