i'm shannon. a pediatric speech-language pathologist and founder of speechy musings!
materials
therapy ideas
reviews
freebies
articulation
Don’t Skip Over Sentences in Speech Therapy
One of my biggest mistakes as a newer SLP was equating “comprehension” with “text”, or at least longer chunks of language including stories, articles, and paragraphs of information.
But, after reading a few very insightful research articles about the importance of sentence-level work in speech therapy sessions, I changed things up. And it’s made a huge difference in comprehension skills of my students!
This may sound obvious to some, but if learners can’t understand the individual sentences that make up a larger chunk of language or text, this will create a huge hurdle in overall comprehension.
The ability to comprehend a sentence is supported by many foundational skills including the understanding of vocabulary and syntax, as well as executive functioning skills including working memory.
As students get older, texts get longer and sentences get more complex. This puts significant demands on both their language skills (vocabulary, syntax, etc… ) and executive functioning skills (working memory, planning, etc…).
We know from research that specific sentence types (sentences that include specific types of phrases and clauses) are harder for kids with language disorders to understand.
Because of this research, the complex sentence types I most often target include adverb clauses, relative clauses, or object complement clauses. These types of subordination make up a large majority of complex sentences your students will encounter and need to understand.
In addition, I might also target other complex language including reflexive pronouns, compound predicates, as well as longer, more complicated noun phrases, verb phrases, and prepositional phrases.
Here’s 3 of my favorite activities when to increase comprehension of these sentence types:
Hope this is helpful for you!
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
i'm shannon. a pediatric speech-language pathologist and founder of speechy musings!
materials
therapy ideas
reviews
freebies
articulation
Get access to freebies, quarterly sales, and a stellar community of SLPs!
Terms & Conditions
Speechy Musings LLC does NOT accept forms of cash advertising,
sponsorships, paid insertions, or complimentary products.
Copyright © Speechy Musings
Privacy Policy
Site Credits
LEAVE A COMMENT!
share this post on