I realized quickly after starting as an SLP that language skills and executive functioning skills are incredibly intertwined. Since then, I’ve purchased several books, attended countless webinars, and tried tons of strategies with my students.  After lots of trial and error, I’ve found a few strategies to be effective and simple enough to teach to […]

For the past couple of years, I’ve really loved printing various visuals for my therapy sessions onto Post It notes. They’re great because I can stick them in student notebooks, directly onto assignments, and they’re disposable! I’ve gotten a ton of questions about how I do it so I thought I’d share a short tutorial […]

This past school year, I realized that my students fit into one of the following categories. The category that they fall in usually indicates what behavior management style I use with them. After this insight, I’ve really enjoyed modifying the reward systems I had in place, as well as the behavior management systems I used! […]

A few weeks ago, I recorded a few of my sessions. I noticed that I said many of the same phrases over and over. After more thought, I decided to start writing down some of my most used phrases, especially ones related to behavior management. They are below, with a short commentary on some examples […]

I work primarily with students in 5th and 6th grade. By this age, most of my students can compare and contrast when given items like dog/cat or house/apartment. However, most of them still demonstrate functional difficulty using these skills in the classroom. Working with older students makes you realize that being able to do a […]

Those of you who’ve been around here for a while know that I’ve switched jobs/settings quite a few times, working in an outpatient setting, a preschool, an elementary school, a high school, and now I’m full time in a middle school (and love it!!). One skills I’ve targeted at all of those settings and levels […]

I’ve gotten a few emails lately asking for book recommendations for teaching narratives, plot structure, and story grammar parts. I have quite a few favorites that I find myself pulling out over and over so I thought I’d share them with you! Below are my favorites: If you’re looking for tons of ideas on how […]

One of the things I was most nervous about when starting to work at the middle school level was working on the dreaded /r/ sound. Honestly, before starting this job, I didn’t feel comfortable eliciting /r/ at all. In the past couple years, I’ve gotten so much more comfortable with it and wanted to share […]

Oh middle school… There is so much distrust at this age, especially at the beginning of the school year. So many of my students don’t want to come, get embarrassed, or are just “over” speech by this age. I don’t give out prizes or use tons of sticker or reward charts at this age either. […]

Working in a middle school, many of the students I see demonstrate decreased vocabulary skills when compared to their peers. I’ve spent the past year coming up with a thorough packet to target these skills in a meaningful, evidence-based, effective way. Read on to learn more about how I’m improving the vocabulary skills of my […]

This past school year I switched to working full-time for a new, wonderful district. The position they offered me was full-time in a middle school. I did not want to work in a middle school, but really wanted to work in this district so I took it, hoping an elementary position would open up soon. […]

I’ve switched around jobs a couple of times since graduation. I’ve worked with a variety of ages and levels, however I always seem to be targeting object function in one way or another.  All of my students do better, learn faster, and grasp concepts more thoroughly when I use visuals. I wanted to share a […]