Richard wanted to go outside. With movement and foam language dice, we tossed the dice which sent us on a scavenger hunt. Great language with describing words while practicing our speech.
Tristan was enjoying a math video game on the computer. We compromised with moving to a speech game on the iPad that incorporated /s/ practice while playing a card game like UNO. He was happy with the balance of game and practice.
Using some of the nature lessons, we expanded our research while practicing /r/ sounds. Spencer was motivated to move the activity on to a game, so we tackled 100 words with 70% accuracy(with model and verbal cues) and moved on to a card game.
We discussed other options at lunch that still set boundaries but help him feel safe and comfortable without drawing negative attention to himself. He had difficulty finding a solution. He was more relaxed during outdoor recess. We discussed this in his room after lunch.
Richard was energetic after PE. We read 3 new books. Progress with receptive/expressive language goals including WH questions, vocabulary, grammar, and retelling stories has given Richard more confidence with his communication skills. He did not want the session to end and wanted to read more books.
Brief lesson recap: Richard was greeted in his classroom. He was happy throughout the session. We targeted the usual goals: /th/ in all positions of the word with self generated sentences. Richard continues to make progress in this area. He has carried over correct production of /th/ in the initial and medial positions of word to the conversational level. We covered the calendar/dates and Richard did well with this task considering we haven't done it in a while. We watched an educational video of past tense and all the different forms. Richard thought this was an interesting new way to approach this goal. We covered possessives again (i.e. "my friend Julian's house" vs. Julian (-s) house. Richard was compliant and very attentive in today's session. I am happy with the progress seen. He continued to require cues to slow rate of speech.
Brief progress note - Santino greeted me with "hi" with inflection. He also greeted others during our session with minimal prompting. We targeted the same goals we have been working on the majority of the year. Santino did well with using verbs and requesting with verbs. For example, he wanted cheerios. He started by saying "cheerios" and by the end of the session, he was requesting consistently with "I want to eat Cheerios" and "I want to drink water". In addition, Santino requested a book activity and chose a book to read/listen and answer simple wh questions to. We went outside, per Santino's request. He also quickly changed his pull up with some assistance but sequencing has signicinantly improved. Lastly - we worked on identifying and naming simple emotions.
Santino was greeted in the lobby at 12:15 - he greeted me with some prompting "Hi Ms. Amanda". When entering the pre-k room, Santino laid down to rest on the carpet while I prepared the first activity. He was yawning with heavy eyes. After a few minutes, he came to the table to work on a few structured things that included identifying basic emotions with illustrated social stories, identifying verbs, using requests with longer utterance length and answering questions regarding object function. Santino requested to go outside so we went to the playground for a few minutes and targeted many goals outside. He appears to be enjoying the playground more and is receptive to therapy in different environments.
Today was field day for the school so it was some what out of the ordinary in terms of speech therapy however it was nice to work with Richard outside of our natural structured environment. We walked over to the park so it did take some time to target some of our language and speech goals. We covered quite a bit of our goals during that time. When we got there - I was his "buddy" during our session time so we spent time at the park and down at the deck where we could target some of our goals. In addition, while he was playing with his
classmates it was nice to observe peer interactions. Richard responded well to a variety of situations presented. He is such a sweet boy and has come so far with his peer interactions. I'm very proud of how far he has come in speech therapy. It has been a joy working with him this year.
Chris was eager to share the collection of items that he had brought with him today. His excitement and enthusiasm prompted his fast pace as he rapidly provided brief detail about each of the items. Supports to allow for pausing, reciprocal expansion and acknowledgement of comment or question was facilitative. Speaker -speaker overlap was subsequently diminished. Topic shifts were rapid however, and familiar cues to assist with use of "transition phrases/starters" was successful. Topic expansion was additionally facilitated through provision of direct question this session.
