So, nine days ago I was offered an appointment with a local expert on apraxia. This person only sees clients twice a month on the weekend and the appointment was for this coming Sunday. I was so excited to have the opportunity to work with her and to have her meet Ava. I emailed her back immediately and said, "Yes, please!"
And then I waited and waited to hear back from her confirming the appointment. Tonight I went back to re-read that email I sent to her so that I could write her another email gently reminding her that I still needed to confirm that appointment.
And I realized that I accidentally sent my response to her email to my husband instead. I never wrote her back! I immediately re-sent the email to her and added an apology and explanation for the delay and I'm now waiting to hear back from her.
But I'm sure the appointment is long gone by now. I'm so disappointed. An opportunity lost. Hopefully she'll have an appointment available two and a half weeks from now. Hopefully.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Therapy Resources – The /b/ list
Description:
My goal here was to collect a list of simple words and images that start with /b/. I needed them to be familiar to a young child. I wanted to have at least one word/image for each vowel sound. Some of vowels have several /b/ words because I was able to think of more of them. If your child can produce the whole word, great! Go for it. However it is perfectly fine if all they can produce is the /b/ followed by the vowel. For example if all they say for bottle is /ba/, that’s great. If they can say /ba ba/ that’s one step more complex. If they can say /ba ba/ three times in a row that’s even more practice. You will probably find that your child can make some of the /b/-vowel combinations more easily than others. That’s typical too. Don’t push too hard. It’s your SLP’s job to work on new things. You can just use these to practice things that your child already can do. The nice thing about this word set is that you know it combines /b/ at least once with each vowel.
Activities:
This, of course, depends on the age and attention span of your child. At the simplest level you can simply hold up each card and ask your child to imitate the word (or simplified version of the word). I’ll admit, bribery here can be useful (stickers, stamps, cheerios). You could also print out two sets and play a matching game with a few pairs at a time.
For an older child you could make a game board with the images and use simple game pieces and a die or spinner. If you had two sets you could play a card game similar to old maid or uno where each player is dealt some cards and tries to get matches by asking the other player for cards. If you have any other ideas, please contribute them in the comments or send me an email and I’ll include them here as well.
Tip: Print them and then “laminate” them by putting them between two sheets of clear contact paper. They’ll last much longer that way.
I’ll admit it. I’m new to this blogging thing and I can’t figure out how to give you guys a link so that you can just download a nice quality version of these. The best I could do is the pictures. If you’d like me to send you a pdf, just send me an email and ask for the /b/ pictures. I’ll send them right along.
I found all the images via google image and tried to avoid the ones with watermarks. If any of you have suggestions for additional words to add to this list please let me know and I’ll put them in. I hope some of you find these to be helpful.
Words:
My goal here was to collect a list of simple words and images that start with /b/. I needed them to be familiar to a young child. I wanted to have at least one word/image for each vowel sound. Some of vowels have several /b/ words because I was able to think of more of them. If your child can produce the whole word, great! Go for it. However it is perfectly fine if all they can produce is the /b/ followed by the vowel. For example if all they say for bottle is /ba/, that’s great. If they can say /ba ba/ that’s one step more complex. If they can say /ba ba/ three times in a row that’s even more practice. You will probably find that your child can make some of the /b/-vowel combinations more easily than others. That’s typical too. Don’t push too hard. It’s your SLP’s job to work on new things. You can just use these to practice things that your child already can do. The nice thing about this word set is that you know it combines /b/ at least once with each vowel.
Activities:
This, of course, depends on the age and attention span of your child. At the simplest level you can simply hold up each card and ask your child to imitate the word (or simplified version of the word). I’ll admit, bribery here can be useful (stickers, stamps, cheerios). You could also print out two sets and play a matching game with a few pairs at a time.
For an older child you could make a game board with the images and use simple game pieces and a die or spinner. If you had two sets you could play a card game similar to old maid or uno where each player is dealt some cards and tries to get matches by asking the other player for cards. If you have any other ideas, please contribute them in the comments or send me an email and I’ll include them here as well.
Tip: Print them and then “laminate” them by putting them between two sheets of clear contact paper. They’ll last much longer that way.
I’ll admit it. I’m new to this blogging thing and I can’t figure out how to give you guys a link so that you can just download a nice quality version of these. The best I could do is the pictures. If you’d like me to send you a pdf, just send me an email and ask for the /b/ pictures. I’ll send them right along.
I found all the images via google image and tried to avoid the ones with watermarks. If any of you have suggestions for additional words to add to this list please let me know and I’ll put them in. I hope some of you find these to be helpful.
Words:
- bug
- bus
- bun
- ball
- bottle
- box
- baby
- bed
- bell
- bin
- bit
- bib
- baa
- bag
- bath
- bat
- bam
- bead
- bee
- beam
- bean
- beep
- boo boo
- boot
- badge
- book
- bull
- bush
- boy
- brown (say /bow/ like bow before a queen)
- bow (say /bow/ like a bow in your hair)
- bowl
- bone
- boat
- bye, bye
- bike
- bite
- bake
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Do-over
As a parent, do you ever want the opportunity to take five minutes and do them again in a completely different way? We were at the store. Ava didn’t want to ride and so she and I were walking behind Daddy who was pushing the cart. We’d been there a while and so the adults were ready to finish up and leave. We’d lost sight of Daddy because he’d turned a corner and we hadn’t. All of a sudden I was tugged to a stop. Ava had caught sight of a little white jewelry box on an end-cap. It was placed right at her height and was the type with lots of little doors and drawers. She was already trying to open a door.
I glanced down long enough to see what was holding us up. What I said to her was, “Don’t touch, baby! Come on. Hurry up. We need to find Daddy.” Then I just pulled her along. At the time, I didn’t give it any more thought than that.
However, after my own lights out, as I was lying in bed thinking back over the day I found myself dwelling on that moment. I wish I had knelt down and helped her open every door and drawer on that jewelry box. It only would have taken a few minutes. She’d have loved it. We could have used the words, “Wow!” and “open” at least 10 times each.
As I thought back over it, I did the mommy guilt thing for at least 15 minutes and then decided to file the experience away as a lesson learned. I will try harder to remember that this is her life too and she doesn’t want to be rushed through it. I will try harder to remember that even a few minutes of our time makes a huge difference to her and her memory of any given outing. Next time, I don’t want to be lying in bed wishing for a do-over.
I glanced down long enough to see what was holding us up. What I said to her was, “Don’t touch, baby! Come on. Hurry up. We need to find Daddy.” Then I just pulled her along. At the time, I didn’t give it any more thought than that.
However, after my own lights out, as I was lying in bed thinking back over the day I found myself dwelling on that moment. I wish I had knelt down and helped her open every door and drawer on that jewelry box. It only would have taken a few minutes. She’d have loved it. We could have used the words, “Wow!” and “open” at least 10 times each.
As I thought back over it, I did the mommy guilt thing for at least 15 minutes and then decided to file the experience away as a lesson learned. I will try harder to remember that this is her life too and she doesn’t want to be rushed through it. I will try harder to remember that even a few minutes of our time makes a huge difference to her and her memory of any given outing. Next time, I don’t want to be lying in bed wishing for a do-over.
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