The Easy Talking Club

Yesterday's post about The Stuttering Foundation of America made me think about the last time that I worked with children who were disfluent.  It was quite awhile ago - the group of three older elementary students, who had moderate to severe disfluencies, formed the Easy Talking Club (ETC). 

Therapy sessions were three times weekly and parents, peers, and/or teachers attended one of our "meetings" each month.  Our school principal often came by to spend time with the students (Thank you Mrs. T.).  Each student had the opportunity to serve as club president, recording secretary, and hospitality director.  

We had "outings" throughout the school to practice using therapy techniques. Students bought ice cream, delivered messages to school staff, and participated in scavenger hunts. Note that these were pre-planned events and the school staff/conversation partners all had scripts. 

Fluency therapy, that year, was fun and functional. The students increased their fluent speech dramatically in the therapy room and in the classroom. The Easy Talking Club was disbanded the following year as students moved on to new schools. However, being such a great motivator, the "club" idea was incorporated into language therapy and many of my older elementary students participated in the Conversation Club.

Diana

© 2012

A Great Low Budget Resource: The Stuttering Foundation of America

Myths about Stuttering is a free
brochure that can be downloaded
from The Stuttering Foundation website. 

I received an email recently, from the marketing director of The Stuttering Foundation of America, asking that I mention it in my blog.  I have had a website since 2004 and often ignore such requests as they are usually for profit requests. However, The Stuttering Foundation, a nonprofit organization,  is one that I have used during my career. Back in the days before the Internet, The Stuttering Foundation was one of only a few free resources. 

A look at the site revealed much information and many free or low cost resources.  When you go to the website make sure that you watch Stuttering: For Kids, By Kids.  Parents will benefit from the free video Stutteringand Your Child: Help for Parents.

7 Tips for Talking with Your Child, 8 Tips for Teachers, and Why Speech Therapy are just three of the several free brochures available to download.

Some free E-books are also available on the site. In the pdf format, these books can be printed or downloaded on to your tablet.  Sometimes I Just Stutter and Trouble at Recess are good for use when talking about stuttering with your students.

If you want to brush up on current research, visit the Basic Research page.

And, although not free, The Stuttering Foundation is another good source for those of you who need CEUs. 

Diana

© 2012

PowerPoint's Photo Album Feature

A few years ago, a friend  wanted to make a "rolling PowerPoint" for her school's open house. She wanted to add just over 75 pictures, but couldn't imagine trying to insert each picture individually. As I was her "go to" computer friend, it was my job to figure out how to accomplish this. Well, PowerPoint's Photo Album feature allowed me to add all of the pictures in less than ten minutes. 

To quickly add multiple pictures from a file or camera to your PowerPoint, simply follow the directions below. 

On the Insert tab, in the Images group, click the arrow next to Photo Album, and then click New Photo Album. 

In the Photo Album dialog box, under Insert picture from, click File/Disk.

In the Insert New Pictures dialog box, locate the folder that contains the pictures that you want to insert, and then click Insert.

If you want to change the order in which the pictures are displayed, under Pictures in album, click the file name of the picture that you want to move, and then use the arrow buttons to move it up or down in the list.

Choose the Picture layout, Frame shape, and optional Theme.

In the Photo Album dialog box, click Create.

Note that these directions are from MS PowerPoint 2010. The 2007 and 2003 versions of PowerPoint have a similar feature, but directions are slightly different. 

Diana

© 2012

A New Page

I have just added the contents to my newest page Resources to Pass to Parents. Click on the tab above to see this new resource. I would love to know your thoughts and any suggestions for additions would be appreciated. 

Diana

© 2012

Cover Your Objectives With Band-Aids - Part II

In the late 1980s, I made a band-aid book by tracing some body part picture cards, glued the pictures to card stock, laminated the pages and added real band-aids. Now, no markers and glue are needed - make your book in PowerPoint and use your own digital pictures or find pictures in the Microsoft collection.  

Click to download the Make 
Your Own Band-Aid Book

I began this PowerPoint book using photographs of people and a band-aid clip-art picture with a transparent background - all from Microsoft. I didn't finish the book as you might want to add pictures of your students. They love to see themselves and I am sure that they will like the added band-aid on their picture. 

Use this book when labeling body parts, answering questions, and increasing utterance length.  Change the phrases in the book to work on he and she or his and her. If you add student's pictures you can also work on possessive -s. 

Give your book a title. Add additional pictures from Microsoft or add your own photos.  The band-aid has a transparent background and can be used on any picture; just make sure that you move your picture to the back. 

Print the books, view them as PowerPoints or import them to use on your Promethean or Smartboards. Print them as handouts to make mini-books or small visuals. AND, save your PowerPoint as a pdf to add it to your iBooks collection. 

Have fun!!

Diana

© 2012

Cover Your Objectives With Band-Aids - Part I

  

Ernie is walking (or running or jumping or flying or dancing) and he falls (or trips or slips or tumbles). He hurt his nose (or knee or hand or forehead).  What happened? Why is he crying? Where does it hurt? Where will you put the band-aid? Do you need a big band-aid or a little band-aid? 

This was one of my favorite lessons when talking about body parts and all that was needed was a doll and a box of band-aids. Label body parts and actions, use appropriate verb tense, answer questions, increase utterance length, and turn taking are some of the objectives that could be covered during this activity. 

A note of caution - I did have one student who was sensitive to latex so she used a plastic band-aid from an old Fisher - Price doctor's bag. However, latex free band-aids can be found at most pharmacies. 

Next Post: Part II - Make your own band-aid book.

Diana

 

© 2012

A New School Year and Changes To My Blog

Well, for me, summer is officially over as school starts on Tuesday in my school division. I just finished reading two good thought provoking blog posts about starting the new school year and want to share. 

Adventures in Faux Pas, at Speech Adventures, really makes you think about those beginning of the year ice breakers as well as other activities that might be repeated in the classrooms. Annie, at The Learning Curve, wrote a very nice post about lesson plans; giving thought to much more than "objectives, materials, and procedures."  

Changes to this blog includes more tabs to make past posts easier to find and a page for Blogs I Follow.  Resources for SLPs have increased tremendously due to these wonderful blogs. 

Enjoy your holiday weekend! 

Diana

© 2012