SeeSaw 

Has the process of creating home activities become a time-consuming part of your week?  Have you been struggling with the appropriateness or format of speech homework?  Here are some quick and easy ideas and links for Seesaw assignments that will get your students and parents talking!

 Seesaw can be extremely helpful in getting specific speech assignments into the hands of families. The responses to assignments can also give valuable insights into your students’ current speech and language skills in their home environments.  Seesaw doesn’t have a large amount of “Community Library” speech assignments already made for us SLPs, however they have made it easy to create assignments from PDFs!  Just check “Terms of Use” for any PDFs you may choose.  Most authors we checked with have opened up their terms to include distance learners and home assignments.   Remember to use these Seesaw assignments for your individual caseloads (from your personal “My Library”) only and to give credit to the authors (we include their store name on the title of the Seesaw activity).   

 There are many free PDFs available on any of your favorite sites that you can use to keep children and families working on their communication skills. We find that static PDFs of no print activities with one picture or stimulus item per page work best. Pages from interactive PDFs or PDFs of printable worksheets can work too, but just seem to take a bit more editing work.  

 On your phone or laptop, download a PDF of an activity you like and save it to your Acrobat Reader or Google Drive.   

 Then, in Seesaw, create an assignment as you normally would (from the homepage tap the green plus button, Assign Activity, Create New Activity). 

 Title your assignment.  Then add directions that can be as simple as “Use the mic button to record your child answering these questions.”  Choose “Add Template for Student Response” and then choose “Upload” from your source (Google Drive, Adobe Acrobat, etc.). You can delete extra pages easily as it gives you that choice on each page of the template (... delete page).  Save your activity and you’re all set!

 The entire process can take under 5 minutes to create a worthwhile at-home activity that you can assign to multiple students with varied needs.  Open-ended directions can help expand the functionality of the assignments.  Have children and families use that microphone to create reponses.  The same assignment can be used for an articulation or language sample, a measure of descriptive language, a tool to train parents in how to communicate with their children through turn-taking and asking questions, and many more purposes.  You will be amazed with how easy it can be and the responses you get from your students and families will bring a smile to your face.

 Check out these FREE PDFs from Language Speech & Literacy that worked great as at-home Seesaw assignments.

                             

 

Reasons to Celebrate 2020!

It wasn’t all bad, right?

There is no denying that this year has been rough.  The world has changed and with it, many of us may have felt like we had to figure our jobs and lives out, with every day bringing new challenges.  Here are some ideas of truly great accomplishments that we can celebrate as this historic year comes to an end.

 The sheer quantity of new things you have learned

Not since grad school has my brain been so full!  Unlike grad school, this new knowledge isn’t presented in a distraction-free classroom but instead is being learned on the fly in busy living rooms and make-shift workspaces.  

You have learned new terminology, new technology, new platforms, and new approaches.  It has been overwhelming at times but by the end of 2020, it is something to commemorate!  

 The paradigm has shifted and you shifted with it 

This unchosen but necessary switch to distance learning, teletherapy, and hybrid schedules has opened up new modes of working with students.  Speech sessions, paperwork, meetings - everything looks and feels different.  Yes, it’s been challenging, but your creativity has exploded.

You have been flexible to change and are growing our therapy tool kit and you should recognize this accomplishment.  

(This free download link takes you to a new Google Slide™ activity with real photos for expanding sentences.)

 The depth of connections to students and families you have made

You are virtually in your families’ homes, working with children and parents in new ways.  You are connecting with texts, videos, assignments on Seesaw - more often and with more potential quality interactions than ever before.  The video feedback from students, the quick return text from a parent, the ability for the SLP to model a chosen technique in a video model - all are at your fingertips. 

More families connecting to speech resources and techniques is a win for you and something for which you can commend yourself!

 The implementation of the always elusive “carry-over” activities

I am guessing that Seesaw, Schoology, and Google Classroom are here to stay in the life of an SLP.  You have been forced to get comfortable using these tools to advance your practice in a more inclusive way.  These invaluable resources can keep student’s learning from home even during a typical year.  

You have learned how to improve student learning and results by including the home learning environment.  This feat alone is impressive enough to give yourself a nice pat on the back.

(Here is a link to a free PDF activity to keep those skills developing at home.) 

New skills in balancing life and work

Boundaries have become even more important than ever, as work has seeped into our own homes and it feels like we can work 24 hours a day and still not get everything done.  

You have learned to take stretch breaks, set limits on working during evenings and weekends, and you have learned just how valuable your personal time is.  Time-savers in therapy prep don’t just make your workday run more efficiently but have become imperative to maintaining your sanity. 

As 2021 approaches, you have learned what to take on and what you need to say no to so that your life can continue to function. What a victory!  

(Here are links to a couple of my most downloaded Boom Cards of 2020.  These Boom Card decks are incredible time-savers and ready-to-go for resources to use for multiple ages and skills in speech.) 

                                   

This year, the ground has been shaken from under us, yet we have accomplished more than we may have realized and much more than this list includes.  Let’s  look forward, not just hoping to return to how things once were but let’s decide what invaluable practices we want to bring with us into 2021.  Let’s celebrate and congratulate ourselves for all we have done!

When designing language remediation all language tasks are not the same in terms of cognitive skills. This is a recreation of a hierarchy of discrete language skills from The Source for Processing Disorders by Gail J. Richard. Language skills build up gradually in neurological demand and this hierarchy depicts this process.

This chart is useful for sharing with parents and teachers to give them a better understanding of the student’s discrete language processing skills as well as developing goals and objectives for students. 

*A test that is helpful for assessing discrete language is the Processing Test-Revised (LPT-R). The LPT-R includes two pretests (Labeling and Stating Functions) and the five subtests, Associations, Categorization, Similarities, Differences, Multiple Meanings.

Welcome to Language Speech and Literacy!  I’m Linda Cannon, M.S., CCC – SLP, an ASHA certified speech/language pathologist. I have worked in the schools for many years with all ages, including PreK. I will be sharing ideas and resources for speech/language pathologists and other educators on this blog. Thank you for stopping by!