Book Review and Giveaway, "First Words A Focus on Final Consonants".

 

 

My students whom are working on final consonant deletions and I had the pleasure of reading a delightful new book in therapy this week.  The book is entitled: Easy-To-Say First Words-A Focus on Final Consonants. It was developed by a skilled Speech-Language Pathologist named, Cara Tambellini Danielson. The book is illustrated by her talented mother, Mary Tambellini. This book is recommended for speech-language pathologist and parents of children developing their first words.  It can be found at Amazon and is currently on sale for $10.39. 

 

Currently, I am treating three younger students (3 years and younger) whom all have goals to help reduce their final consonant deletions that occur during their speech.  This book was a perfect addition to their therapy sessions. The book targets easy-to-say one-syllable words that contain early developing consonants, most specifically, the sounds of /p/, /t/ and /k/.  Two of my students are able to produce the /p/ and /t/ but the third is not quite ready for the /k/ sound but we enjoyed looking at the wonderfully illustrated pictures in this section together as I modeled the sound for her.

 

In the beginning of the book there is a very useful parent guide which discusses how parents can help their child with his/her speech and language skills. These tips include helpful suggestions such as; ensuring that their child is looking at them, utilizing pausing before the last word is spoken on each page, using gestures, encouraging play with the word targets, responding with enthusiasm with speech attempts and the suggestion to make book reading fun and engaging.

 

The book then begins with the words targeting the final /p/ sound. The words in this section include: up, mop,  hop, beep, and cup. An example page from this section is shown here. 

 



 



The illustrations in the entire book are very adorable. It was super cute to see how the faces of my little students just lit up by seeing them on each page.  I also saw how they anticipated seeing the next page and hoped for a page turn.  The illustrations shown are engaging!  

In addition to reading the book during the session, I also modeled the sign for each age appropriate word  that was shown, and then utilized a visual phonic for the final consonant for each targeted word.  These three students all attempted either the sign, phonic and/or verbalization for each word.  I also liked how each page encouraged three attempts of the word. This too is similar to how I approach word targets (three repetitions) to help increase consistently and overall production.

The /t/ section included the following words: hat, bat, hot, eat and boat. Here is picture of the hat pages. The owl is beyond cute.

 







The /k/ section targets the words of: book, kick, cake, bike, and duck.  The sweet and cute illustrations continued to help my students stay engaged.   The book was just the right length for a young child's attention span. Each session with my students was fun and productive.  I wrote each word on a take home practice sheet (from our Easter Eggstravaganza unit) and provided supplemental visual phonic sheets for the /p/, /t/ and /k/ for each family.  A parent for these little ones participated in each session with us so I knew they were more then capable to provide continued home carryover practice with their child.

I highly recommended this book to be part of all pediatric speech-language pathologists therapy materials. It is also perfect for parents of children working on developing their early words as it has a very useful parent guide in the beginning which will assist them in how to best read it to their children.

A copy of this book was provided to me by, Cara Tambellini for the sake of this review. The opinions are my own and result from the direct use of the book in a therapeutic  setting. Cara is generously providing a free copy to one of the readers of this review today.  Thank you Cara! Enter the Rafflecopter giveaway below for your chance to win a copy of this great book!

Have a wonderful day and good luck!
 
Sincerely,
Shanda Gaunt, SLP

a Rafflecopter giveaway








Author bio:- Cara Tambellini Danielson is a California licensed and ASHA Certified Speech- Language Pathologist. She received her M.A. in Communication Sciences and Disorders from Northwestern University. Cara specializes in pediatric speech and language development.  She currently lives in Santa Monica, California where she works in elementary schools, early intervention, and her part-time private practice.