Speech and Language Kids Podcast

Do you think you could go a full month without prepping any activities for therapy?

Would you like to try?

December is a notoriously busy month and usually our clients and students are all zany with that “pre-holiday” energy.

So how about this year, you give yourself some slack?

We’re doing a no-prep challenge this year and it’s going to change the way you look at therapy!

You can listen to the full podcast episode below:

Don’t worry, I have everything you need to make this easier!

Inside The Hub, I’ll give you…

Click Here to Join The Hub

Free plans available!

The post No-Prep December Challenge! I Challenge You to Do Less appeared first on Speech And Language Kids.

Your students come into your therapy space and they know what to do.

They grab their speech folders from the bin by the door.

They walk to the table and sit down.

They open their folders and get out their practice page.

And they start practicing their skill quietly to themselves.

While everyone is coming in and getting settled, you have a few minutes to walk around and make sure everyone is practicing correctly.

You give a few redirections and corrections to help them get it right.

Sound like a dream?

Well, today I’m going to show you how to set up speech folders for your own effortless speech therapy sessions!

You can listen to the full podcast episode below:

HINT: Our No-Prep Therapy Kits inside The Hub are perfect for this and will allow you to plan once for weeks of therapy!

Need product recommendations? See my recommended files, boxes, carts, etc. inside The Hub.

Are you ready to set up your speech folders?

I have everything you need inside The Hub:

Click Here to Join The Hub

Free plans available!

The post Set up a Folder System for Effortless Speech Therapy Sessions appeared first on Speech And Language Kids.

If you’re a speech-language pathologist, SLPA, SALT or some other alphabet soup doing speech therapy with kids…

And you’re stressed out…

And overwhelmed…

You are not alone!

There are so many kids right now that need support and not enough of us to go around.

So what’s an SLP to do?

Well don’t worry, I’m Carrie Clark and in this episode of the speech and language kids podcast, I’m going to show you the way to be UNSTRESSED (just like a shwa) and do speech therapy without tears.

And by that I mean your tears. Not the kids. I can’t guarantee the kids won’t cry.

Working as a speech-language pathologist is hard.

And working in a school setting can feel even harder.

But I’ve spent the last 16 years of my career figuring out a better way.

The Way is my streamlined system that allows you to see more students in less time.

And it will help your students make faster progress, too!

The Speech and Language Kids Podcast is back!!

Listen to the full podcast episode below to get a full overview of The Way

Are you ready to get started with The Way?

I’ve laid this all out in a video course…

…and the first three modules are free!

Click Here to Join The Hub

Free plans available!

The post The Way of the Unstressed Speechie: Speech Therapy without Tears appeared first on Speech And Language Kids.

AAC devices are augmentative/alternative communication systems that allow a person to communicate with those around them without speaking.  There are many different types of AAC but the most common are high-tech AAC Devices that allow a person to push a button to speak a message.  These are helpful for children or adults who have either lost the ability to speak or who are not able to speak well enough to clearly communicate everything that they want to say.

So why would you need to use AAC with a toddler or child and how does it work?

Today we’re talking about how, when, and why to use AAC or augmentative-alternative communication devices and systems.  AAC allows children who are not able to talk to use something else to communicate with those around them.  Every child has the right to communication and it is our job as speech-language pathologists to figure out a way for every child to do just that.

This podcast will go over the basics of what is AAC, how to use it to help a child communicate, when it is appropriate to use AAC, and why it should be considered as an option for non-verbal and minimally-verbal children.  Click the play button below to hear the whole podcast, or scroll down to read the quick notes:

Everything You Need to Trial AAC with a Child

AAC is the term used to describe any form of communication that a person can use that is not speech.  This may include pointing to pictures of what the person wants, using sign language, or using a device that will speak a message when a specific button is pushed.

AAC should be considered for any child when his/her speech output is not adequate to communicate everything that the child wants/needs to communicate.

Things to consider:

In short, there are no skills that a child MUST have before AAC can be tried.  Though, here are a few of the common misconceptions about this:

These are commonly used as excuses why AAC devices should not be attempted with children but these are WRONG:

For more information about these “prerequisites”, click the link: http://www.speechandlanguagekids.com/what-are-the-prerequisites-for-using-an-aac-device-augmentativealternative-communication/

Download the free PDF cheat sheet of the different types of AAC here:

Make it as natural as possible.  Think of it as similar to how you would encourage a late talker to talk.

For more info on getting started, click the link: http://www.speechandlanguagekids.com/help-child-use-aac-home-classroom-hint-easier-think/

Everything You Need to Trial AAC with a Child

Guide to Using AAC with Non-Speaking Children

Check out the freebies that we have inside our Free Therapy Material Library!

6 Tips for Encouraging a Child to Use their AAC System

AAC Cheat Sheet

AAC and Autism Handout: Giving a Child a Voice with AAC

Hi, I’m Carrie! I’m a speech-language pathologist from Columbia, Missouri, USA. I’ve worked with children and teenagers of all ages in schools, preschools, and even my own private practice. I love digging through the research on speech and language topics and breaking it down into step-by-step plans for my followers.

Connect with Me:

The post Why Use AAC for Toddlers or Children? appeared first on Speech And Language Kids.

In this episode of the Speech and Language Kids Podcast, speech-language pathologist Carrie Clark discusses the benefits of groups speech therapy for children and why speech therapists group children together.  Carrie also discusses the types of cases that benefit from individual therapy.

Looking for more therapy ideas and resources to help you provide the BEST services to your clients?  Join us in The SLP Solution, our membership program for speech-language professionals!  Inside the membership, you’ll find:

To join us in the full SLP Solution, or to snag a free membership, click on the button below!

You have a lot on your plate.  Let me help with that!

I’ve put together my best resources here.  Whether you’re streamlining your job as a speech-language professional, helping your child with his communication challenges, or trying to meet the diverse needs of your students, I’ve got you covered.

Choose the resource that you need most right now:

The post Why Do Speech Therapists Group Children Together? appeared first on Speech And Language Kids.

In this episode of The Speech and Language Kids Podcast, speech-language pathologist Carrie Clark discusses what speech therapists can do to help with literacy (reading and writing) skills in children and adolescents.

Prevention—Communicating risk factors to teachers and parents, and working with them to develop programs to help children acquire explicit, age-appropriate knowledge, skills and strategies of the components of language that contribute to reading and writing development.

Identifying At-Risk Children—Assisting in development and implementation of screening (e.g., instruments and teacher observation checklists) and referral procedures for very young children, as well as older school-age children, including modifying procedures to reduce bias (e.g., dynamic assessment techniques and criterion referenced tasks) for culturally and linguistically diverse populations.

Assessing—Selecting, implementing, adapting, and interpreting assessment tools and methods to evaluate skills in spoken language, reading, writing and spelling.

Providing Intervention—Collaborating with teachers and families to plan intervention goals and activities, as well as modifying curricula to keep students progressing in the general education curriculum.

Documenting Outcomes—Establishing a tracking system for identifying new or re-emerging literacy deficits and documenting outcomes of intervention goals and plans.

Program Development—Directing or participating in teams to develop school or system-wide strategic approaches to early identification and intervention for children with reading deficits.

Advocating for Effective Literacy Practices—Providing information about literacy development to state and local agencies that plan and evaluate curricula, establish comprehensive assessments and set related policies; educating them about relationships between spoken language and written language (i.e., reading, writing and spelling) and the benefits of collaborative instructional approaches.

Advancing the Knowledge Base—Conducting scientifically-based research on early literacy development.

Need more resources for helping children with literacy?  Check out our free pre-writing organizers here:

Looking for more therapy ideas and resources to help you provide the BEST services to your clients?  Join us in The SLP Solution, our membership program for speech-language professionals!  Inside the membership, you’ll find:

To join us in the full SLP Solution, or to snag a free membership, click on the button below!

You have a lot on your plate.  Let me help with that!

I’ve put together my best resources here.  Whether you’re streamlining your job as a speech-language professional, helping your child with his communication challenges, or trying to meet the diverse needs of your students, I’ve got you covered.

Choose the resource that you need most right now:

The post The Speech Therapist’s Role in Reading and Writing in Children and Adolescents appeared first on Speech And Language Kids.

Hypernasality occurs when a child speaks with too much nasal resonance.  Airflow tends to be directed up into the nasal cavity during speech instead of primarily through the oral cavity.  Nasal emission is when that air comes all the way out through the nose.  This can make a puffing or noisy sound in the nose during speech.  Here are the steps for therapy for both hypernasality and nasal emission.

Worksheets for Reducing Nasal Emission and Hypernasality

Check out this sample goal for hypernasality speech therapy!  Keep in mind, you should modify this goal to meet the needs of each individual client or patient that you’re working with:

The patient will demonstrate appropriate oral and nasal resonance during a 30 minute unstructured conversation in 2 speaking settings with no more than 2 instances of hypernasality.

*** Discontinue Therapy if Not Making Progress: If no progress is made after 6 weeks, client should be re-evaluated by ENT.

Source:

The Voice and Voice Therapy, Seventh Edition: By Boone, McFarlane, and Von Berg

Worksheets for Reducing Nasal Emission and Hypernasality

Cheat Sheet

Hi, I’m Carrie! I’m a speech-language pathologist from Columbia, Missouri, USA. I’ve worked with children and teenagers of all ages in schools, preschools, and even my own private practice. I love digging through the research on speech and language topics and breaking it down into step-by-step plans for my followers.

Connect with Me:

The post Hypernasality Speech Therapy: Treatment Activities appeared first on Speech And Language Kids.

The purpose of speech therapy for children who stutter is to help them learn how to communicate effectively and easily.  Sometimes that means eliminating the stutter all together, such as with preschoolers experiencing developmental disfluencies.  But often, especially for our older clients, the stuttering may never fully go away.  Our job then is to help them communicate to their best ability and to help them learn how to handle stuttering and disfluencies when they arise.

Take a look at our therapy ideas below.  Scroll down to the age group that you are working with and see what we recommend at each of these ages.  Or, check out our awareness and emotions therapy kit here.

Workbook to Deal with Negative Emotions

Preschoolers

Elementary School

Middle School/High School

Many preschoolers go through periods of dysfluency where they will stutter off and on for a while.  This happens as their mouths are struggling to keep up with all of the things that their developing minds want to say.  For many children, this stuttering goes away on its own.  For others, they will develop persistent stuttering that will require more therapy.

Here are the “red flags” or warning signs that may indicate that a child is more likely to have persistent stuttering that will require therapy:

Source: http://www.stutteringhelp.org/risk-factors

For preschoolers, it’s usually a good idea to begin with indirect therapy as this will promote smoother speech without directly talking about the stutter (which can sometimes upset a child or cause more pressure).  If indirect therapy doesn’t work, or if the child is already upset by his/her stuttering, we can move to direct therapy activities.

Indirect Therapy:

Direct Therapy:

Once children enter school, if they are still stuttering then we are ready to start addressing the stuttering directly.  The stuttering therapy techniques you use at this age will depend on what each child needs.  But here are some simple stuttering therapy activities you can use to help children who stutter communicate more easily:

1. Learn About the Respiratory System

Start by doing a lesson all about the respiratory system.  Use pictures, charts, models, or whatever you have available to you.  Practice inhalation and exhalation, as well as deep and shallow breathing with the students.  Talk about how we speak on exhalations and practice taking a deep breath in and then slowly exhaling while saying a single word.  Gradually increase to speaking in longer phrases and sentences while using gentle exhalations.  Talk about breathing timing during conversations (when to take a breath).

2. Practice Smooth, Prolonged Speech while Playing Games

Take whatever games you have available and practice using smooth, prolonged speech during those games.  For example, you can have children play “Go Fish” and make sure they slow down and elongate their words when asking “Do you have a…”.  Or, you can have them take a turn in a board game and use their slow, smooth speech to describe what happened (ex: “I rolled a four.  I’m going to move four spaces”).

3. Learn About the Types of Stuttering

Help students learn about the different types of stuttering and which ones they do.  Help them identify when they have stuttered and what type it was. Practice the different types of stutters to desensitize them to it.

4. Practice Fluency Shaping Techniques

Practice different techniques that help a child speak fluently for a period of time.  These include slow/stretchy speech, easy onset, yawn-sigh, etc.

4. Teach the Students Stuttering Modification Techniques

Help the students learn the different techniques they can use if they anticipate a stutter (preparatory set), are in the middle of a stutter (pull-out), or have stuttered and can’t move on (cancellations).  Practice demonstrating these while playing games (pretend to stutter so you can use a technique).

Now we’re ready to dive deeper. Older clients who stutter can benefit from learning these stuttering therapy techniques and practicing with these stuttering therapy activities:

Speech modification (including fluency shaping) strategies (Bothe, 2002; Guitar, 1982, 2013) include a variety of techniques that aim to make changes to the timing and tension of speech production or that alter the timing of pauses between syllables and words. These modifications are used regardless of whether a particular word is expected to be produced fluently. Strategies associated with speech modification include:

Other speech modification strategies, including appropriate use of pausing, are used not only to increase the likelihood of fluent speech production but also to improve overall communication skills (e.g., intelligibility, message clarity, etc.). In addition to being used for improving communication skills, pausing is also an effective method of rate control.

Keep in mind the child may be self-conscious about using these techniques.

Click here to access our guided program for addressing negative emotions for clients who stutter (Inside The Hub)

Workbook to Deal with Negative Emotions

Hi, I’m Carrie! I’m a speech-language pathologist from Columbia, Missouri, USA. I’ve worked with children and teenagers of all ages in schools, preschools, and even my own private practice. I love digging through the research on speech and language topics and breaking it down into step-by-step plans for my followers.

Fun Fact: I have a son with sensory seeking and some sensory avoiding behaviors.  As I type this, he is on my lap while I bounce him up and down on my knees because we are waiting for his brother to be done in a class.  We’ve found that giving him deep pressure is the best way to help his sensory needs.  We do big squeezes, wrap him in blankets, and push down on his head.  That one was the weirdest for me because I don’t enjoy that type of sensory but he LOVES it.  I just push on his head and he calms right down!

Connect with Me:

You have a lot on your plate.  Let me help with that!

I’ve put together my best resources here.  Whether you’re streamlining your job as a speech-language professional, helping your child with his communication challenges, or trying to meet the diverse needs of your students, I’ve got you covered.

Choose the resource that you need most right now:

The post Stuttering Therapy Techniques | Exercises and Activities appeared first on Speech And Language Kids.

Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS) is a rare, neurologically-based speech disorder where the child knows what he wants to say but the message gets mixed up in the motor-planning and execution phase so the sounds come out all wrong.

Though the diagnosis of CAS is relatively new, experts have agreed that CAS usually includes these 3 generally-agreed upon components:

Teach CV, VC, and CVC Words to Children with Apraxia

Sometimes it can be difficult to know exactly what you should be working on with your children with childhood apraxia of speech.  In this podcast episode, I break down speech sound learning in different levels.  Then, I give practical therapy activities that can be used for each level.  Click the play button below to listen to the entire episode.  Or, scroll down to see the notes below.

To get started, download the free PDF of the Skill Set Charts for Childhood Apraxia of Speech.  This will break down a nice order to help you determine what speech skill to work on next with a child with CAS:

Start Here For…

Therapy Activities

Start Here For…

Therapy Activities

Start Here For…

Therapy Activities

Start Here For…

Therapy Activities

Start Here For…

Therapy Activities

Start Here For…

Therapy Activities

Start Here For…

Therapy Activities (work on speaking clearly in tasks with increasing complexity, don’t move on until the previous level is clear)

Teach CV, VC, and CVC Words to Children with Apraxia

2-Hour Course on How to Help Children with Childhood Apraxia of Speech

Hi, I’m Carrie! I’m a speech-language pathologist from Columbia, Missouri, USA. I’ve worked with children and teenagers of all ages in schools, preschools, and even my own private practice. I love digging through the research on speech and language topics and breaking it down into step-by-step plans for my followers.

Connect with Me:

The post Apraxia of Speech: Speech Therapy Activities for CAS appeared first on Speech And Language Kids.

Do you know a child with autism who isn’t able to communicate basic wants and needs?  Does the child lack the social skills to participate in social interactions?  Do you need a guide for how to improve functional communication in a young child with autism?

Well don’t you worry, you’ve come to the right place!  I’m going to show you the top four skills to start targeting to improve functional communication in a young children with autism or suspected autism.  Let me show you what those four skills are and how to work on them.  Click “play” on the player below to hear the entire episode, or scroll down to get the show notes below.

No-Prep Activities and Resources for Helping Non-Speaking Children Learn to Speak

All children have the right to communicate.  No disorder, disease, or physical limitation should be able to take that right away from them.  For that reason, it is our obligation to make sure that all children with autism have SOME way to communicate with us.  Speaking may be too hard for them so sometimes we need to come up with other ways of helping them communicate.  Here’s how we can do that:

The first thing that we need to consider for a non-verbal or minimally-verbal child with autism is whether or not speaking is real option for them.  We can do this by asking the child to imitate basic speech tasks, like saying words or making sounds.  If the child is able to say words or make sounds in order to get something that he or she really wants, then we can say that speaking is definitely the best way to go to help that child communicate with us.  Speech is always the first option and we would love for all of our students with autism to speak to us.  However, some children simply aren’t able to talk right now, but that doesn’t mean that we give up on them and don’t provide them with an alternative.  If speech isn’t a viable option for the child you’re working with, move on to step two:

Options for AAC Devices, Methods,

Once you’ve found what works, use these steps to teach it:

How to Help a Child Use AAC at Home or in the Classroom (Hint: It’s easier than you think!)

Click Here to Learn More about Teaching Following Directions

No-Prep Activities and Resources for Helping Non-Speaking Children Learn to Speak

Everything You Need to Trial AAC with a Child

Hi, I’m Carrie! I’m a speech-language pathologist from Columbia, Missouri, USA. I’ve worked with children and teenagers of all ages in schools, preschools, and even my own private practice. I love digging through the research on speech and language topics and breaking it down into step-by-step plans for my followers.

Connect with Me:

The post Speech Therapy for Non-Verbal Children: Building Functional Communication appeared first on Speech And Language Kids.