Do teachers in your building know what your role is as a speech and language pathologist? Do they still question why kids get speech if they “speak just fine?” Well, it’s our month to spread awareness of what we actually do when working with our students. We want our colleagues to know we not only support our students, but how… Read More
May is National Speech-Language-Hearing Month
Do teachers in your building know what your role is as a speech and language pathologist? Do they still question why kids get speech if they “speak just fine?” Well, it’s our month to spread awareness of what we actually do when working with our students. We want our colleagues to know we not only support our students, but how… Read More
4 Ways to Teach Driving Without Needing a Car
Have you ever had a student come into your room and say, Student: “Ms, I’m taking my permit test” SLP: “That’s so exciting! Have you started studying?” Student: “No, why would I need to study.” In that situation, we hoped our student picked up on our concerned facial expression. Lucky for this student, we were well prepared for this moment and had… Read More
4 Ways for High School Students to Improve Time Management Skills
If your students are like ours, they struggle A LOT with managing their time. Instead of studying or doing homework, many of our students find themselves glued to their phones for hours after school (thanks TikTok). I mean…if we’re being honest…sometimes we struggle with the same thing! Time management is such a critical life skill. Not only do we need… Read More
Strategies to Use With Any Non-Fiction Text
Are you scrambling at the last minute to find a text to read with your students? Do you find yourself searching readworks.org, newsela.com or scholastic for an article right before a session starts? Once you find the right article, what do you do next? Now you’re searching for a random graphic organizer to go along with the text. Let’s… Read More
Top 5 Reasons to Teach Your Students to be Critical Thinkers
Have you ever gone to the movies and instantly shared an opinion on whether the movie was good or not, if you liked the main characters, or if you would have written the ending differently? Being critical is second nature to all of us and is something we do daily. Have you ever put on a shirt and taken it… Read More
7 Steps to Stuttering Desensitization
As high school SLPs, it is rare for a student who stutters to appear on our caseloads. As a result, it is a common feeling to doubt our abilities as an SLP when treating stutterers. A few years ago, we attended a PD and our entire view of stuttering therapy changed from what we learned in graduate school. This PD… Read More
5 Reasons to Make Speech and Language Fun for Older Students
Do your students ever look like they are going to fall asleep during your sessions? Perhaps it’s because of a lack of engagement. Have you ever seen one of your students in the hall 6th period when they were supposed to be in your session 5th period? Simple reasoning for that is they don’t want to come to speech and… Read More
Seasonal Activities to use Throughout the Year
Do your students always ask you to do something fun in your therapy sessions on a holiday or right before a vacation break? At the high school level, it’s not that easy to pull out a game and start playing. We need to make sure that whatever fun activity we choose still aligns to our students’ goals. Seasonal activities are… Read More
Top 5 Ice Breakers for High School Students
Working in a high school is not always easy, but we want to let you in on a little secret – the more you get to know your students on a personal level and allow them glimpses into your own life, the more likely they are to come to your therapy sessions. High school students want to trust the adults… Read More
7 Reasons to Teach Your Students How to Write Emails
Have you ever gotten an email from a student and it made you want to scream? Perhaps their subject line was in ALL CAPS and they appeared to be yelling at you. Or maybe they wrote the entire email in the subject line. Or, most likely, they didn’t even include a subject line at all. We have received one too… Read More
7 Executive Function Skills Needed for Studying
When you stop and really think about all that goes into studying, it’s no wonder our students struggle to study and pass tests. In school, the focus is on teaching students strategies and skills to access the curriculum. But what if we spent more time teaching our students HOW to study and HOW to pass their tests? This is where… Read More
The Top 3 Strategies for Note Taking
On Tuesday and Thursdays we have a student who we will call, Paul, who receives in-classroom speech and language services during his English class. We, as the providers, have our go-bag ready with a notebook for note-taking, pens, pencils, highlighters, extra erasers, post-its, etc. We walk into the classroom and see Paul sitting at his desk with his jacket on,… Read More
How to Teach Paraphrasing to Students
How do you explain paraphrasing to your students? How do you help students avoid plagiarism? Do you have students who copy an entire answer to a question, or even an entire essay word for word? The internet has made it so easy for students to look up information, but once they find what they are looking for, they don’t know… Read More
SLP’S Role in Transition Planning
Right from the start of school in September, our students (specifically seniors) are already looking forward to graduating. They can’t wait to get out of high school. Unfortunately, they don’t realize that graduating high school means becoming a productive, independent member of society. How are they going to remember their work schedule or when to go to their college classes… Read More
5 Non-Speech Stuttering Activities for High School
We used to feel totally lost when it came to stuttering therapy with high schoolers. In the high school setting, it is rare to have stutterers on your caseload. We always felt out of practice and to be honest, a bit intimidated, when we got a stutterer on our caseloads. Over time, with practice, through professional development presentations, and reading… Read More
Support Small Businesses
How do you pick a meaningful gift? How can you find the perfect gift while supporting small businesses? We are always looking for super cute, fun, and personalized items for ourselves, and of course great gifts for others. We’ve worked with many talented entrepreneurs and we want to share our shopping experience with you in hopes you’ll be inspired to… Read More
Speech & Language Activities for an Entire School Year
Wouldn’t it be great to have activities ready to go for every single session? What about having an activity available each week? Even better, activities that focus on keeping your students engaged by teaching them new strategies all while working on their goals. We used to stress about planning sessions every day – so we wanted to create a resource… Read More
Speech and Language Strategies and Rubrics
Ever teach your students a strategy and weren’t sure how to keep track of their progress or collect data? Or after you teach the strategy, they have a hard time using the newly learned strategy in the classroom? We constantly found ourselves struggling when it came to finding rubrics to collect data on the strategies we were teaching our students. … Read More
5 Easy Steps to Write an IEP Goal
Have you ever found yourself typing into a google search, “executive function annual goal for older students” or maybe even searching, “free SLP goal bank?” Goal writing is often the hardest part about writing a student’s Individualized Education Plan (IEP). We find ourselves staring at the computer screen because we want to make sure the annual goal is measurable. It… Read More
Let’s Talk: The Importance of Oral Language
When you think of a high school setting, most people think of a classroom with individual desks and students sitting in rows. That same visual includes a teacher in the front of the classroom lecturing and maybe even writing notes on the board. It is safe to say that most students spend their days sitting at their desks and listening… Read More
The College Application Process
The College Process One of our students walked into our room the other day and announced proudly “I want to go to college!” We were so excited for our student, but it was March of his senior year and he was about 12 months too late to start the process. A few questions quickly came to mind – didn’t he… Read More
5 Reasons Why 1:1 Coaching Will Work for You
We know how hard it is to be a brand new SLP. You passed all of your graduate school classes, got your clinical hours, took the Praxis, and maybe even completed your CF and earned your C’s. But when you finally land your first job, you quickly realize how unprepared you feel. Graduate school didn’t tell you how to schedule… Read More