The Weekly Review: Week 56

SLP Idea of the Week

Viktorya at Speech Language Play has such a fun idea for what to do with articulation cards that have been mastered. She prints out my free articulation cards in black and white and uses them with her students. Then, when the students have thoroughly mastered a card and no longer need to drill with it they get to feed it through a little hand crank powered mini paper shredder. What fun! I can think of lots of variations on this children would enjoy. Tear it up. Cut it with scissors. Run it through a paper crimper. Crumple it and try to throw it in the trash can. I'll definitely have to print some on regular paper in b/w (instead of in full color on cardstock) just so we can try this. I think my kids will love it.

Ava this Week

One night I was getting some extra work in on the computer after dinner, but before the children went to bed. My husband was doing dishes in the kitchen. Ava came up to me and asked if she could have the stack of speech cards sitting next to me on my desk. I'll admit I looked at her a little suspiciously and asked her why she wanted them. She replied, "So I can do speech with Daddy!". I handed them over and watched her find a spot on the carpet, sit down, and start laying the cards face up on the carpet waiting patiently for her Daddy to come join her. She didn't actually notice that she'd neglected to invite him to play. I snuck into the kitchen to tell him what was going on. He abandoned his dishes and let her teach him "speech". It was so adorable.

Weekly Michael

Fine motor is finally kicking in for Michael. He's enjoying drawing pictures. He prefers his magnadoodle, dry erase board, or an iPad, but will use colored pencils or crayons and paper when necessary. He always tells elaborate stories about his pictures. One day this week he was staying at my mom's house and drew this picture on her iPad. I love seeing him find a new way to exercise his imagination. (It is a hot air balloon. What looks like hair on the passenger is actually the hot air balloon's flame.)

Ava's and Michael's Weekly Home Therapy Notes

/s/, /f/, /l/, and blends are falling into place for Ava. We've also recently re-introduced /k/ (only in final position) and she's finally making progress there. If she isn't paying attention, /k/ will always be /t/. When she is paying attention, with multiple types of cues, she's getting a back sound about 65% of the time. Yea! Progress. Hopefully it will all be downhill from here.

Michael's doing well with his /s/ and /f/. His /s/ sound can be easily corrected now when he's paying attention. His /f/ production is starting to lighten up a little and sound a bit more natural. I'm going to let him settle into those for at least another couple of weeks before even considering starting /th/ with him.

Weekly Homeschooling

I went ahead and ordered a couple of homeschooling curriculum programs. This week we did a math lesson and a handwriting lesson. They took about 20 minutes each (not consecutively) and the children and I had a great time. I look forward to continuing as soon as our schedule permits. I'll write more about the specific curriculum materials I purchased and what I think of them soon.