Best wishes,
Manda & Shanda, SLP's
Twin Sisters Speech & Language Therapy
Welcome to Twin Speech, Language & Literacy LLC! (Previously known as Twin Sisters Speech and Language Therapy LLC). Our mission is to make original theme based materials that are both useful and fun! We strive to make every single therapy session interactive, enjoyable, and very beneficial! We love being speech therapists and enjoy knowing that our students want to come back each and every week!
Friday, July 12, 2013
The Occurrence of Sounds Worked On In Articulation Therapy
So, we just finished our big giveaway for our new Interactive Articulation Screener. A big congrats are going out to Neita R. and Melissa A. You ladies should check your email boxes because your document will be emailed to you soon! Because of the giveaway, we had a lot of great data that was collected from the comment lines. We asked all of you to let us know what sounds in articulation therapy were the ones that you had worked on the most in the last year. As a result, we had 329 sound "entries". We were a bit nerdy and decided to put them in a chart so that you can all see what sounds were worked on the most in the therapy rooms across the country this past last year. You will see from this chart that the most common sounds are: K, G, R, S & L! We thought this would be interesting data to share and that it would be helpful for us to know these commonly worked on sounds when deciding what sounds to target in our next articulation themed documents! Maybe it will be helpful for you to know as well? Thanks for stopping by the blog today.
Best wishes,
Manda & Shanda, SLP's
Twin Sisters Speech & Language Therapy
Best wishes,
Manda & Shanda, SLP's
Twin Sisters Speech & Language Therapy
Saturday, July 6, 2013
GIVEAWAY of our Interactive Articulation Screener!
We also provide two ways to document the results by providing short and long result summary page options. Summary of the articulation results for each individual sound can be written on the comments section for you and the child's parents, or next to each sound on the results summary pages.
In addition, we have included a one page "quick screener", a sheet about sounds and when they should be mastered, and a handout for parents and caregivers on what they can do to help their child progress in articulation therapy at home!! The handouts would be awesome sheets to give after the screening to the child's caregivers and teachers!
There's a lot of fun stuff in this download speech therapy friends. Please check out the preview provided at our TpT and/or TN stores for the contents and sample pages. Also, if you could please leave feedback at our stores if you purchase the articulation screener we would really appreciate it! Your comments help us to make the best products that we can.
We are giving away two of these! Please enter the Rafflecopter contest below by leaving a comment about what sounds that you seemed to work on the most this past year in therapy, or enter the giveaway by simply becoming a Twin Sisters Speech & Language Therapy follower on Facebook or by following this blog.
Thanks a bunch! Sincerely,
Manda & Shanda, SLP's
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Thursday, July 4, 2013
TOP TEN LIST: How Parents & Caregivers Can Help With Articulation
How Parents & Caregivers Can Help With Articulation
Shanda Gaunt M.S. CCC/SLP & Manda Riebel M.A. CCC/SLP
Shanda Gaunt M.S. CCC/SLP & Manda Riebel M.A. CCC/SLP
1. Use gentle reminders of correction when speaking with your child. Attempt to only model the sound that is currently being practiced in speech.
2. Try to revise what your child has mispronounced by repeating it using the correct production of the targeted sound. Emphasize the mispronounced sound. For example, the child said, “I like the tuck”. Parent can say, “I like the Duck too”.
3. Try to practice targeted sounds at home for 5-10 minutes a day. Suggestions of activities include: memory match, scavenger hunts, coloring pages, adding a sticker to word lists as they are imitated, “feeding” words into a tissue box, word searches, Apps on smart phones and devices targeting articulation, and eye spy. Your speech therapist will have many more ideas as well.
4. Model the sound during your daily routines as much as possible. For example, if your child is working on final /g/ sound, the parent could say, “Please let out the doG. We have such a cute doG. Let’s take the doG for a walk”.
5. Address health issues such as ear infections, voice difficulties, sleeping concerns, dentition, drooling and mouth breathing, which may be contributing to sound productions.
6. Read to your child and when your child’s sound is brought up in the story be sure to emphasize it. If your child is a reader, encourage them to seek out their target sound as well.
7. When you are playing with your child take the opportunity to emphasize correct sound production. For example, when you are playing Candy Land and your child’s sound is initial /y/ in words you could say, “I am on Yellow”.
8. Attempt to congratulate and emphasize when you hear correct production of your child’s articulation targets. For example, “Wow! I just heard you make a great K sound- way to go!”
9. Use positive and descriptive words when trying to correct such as, “Great try, but this time when we try to say the /th/ sound, let’s put our tongue through our teeth”.
10.Ask about how things are going at speech and sit in to watch and participate if it’s possible.
Please feel free to leave a comment or question about articulation therapy, and we would be happy to answer you back.
Best wishes,
Manda & Shanda, SLP's
Wednesday, July 3, 2013
4th of July Sale!!!!
We will be having a storewide sale of 20% off every single document at our shop! It will be a fantastic time to pick up our new pronoun document that can be used all year long, our new /s/ and /th/ minimal pairs document, and our new Groovy Grammar docs. Yay!
DON'T MISS THIS SALE EVERYONE. IT WILL BE A BLAST!!!
Also, please know that there's a large number of other TpT sellers who are also having a sale that day. See the links to their sales below! The 4th is going to be a fantastic day to pick up some terrific new materials.
Monday, July 1, 2013
PRONOUNS, PRONOUNS, PRONOUNS! - FOR THE WHOLE ENTIRE YEAR!
Without a doubt, our pronoun packs are our most downloaded documents and we are happy to say that we have received a ton of positive feedback about them. So, we decided to combine our packs to make one BIG and AWESOME pronoun pack that can be used the whole entire year long! We have also added some new pages that have never before been seen! The new pages feature the fun themes of summer, back to school, and Halloween. Our packs are filled with worksheets, puzzles, activities, and games! Please see the preview at our TpT and TN stores for specific details on this VERY LARGE packet full of fun pronoun work accompanied by colorful and cute clip art for the entire year!!
Click on the sample pages below and print for some free pages!
Please use the following links to view the packet at TpT and TN:
CONTENTS OF PRONOUNS, PRONOUNS, PRONOUNS
FOR THE WHOLE ENTIRE YEAR!:
FALL
PAGES 5-12: BACK TO SCHOOL
PAGES 13-20: HALLOWEEN
PAGES 21-25: THANKSGIVING
WINTER
PAGES 26-51: CHRISTMAS/HOLIDAY
PAGE 52: MARTIN LUTHER KING DAY
PAGES 53-77: VALENTINE’S DAY
PAGES 26-51: CHRISTMAS/HOLIDAY
PAGE 52: MARTIN LUTHER KING DAY
PAGES 53-77: VALENTINE’S DAY
PAGES: 78-80: ST. PATRICK’S DAY
PAGES 81-83: SPRING
PAGES: 84-89: EARTH DAY
PAGES 90-91: CINCO DE MAYO
PAGES: 92-94: MOTHER’S DAY
PAGES: 95-116: PATRIOTIC
PAGES 117-119: FATHER’S DAY
PAGES 120-127: SUMMER PLAY & BEACH
PAGES 128-131: GROOVY 70’S THEME
PAGES132-134: PLAYGROUND THEME
PAGE: 135: BALLOON THEME
Manda & Shanda, SLP's
Twin Sisters Speech & Language Therapy
Monday, June 24, 2013
Phono Learning Center App Review and GIVEAWAY!!!!
Today's app review is for Phono Learning Center. It was created by Smarty Ears and can be found in the Itunes App Store for $14.99. I would like to start out by shouting,
"It's here- the app I've been waiting for!"
This app was just what I was hoping for because it approaches phonological process therapy in much the same manner as I do. I often ask my students for a lot of repetitions while we play fun and educational games that are designed to elicit certain responses and that is what this app does too.
Phono Learning Center is an engaging and motivating app for all ages of students and it was developed to target phonological disorders in children using the Hodson's Cycles Approach, PLC. The games within the app only require a simple touch and drag. This allows my younger students to achieve productive imitation and stay focused on task without other complicated operating tasks. In addition, the older students enjoy the motivating factor of task completion, which the games provides!
Please continue to read for a description of this fabulous app. Also, if you are a visual learner, here is a video tutorial from Smarty Ears of the app:
Author: Mary Huston, MS, CCC-SLP
Phone Learning Center was designed to assist in sound production therapy for students who are highly unintelligible. What is really cool is that careful consideration was given to the development of this app. In fact, a hierarchy of primary and secondary targets developed by Barbara W. Hodson (2010) was utilized to determine which patterns and phonemes would be targeted. Areas covered include: syllables, initial consonants, final consonants, clusters, anterior contrasts, liquids, and more!
*multi-user play with data collection
*four interactive and motivating games with play options
*the auditory bombardment feature
*the homework pages
*the ability to import users from the free Therapy Report Center app from Smarty Ears
*ability to individualize targets (primary, secondary and/or advanced)
*settings button allows further customization for the student
*the use of the cycle approach and the ability to turn it off if you would like to use more than one target
*individualized goals and report cards for each student
*the ability to rate the students performance and store results
easy to use and quick to set up
*students enjoy being able to select their own picture
*students enjoy the reward of watching something grow or a task to be completed
*good support from Smary Ears for technical issues
Thank you for reading our review. We hope that you can leave a comment to let us know what phonological process that you work on the most in your therapy room and take the time to enter the giveaway. Please see the Rafflecopter entry below.
Have a great day!
Shanda and Manda, SLP's
Twin Sisters Speech & Language Therapy
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Sunday, June 23, 2013
Activity Pack For /S/ vs. /TH/ Minimal Pairs (Words to Sentence Level)
This colorful packet contains teaching tips, picture therapy cards, games, coloring pages, and worksheets. We hope you find it fun and helpful! We welcome your feedback as we strive to make each packet useful and fun and one that you will want to use often with your own speech students.
Sincerely,
Manda & Shanda, SLP's
Wednesday, June 19, 2013
Top 10 Compensatory Memory Strategies
Shanda and I see a variety of clients at our clinic who are experiencing memory loss. One of the most common reasons for memory loss is when a person has had a stroke. A stroke most often occurs when the blood supply to the brain is stopped due to a blockage of a blood vessel to the brain or leakage of a vessel into the brain. Strokes seem to cause the most difficulty in the short-term memory area vs. the other memory area called long-term memory. We find that the most clients will still have very good long-term memories that were established years before the stroke, but the ability to recall new information after a few minutes often becomes difficult for them.
*Short term memory is also known as recent or working memory. And it is defined as a system for temporarily storing and managing information required to carry out complex cognitive tasks such as learning, reasoning, and comprehension. Short-term memory is involved in the selection, initiation, and termination of information-processing functions such as encoding, storing, and retrieving data
*Long-term memory: A system for permanently storing, managing, and retrieving information for later use. Items of information stored as long-term memory may be available for a lifetime.
Other patients that we have seen that have exhibited changes in short-term memory loss have experienced traumatic brain injuries, or another neurological conditions or disorders such as; Multiple Sclerosis (MS), Parkinson's disease, Dementia or brain tumors. We have taught and practiced a variety of compensatory memory strategies and techniques with our clients over the years to help them learn ways to simplify and organize their lives, and to learn new information.
Today's post is a list of our top 10 compensatory memory strategies that we like to teach our clients in therapy. We hope that you find this information useful. Thank you so much for stopping by our blog today.
Sincerely,
Manda & Shanda, SLP's
TOP 10 COMPENSATORY MEMORY STRATEGIES
1)Use calendars, daily logs, appointment books, and/or journals. It is essential to write information down so that you can easily look up information that you need to remember at a later time.
2)Use hand held tape recorders, iPads, cell phones and iPods, for recording ideas and other information that you want to remember. Use these devices to help keep frequently used phone numbers and emergency phone numbers with you at all times.
3)Always place important things such as money, keys or glasses, in the same place so you will always know where to find them. Designate one bowl or spot on a shelf, for instance, as the spot for the daily routine placement of these objects.
4)Bring someone with you to appointments if you predict that you may be receiving a lot of new information.
5)Use a bulletin board, calendar, or the front of the refrigerator as the “go to” spot for always posting appointments and events so that you and all people in your household can easily see what is planned for that day.
6)Use a telephone answering machine or utilize voice mail so that phone calls can be recorded.
7)Use checklists during tasks that require a number of steps and make a “to do” list daily.
8)Use timers and alarm watches to alert you to remember important appointment times and when to take medications.
9)Become better organized. Reduce clutter in your surroundings. For instance, organize magazines and books into piles, put pills in pill boxes, keep all phone messages in a notebook next to the phone and not on a lot of different post-it notes. Throw away or give away things that you have not used or plan not to use. Make a clean environment.
10)Use compensatory memory techniques to remember information, lists, and names of people. (Our top 10 memory techniques will follow in another posting).
*These definitions taken from Medicine Net Online on 6/19/2013 http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=15299
Sunday, June 16, 2013
Enter to win our Groovy Grammar Documents Giveaway!
Hello! Do you need to add some funk to your grammar lessons? We did, and that is why we put together these two groovy comprehensive grammar documents.
We would love for you to check them out! They are super groovy!! We will help two of you out for sure because we are starting a FAR OUT giveaway today in order to give them away to two cool cats!
In the meantime, if you want to start making your speech or classroom time cool-o-roonie today, then head on over to our TPT or TN stores to get your own copies!
They are only $5.50 a piece! That's a low price for days and days worth of fun grammar games, worksheets, and activities for your therapy room or classroom. In fact, there's 117 pages when the two documents are combined.
TPT Store Link
TN Store Link
Enter the contest via the Rafflecopter giveaway below.
Good Luck!!
Manda & Shanda, SLP's
Twin Sisters Speech & Language Therapy
a Rafflecopter giveaway
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