General Use:"Off-the-Shelf" Materials

So I've mentioned it before, but I'll say it again: in general, I dislike most "off-the-shelf" therapy materials. If it comes prepackaged with cards, a workbook, and an instructional manual, I probably have turned my nose up at it at some point in my career. Not to say the products are bad, but in my opinion, most "off-the-shelf" products simply aren't appropriate for teenagers or they just don't target their real needs.

Of course, there are always exceptions, especially when those products are modified heavily, such as the case with my use of Matt and Molly with my Mod/Severe teens. But sometimes, it's one of those days where I just haven't had enough time to plan my next session. A group is coming in 5 minutes and I need to just yank something off the shelf and survive the next 25 minutes. In occasions like these, I reach for a few special products that hold a dear place in my heart. I tend to use them as intended, but modifications are almost always at the forefront of my mind...

Language:

Jeepers Peepers or Headbanz (same game, I recommend whichever one you can secure funding for)
Hopefully you've all heard of this game before, or maybe you've heard of it but dismissed it as not appropriate for teenagers. Whatever the case, this is one of those games that should be in your arsenal. The premise is that each student has a card on their forehead that they can't see. The game can play out in a few ways:

1) The target student must ask yes/no questions about their card: e.g. "Am I an animal? Am I a tool?"
2) The target student must ask categorical questions about their card: e.g. "What category am I? What shape am I?"
3) The non-target students take turns providing individual descriptions of the target player's card: e.g. You are a silver tool with a handle used at home by mom and dad.

Depending on your students' goals, one method can be employed for the entire game or each student can use a different method. You can easily target goals like asking/answering questions, explaining, using complex grammar, etc.

The cards that come with the games are OK, but I have made a few specific cards with updated images (since, for example, some of the Jeepers Peepers technology images are very old).

Blurt!
Now I own a very, very old version of this game (as in I got this game when I was 9... so 16 years ago!), so perhaps the new game has a few differences I'm unaware of. But looking on Amazon, this latest version looks more or less the same.

Essentially, Blurt! is a combination vocabulary and memory game. The vocabulary that students will be asked to generate is not complex or difficult, but speed is the key to playing the game and if your caseload is anything like mine, you've got some students with dreadful word retrieval issues. Students take turns reading short descriptions (e.g. "A flat moving part that sticks out from the body of a fish,") and the first student to provide the correct answer wins a point.

You can play this game in several ways:
1) You read the descriptions and all students answer,
2) Students take turn reading one description at a time (use a die roll to select the number or just read the next in the line),
3) One student reads 2 - 6 descriptions in a row before moving to another student.

Lots of accommodations can be made for this game:
- A list of unfamiliar words is generated as a group
- After a pre-selected amount of words, students use and/or write a selected word/s in a sentence
- You provide the each student with a word and they generate their own description (after playing for awhile so they have some examples of what the descriptions are like) to test out on the group

Social Skills/Thinking:

Should I or Shouldn't I - Middle and High School Edition

Praise be to Michelle Garcia-Winner for the creation of this amazing game. I have used this game with my highest level Mod/Severe class and kids on the spectrum of all varieties - you will definitely get your money's worth if you work with any students with autism!

The game comes with a wide selection of scenarios, which I have since organized into categories like "conversations," "naivety," "manners," "college/job, 'etc. so that I can select specific cards for each group. The game starts as you read the selected card and students pick whether that scenario is:

1) Will give people good thoughts!
2) Is just fine, OK
3) Will give people weird thoughts...
4) Will annoy people...
5) Is against the rules!

Students are given a deck of cards from 1 - 5 so they can vote secretly and all reveal their choices together. After revealing, engage your students in discussion about why they selected their answer and what the consequences could be from engaging in that behavior. I have been very surprised by my students' answers; the game really highlights areas of weakness and strength for our students' social behaviors.

Bubble Talk
I picked this game up at a Goodwill for $2 this summer and BOY am I glad!! This game has been an absolute hit with my social thinking groups - so much so that we've struck up a deal to "work one week then play the next week" and alternate playing of this game every other week. Which is fine by me, because although they think they're playing, we're really targeting some great social thinking skills!

This game works a bit like Apples to Apples: a picture card is placed in the middle and each student selects a "bubble" card from their hand. This "bubble" card symbolizes something that a character in the picture card is saying... meaning that in order to play a successful, humorous card, your students will have to take the perspective of the characters in the picture!! After we all lay down our cards, I ask each student to explain who would say that in the picture and why their card is funny. It's great insight to watch them either give a great explanation or completely fail to understand what the character could be thinking or feeling.

In the end, we all end up laughing a lot. Sometimes we take extra time on specific cards where students are having difficulty and sometimes we spend extra time celebrating a student who plays a legitimately funny card. It's a good time all around - I highly recommend getting a copy!

Artic:
 

Artic Attack /r/ and /s/ and /z/
It seems to me that sooooo many articulation materials are made for the under 11 set! My teenagers are no longer amused by "Artic Flips" and coloring pages, and they have played more games of /r/ Go Fish than you can count. Don't even mention bingo or Chipper Chat. Don't even go there.

So what's a high school therapist to do? I ordered these great books with some Medi-Cal money last year and they're already proving to be invaluable. Artic is my LEAST favorite type of therapy and these books make it a little less painful when dealing with a group of 3 unruly 14-year-old boys who exhibit minor /r/ distortions (AKA boys who are leaving my caseload come their annual IEPs!).

These books are organized according to Pam Marshalla's hierarchies - you know, /or/, /ire/, /air, /er/, etc. - and different s-blends and word placements. For each context, there are 4 different games (tic-tac-toe, battle ship, etc.) that you can use to target specific /r/ and /s/ contexts that remain troublesome into adolescence! And chances are, these are games that have not yet been played-to-death in middle and elementary school! And you can print them out and send them home for homework! I haven't yet come up with modifications for these yet, let me know if you think of some new ways to use these games!

Fluency:
So I did my best to try and think of an "off-the-shelf" material I use with my students and... I don't think I do! I highlighted some therapy ideas in my previous blog post on fluency, but something that I might pull out of my tool bag at the last minute is watching and discussing videos by comedian Drew Lynch (who happens to be a young adult who stutters)!

My favorite stuttering-related videos are:
1) Why My Stutter is Getting Better
2) I Try to Cure My Stutter
3) How to Deal with Bullies

But really, there is something valuable in nearly all of his videos. Remember, the same rule applies as when showing students any media: watch each video ahead of time to verify that it's OK for your students (he does talk about dating and more mature subjects in some videos). I suggest introducing Drew by watching his America's Got Talent audition to highlight his great attitude of not letting his fluency disorder get in the way of his dreams.

I hope you've gotten a few new ideas of what to keep on your shelves to help out in those last-minute pinches! Comment below with your favorite quick fixes, I'm always looking for ways to keep things simple and effective! And as always, it doesn't have to be fancy, just keep it fun and functional!

• Jillian, the No-Frills SLP

Higher-Level Language: Developing Critical Listening and Self-Advocacy Skills Part 2

Welcome back everyone! If you haven't checked out last week's blog, please do so before reading this post! You can find it here.

Last week, I started talking about ways to target our Speech-Language Impaired (SLI) or Specific Learning Disability (SLD) students who struggle to comprehend auditory language presented to them in their general education classes. These students are expected to take notes on what the teacher is saying and too often they resort to only copying what they see on the Powerpoint or on the board. Last week I went over the foundations for understanding what we're targeting when we look at auditory processing and critical listening skills in addition to some goals we might write for students that fit this profile.

This week, let's dive into the nitty gritty of therapy and how to target the development of these very important skills! Depending on the group's size, needs, and skill level, my lessons on critical listening have lasted anywhere from 2 - 4 weeks. For the purpose of the blog, I've broken the lessons down into 3 weekly sessions; however, as with everything, these lessons should be modified and extended/shortened depending on the level of the students!

Lesson 1: What is Self-Advocacy?

    ~15 Minutes – IEP Accommodation Worksheet

1)   Provide students with copies of their accommodations page and an IEP Accommodation Worksheet

2)   Work with your students to identify what each accommodation means in plain language. Ask each student to select (or you select if you know that they have certain accommodations for a specific class) a class and complete the graphic organizer (maybe even laminate it, as I have done for some students). Make sure you make a copy or take a picture of it because some students may lose it and it will be used in future activities!

3)   Explain to your students that they must explain their graphic organizers and take ownership of their needs. They are in high school now and they must advocate for what they need to be successful.

     ~10 Minutes – Practicing the IEP Accommodation Worksheet Script

1)   Discuss what the most important information is on their worksheet. Is it their extended time on tests? Is it copies of notes? Prompt the students to come up with what is most important to them. Make a list of the most important accommodations in ranked order; I believe that students should focus on explaining their most pressing needs instead of trying to go through the entire worksheet with their teachers. Give a model for how you would explain a set of hypothetical accommodations.

2) Time to role play! You now take on the role of their classroom teacher - it helps to physically move away from the group and sit at your desk like their teachers would. Have them practice walking up to you, gaining your attention appropriately (a weakness for so many of my students!), waiting if necessary, and then explaining their key, most important accommodations. This is a a great opportunity to employ video modeling if students are struggling with this. It's also a good tool to go back and watch their explanation and identify areas of weakness.

3) Practice, practice, practice! Have each student take as many turns as time allows so they can get multiple opportunities at explaining their needs. Depending on the level of student need, I might take another week to review video models and gain more practice with this skill. We might even go on a field-trip to another classroom to try approaching a teacher who is on their prep period to practice.

Lesson 2: Let's Apply Critical Listening in the Classroom

     ~5 Minutes – The Bus Riddle

1)   Provide students with paper and pens and tell them to take notes without further guidance or prompting. Show the “Bus Riddle” and read it aloud or just read it if technology access is limited.

2)   Elicit answers to the riddle. Prompt as needed to elicit the correct answer.

3)   Discuss why coming to the correct answer was difficult and make connections to their classroom note-taking expectations.

     ~5 Minutes – Accommodations Tie-in

1)   Have your students pull out their Classroom Organization graphic organizers that were completed the week before. Specifically highlight the “note-taking section” and ask your students to identify if having a copy of the bus notes would have been helpful (or having a scribe, etc). Discuss why actively utilizing their accommodations will help them earn better grades. Also ask your students if any of them have tried to explain their accommodations to a teacher and reward those who have,

   ~5 Minutes – Teacher Signals

1)   Generate a list of things that teachers do to indicate that what they are saying is important, such as:

a.     Saying “This will be on the test!”

b.     Raising their voice

c.     Asking questions of the students

d.     Writing information on the board

2)   At this point I solicit information from the class regarding which of their teachers they believe lectures instead of just reading off a PowerPoint. Sometimes the students are under the impression that their teachers don't really lecture (when I know for a fact from classroom observations that they do). It's often hard for our students to realize that the information that the teacher is providing verbally may not actually be what's on the slides!

     ~10 Minutes – Practice Lecture

1)   By this point, I can tell that the students are only barely grasping this concept. Perhaps in theory they get it, but it reality... not so much. Time for a real world example! I pull up this PowerPoint that I found on-line that is a companion to a US History textbook. I ask my students to take notes like they do in class. There will be a quiz on this material next week, so take the best notes they can. 

      I skip down to slide #25 and begin to lecture on this slide as if I was their US History teacher. The information is fairly basic, but instead of merely reading off the slide, I provide real-world examples for each vocabulary word, and my own definitions. I talk about Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream Speech" - would it be a primary or secondary source? Is it authentic? Reliable? Biased? How would we know? What does interpreting evidence mean? I talk about crime scenes and detectives and how historians are, in a sense, detectives. Essentially what I'm doing is providing them with a wealth of information that is not provided on their slides - information that will be helpful when they take their "quiz" the following week. At the end, I collect their "notes" to ensure I have them for the next week.

Lesson 3: Critical Listening Wrap-Up
    ~5 minutes - Time for a Quiz!

1)   I hand out the notes the students took on the history PowerPoint. For nearly all my  students, these notes are just the PowerPoint they copied down while I was talking without any additional examples or commentary from what I spoke on. I put 7 minutes on my timer and then give them a "quiz" with these questions:

           a) What is a primary source? (They can answer this one with the information from the ppt)

           b) What is an example of a primary source? (They would have this answer in their notes if they were critically listening and documenting my examples during the lecture... but since they merely copied, many have struggled with this question)

                 c) What does it mean to be biased? (Another answer found in the notes)

                 d) How might historians be biased? (I gave them this answer in my lecture
           but not the notes!)

      ~5 minutes - Quiz Discussion

1)   Next, we discuss how it felt to take that quiz and we review the correct answers. Which questions could they answer easily? Which questions were harder? Which questions required rote memorization? Which questions required critical thinking? Were all the answers in the notes? If not, how could you have gotten that information (Answer: critical listening!). Have you felt this way on other tests before? What can be done differently to ensure more success in the classroom? This is also a time where you can discuss asking Closed and Open questions (if you've already talked about this concept) and how teachers might provide open question answers vs. closed question answers found in the notes. I also take this time to model how to generate questions that you think might be on a test based upon notes.

   
      ~10 minutes Model Notes

1)   Now in order to help cement this process, the students have to practice. I return to the PowerPoint used previously and go on to slide 26. I lecture just as I did on slide 25, adding information, examples, and my own definitions to augment the information included on the slide. But this time, I assist the students in their note taking and model what key elements should be written down and how to structure it on a page to make it easy to follow for later review. This process alone may be extended into another session if I feel the students need even more practice.

      ~5 minutes - What next?

1)   I ask all my students to select one class where the teacher lectures and make that their "focus" class. This class will be their test run in critical listening - can they focus on taking good notes while paying attention and documenting what the teacher is saying? A good choice for this focus class might be a class where they are given copies of the notes or where the notes can be accessed later on a teacher's website. In the future weeks, I check in with these students about how this focus class is going and whether or not their quiz/test grades have improved.

I hope this two-part series on addressing the need to develop critical listening skills has helped you to examine the goals of your students, develop some news lessons, and think critically about how as SLPs we can are in a great position to set them up for success in their academic classes (and in the future!).

As always, it doesn't have to be fancy, just keep it fun and functional!

• Jillian, the No-Frills SLP

Higher-Level Language: Developing Critical Listening and Self-Advocacy Skills Part 1

What Do You Mean You "Weren't Listening?!"

How many of you found yourself in a general education classroom watching your students and thinking to yourselves, "What are you doing??" You see them zone out, miss information, get on their phones, and write down only what's on the board and not what the teacher was saying. You think to yourself, "When I was in school, the teacher couldn't say two words without me analyzing their importance and writing down what was meaningful!"

But alas, our students are not us and there they sit… often feverishly copying the board or staring out the window. It drives me nuts to see students copy an entire PowerPoint word-for-word and devote so much mental energy to the task of copying that they miss the entire spoken lecture - especially when many of them have accommodations in their IEP to receive copies of PowerPoints or have note-taking assistance!!

But how many of our students are actually aware of their IEP accommodations? How many can self-advocate for their use? How many students miss assignments or turn them in half-complete because they failed to get all the instructions? And how many come to high school ill equipped to decipher what is important and what’s not over the course of their school day?

Join me for a two-part series as we look at students who fit this profile and how to help them make the most of their IEP accommodations, understand the concept of "critical listening," learn to become self-advocates, and change their note-taking habits.

Let's Try a Riddle!

Before we get into the nitty-gritty of lesson plans, let's examine the basis for why we want to cover critical listening and self-advocacy skills. Let's also examine how good we are at listening critically. As an activity, I ask my students to watch this riddle as I read along with it and ask them to take notes on what they find important. Try your hand by watching this YouTube video below...

Did you get the correct answer? Or had you forgotten the beginning of the riddle by the time you reached the end? If it stumped you, you’re in good company! Essentially none of my students write down the statement "you are a bus driver" and instead, they’re immediately drawn in to the “facts” of the numerals that follow. It mimics their classroom behavior of stressing to copy down the “facts” that could easily be located in their books instead of the instructions or analysis that the teacher is likely providing verbally.

Students have gotten defensive with me, saying things like, "You never told us the color of the bus driver's eye!!" Their emphatic frustrations remind me of the conversations they have with their teachers after failed tests... "You never told us why the Holocaust is meaningful to life in the 21st century! It wasn't in the notes!! Not fair!!" And you bet that throughout the unit on the Holocaust, the teacher was verbally making ties to life in the 21^st century that our students failed to write down (because they weren’t included with the “facts” in the PowerPoint).

Our students with auditory processing and language disorders generally struggle with taking in the auditory stimulus of the teacher talking. On the other hand, writing down notes off the board or PowerPoint (and in doing so, tuning out the teacher's lecture) is often something they can do easily. It may be scary and foreign to them to take a break from the rote copying and focus on what the teacher is actually saying.

Riddles like the example above help to highlight the fact that while solely copying down information may be the key to success in certain classes with certain teachers, it will hinder them in other classes where they are expected to take notes on the information the teacher is presenting verbally. These skills are also essential for college and can easily be incorporated into transition plan goals.

And now as high school students, they must be prepared to inform their teachers of their needs. Their teachers work with 120+ students a day and they need to understand what is expected of them. I've noticed that many teachers seem to respond more positively when the student themselves tells them "I need to re-take this test because I got less than a 60% and it's written in my IEP," instead of hearing it from a SpEd staff member and feeling as if a colleague is creating more work for them. 

So the take away this framework should be straightforward: As SLPs, it's our job to encourage the development of critical listening skills and encourage our students to stand up for their needs!

So how do we get started on that lofty task? Goals, of course!

Goal Ideas for Critical Listening

Goals are always my starting place for designing therapy units, activities and teacher consultation strategies, so writing authentic goals is something about which I’m deeply passionate. Here are some ideas for goals I might write that target critical listening activities and self-advocacy skills:

- Receptive Language Goal Ideas (Auditory Comprehension)
   By 10/17, given verbal directions and a prompt, Bobby will demonstrate understanding of 3- to 4–step classroom instructions by repeating and/or rephrasing them to his teacher with 80% accuracy in 4/5 opportunities as measured by SLP and/or teacher data.

- Expressive Language Goal Ideas (Self-Advocacy)
   By 10/17, Bobby will independently provide an IEP Accommodation Worksheet to his teacher, verbally provide 2 reasons why it must be followed, and provide explanations for 80% of his classroom IEP accommodations as measured by teacher report/SLP observation.

- Transition Goal Ideas (College Awareness)
   By 10/17, given minimal clinician assistance, Bobby will identify 3 note-taking and/or critical listening strategies that will lead to success in college-level courses as measured by student work samples.

As you can see, the development of critical listening skills and self-advocacy can be applied to a variety of student needs. I'm sure you all can think of some other awesome goals that target these skills as well!

Join me next week for a continuation of this series - including two lessons plans on engaging critical listening and self-advocacy skills! And as always, it doesn't have to be fancy, just keep it fun and functional!

• Jillian, the No-Frills SLP

Higher-Level Language: Asking Open and Closed Questions

How many of you have inherited those Speech-Language Impairment (SLI) students who are really “language only” students? They may be in a Mild/Mod or RSP program, or perhaps they’re just a lower-performing general education student. In elementary and middle school, their therapists probably drilled grammar, gave them opportunities to practice using more complex expressive language, and hammered story grammar structure.

Then, they reach high school, and you watch the real-life consequences as they receive Fs in their ELA, history, science and math classes. You call them in for their weekly sessions (because you haven’t yet had an IEP to reduce their hours!) and you wonder what on earth you’re going to target. Maybe they have a main idea goal, maybe they have an expressive grammar goal, who knows. What you do know is that this student has no study skills and is going to flunk all of 9th grade if you don't so something. What can you do to target their academic skills while still operating within a language framework?

Metacognitive Processes! What? Why?

In my opinion, one of the best ways we can help students who fit this profile is by being a teacher of “how to think about your thinking” (or in technical terms, “metacognitive skills,”). There are lots of reasons to teach metacognitive skills - the biggest one in my book being that our students don’t naturally learn these skills in the way neurotypical students naturally pick up on them. But our higher-level students certainly have the ability to use metacognitive skills when explicitly taught. And who else will teach them these skills but us? It’s certainly not something I’ve seen tackled in my school’s freshman curriculum.

One metacognitive process I like to start with it the concept of “asking yourself questions.” You probably do it all the time often without noticing. People who are “good at learning” ask themselves things like, “What did I just read?,” “Do I agree with that?,” “Why is this important?,” and “Why should I trust this author?”  

But did you notice something? Were any of those questions “closed questions?” As in, could they be answered with a short, factual statement? No, good learners with high language skills tend to ask themselves “open questions” - questions that require a decent amount of thinking and language in order to answer correctly. And in asking open questions, our comprehension of the material is confirmed, our misunderstandings are brought to light, and new interpretations of the material takes place.

When we teach students the difference between open and closed questions, they are learning the cognitive skill of thinking about their own thinking. They are forced to think, “Am I asking comprehension questions?,” (Probably not).  “If I am, am I asking basic closed questions or am I stretching myself and asking open questions that require me to come up with a more complex, deep answer?” We want them to go through this process in order to better engage with the material they are reading or listening to!!

When all is said and done, I wish every student at my entire high school could be given this lesson. The importance of understanding your own thinking cannot be understated at this age in development!

So… How do I Teach The Open/Closed Question Strategy?

I was first introduced to this metacognitive skill when I read Claudia Dunaway’s fabulous book “Think and Speak Successfully.” Sometime in the future, I’ll write a blog post on my favorite mass-produced products (hint: there aren’t many) and Claudia’s book will be at the top of my list. It’s a must-have for any SLPs that work with adolescents with higher-level language processing deficits. I won’t go into the specifics of her strategy here, but I did create a tool to augment the teaching of this concept.

This tool functions like a flowchart. At the top, it helps students identify what kinds of question they’re asking based on the language they’re using. As the flow chart moves down, it helps remind them why practicing each type of question is most effective in a certain situation (e.g. answering a multiple-choice test or a free response).

Over several sessions, we then practice applying this flowchart and the principles to real life examples in several situations. I typically provide the students with a short article and we discuss how we would approach one of the following scenarios in regards to what we’ve just read:

• Preparing for a multiple-choice exam (i.e. practice asking closed questions to double-check that you know the answers!)
• Preparing for free response essay questions (i.e. practice asking open questions to make sure that you can interpret the material correctly)
• Preparing to complete book reports, essays, and other writing assignments (i.e. practice asking open questions to make sure that you can interpret the material correctly)
• Participating in classroom-based academic conversations where students are expected to ask each other questions about a topic

You can download this tool here at my TPT Store: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Metacognitive-Language-Strategy-OpenClosed-Question-Flowchart-2544952

What About Carryover?

Carryover with metacognitive strategies is tough. You can’t follow the student around to all their classes to ensure that in class they are engaging in asking themselves open questions, after all! I have distributed copies of this flowchart to some of my general education ELA teachers in order for them to make copies available to students when they are engaging in academic conversations. It would also be possible to shrink down the flowchart in order to make a small copy that could be affixed to a student’s planner, journal, binder, etc. In the end, what we want is for our students to use this strategy as often as possible so it becomes like second nature!

If you have any ideas on how to ensure that your students actually use this strategy in the “real world,” I’d love to hear about them in the comments!

As always, it doesn't have to be fancy, just keep it fun and functional!

• Jillian, the No-Frills SLP