Love it and List it: Fluency

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Time for the Love It & List It Linky Party!  This month is all about Fluency.  It's rare when I have a fluency student, but when I do, these are my "Go To" products:

~Fluency Criterion Program:  This program is great for teaching Easy Speaking Voice (ESV).  It starts with words beginning with vowels, then goes through phrases & sentences.  After that, you teach the student how to use "light contact" with consonants.  

~Easy Does It for Fluency is another "go to" product.  I  start using this after the easy contact phases of Fluency Criterion Program.  I have the materials printed out and laminated.  The activities are great to use for language, too.

~  There is an app called "Fluently" that I really wanted to try out on one of my students, since this is the first dysfluent student I've had "after iPad", but unfortunately it isn't working!  I contacted the developers; he got back to me pretty quickly, but we weren't able to resolve the problem.  I'm hoping for an update soon so I can use it!  When the student has an "irregularity", the green button turns red.




That's pretty much all I've got in the way of fluency.  I do a "spot check" at the end of every 9 weeks:  I record the student in conversational speech, then go back and record the total number of syllables and the number of stuttered syllables.  I made this quick tracking chart to use to help me with that:
(The chart actually looks a lot better than what is shown here.)
The chart is really easy to make on Excel.  I use 25 blocks/line to make it easy to count the total number of syllables.
And now, a "shameless plug":  I've noticed that there are several of us speech bloggers who write a "Peek at My Week" or "Week in Review" on Fridays. I thought it would be a lot more convenient to readers if we have them in one place.  I contacted Teach Speech 365 to suggest that she host a weekly linky, but she ended up giving me her blessing to host one on my blog.  And, Jenna was nice enough allow me to plug the linky through her linky!  The linky will be up every week on Fridays at 12:01 a.m., except for the week that we have "Love It & List It", then it will go up on 12:01 a.m. on Saturday. You can join in any time during the week until Wednesday night at 11:59 p.m. We'll see how it goes!  

Now, hurry over to Speech Room News' new digs and join in the party!

It's All in Organization: Data Collecting

I've read several threads on Facebook about how stressed a lot of School SLPs are.  I don't know if I'm not doing something right, or if I've just been in the field long enough to be able to go with the flow, but I'm not feeling the stress others are.  Not right now, anyway.  At the beginning of the year I definitely felt it!  Screenings, evaluations, placements, and scheduling all made for some very stressful days and nights.  At the beginning of the year, I stayed at school until 4:00 on some days, just trying to keep my head above water.  My kids are all out of high school, so I have that luxury of not worrying about getting my kids from daycare, or making sure they're picked up from after school activities.  I also don't have to get kids ready for school, so I can be at work early to prepare for the day.  
How do I do it?  It's all in the organization.  I have a notebook where I keep the following: Labels for data sheets, sticker charts, progress charts (on some of my artic students), attendance forms, and a cardstock page for each student that has their objectives.  When the sheet of labels for data is complete, I put each individual's labels on the cardstock page.  This works for me.  When it's time for progress reports, all I have to do is look at their data labels and put in that information. 

Week in Review

I've noticed there are several speech bloggers who write a weekly posting outlining their weekly activities.  Since I'm a BIG fan of linky parties, I thought...why not?  I contacted TeachSpeech365 to see if she was interested in hosting, but she ended up giving me her blessing to start one.  
I'm having trouble getting the linky to appear; all I'm getting to show up is the code, so I've got to figure out what's going on with my template.  Hopefully I'll be able to get the linky up in the next week or two, so be on the lookout for it!
6:52 pm:  Update:  the linky is UP!  It's easy to participate:
1)  Grab my button on the side bar.  highlight the code, copy and paste it at the top of your post (like I did in this post).  Some of you have your own really cute graphic, so keep using yours!  This isn't a requirement!
2)  Write your post like you normally do/would.
3)  At the bottom of my post, click on "Click here to enter" and follow the directions.
4)  Come back to see some other great ideas from SLP Bloggers!
It's that easy!  The Linky will be up on Fridays beginning at 12:01 a.m., and will stay up until Wednesday nights at 11:59 p.m.

Should I Stay or Should I Go

Do you need a change?  Are you struggling with whether to stay in your current position or grab an opportunity that has come your way?  I think I can help, or, at the very least, give you something to think about.
In 29 years, I have worked in 6 different school systems in 3 different states.  I can't imagine how it would be to work in the same school system for all of my career.  I changed states (from Ga. to SC) because of my husband's transfer, and (from SC to Tn.) for personal reasons.  Within those states, the moves have been for personal reasons.
I learned something valuable at each of my places of employment.  In my 2nd school system, I learned to take a less than stellar evaluation and turn it into a positive.  I have a lot to thank that special ed director for:  that evaluation turned me into a better SLP (or Speech Clinician as we were called then).  My Nursing Home experience taught me the importance of documentation.  To this day, I document everything.  In fact, it saved one of my site supervisors:  he called me after we moved to SC because they were being audited, and he needed to know when I saw my kids.  BAM!  I had it in my calendar, so he was saved!

Stick a Fork in This Week

Affiliate links have been included in this post.
Well, it looks like this work week is done after only 2 days.  Craziness.  We had a snow day yesterday, but the roads didn't get troubling until last night.  Better safe than sorry, right?
I was torn between doing Valentine's Day Activities or moving on to the Olympics, especially since we're out on Monday for Presidents' Day.  Valentine's won out!

Wednesday Waffs

I've been saving several funnies up so I would have enough for a post!  Enjoy!

~  A fourth grader was "tidying up" for me.  She said, "What?  I like to tidy up, just like my grandmother.  She's in a nursing home but she always cleans up, even though she's not allowed to."  (So I immediately think dementia or Alzheimers, thinking she's not allowed to because she puts things where they don't belong, or wanders into other patients' rooms and cleans up.  It turns out that she's not allowed to because she's a risk for falling.)

~  A student that has autism was in my room the other day.  He was answering in a very loud voice.  I looked at him and said quietly, "I'm right here."  He continued in a loud voice.  I repeated, "I'm right here."  He looked at me, grinned, and said, "I know.  I see you!"  I had to explain that I meant that he was too loud and needed to speak quietly.  We're already working on inferences, so I guess there's more to do in that area!

~  A First Grader told me that one of the male teachers likes a lot of the "womans" in the school.  Oh, and one more thing:  He's married to Lady Gaga.

~  While reading "Snowmen at Night" by Carolyn Buehner, when we came to the page where the snowmen are on the ice, a student said, "When the ice melts, wouldn't it turn to black ice?"

What funny/interesting things have your students said lately?

Scheduling Meetings: Easy as Pie

Through various forms of social networking, I keep reading that there are SLPs out there who have so many questions about organizing their IEP Meetings.  Maybe I'm just very fortunate to work in a school system that values technology, but I don't get what all the confusion is about.  
My school system uses "Microsoft Outlook" for email.  We use EdPlan by PCG Education for our IEP Process.  It's very easy to figure out when IEPs and 3 year Re-evals  are due.   This is an example of 2 of the columns:
Just by clicking on Proj Elig (which is the 3 year re-eval date or the day that my 60 days runs out for initials) or IEP End, I have the dates in order.  

Therapy Week in Review: 02/07/14

Affliliate links have been included at the bottom of this post for your convenience!
We had a whole week of school, and it felt like a very long week!  
I go into the developmental preschool classroom on Mondays and do a class lesson.  This week we read "Snowman, Snowman, What do you See?" on the Smartboard, courtesy of Chapel Hill Snippets.  This was really neat, because the kids touch the winter item that's named in the story, and if they choose the correct one, it spins and makes a noise.


Feeble Attempt

Since we only had school 1 day last week (early dismissal on Tuesday), I have a very feeble attempt at what I did in therapy last week.  Or, should I say, on Monday.
The COTA & I are trying to do a craftivity with our preschool class once a month.  This month, I read "Snowmen at Night" by Caroline Bruehner, and we made these cute snowmen that I saw on Pinterest:
We used real buttons for the buttons, googly eyes,foam for the scarf & hat, construction paper for the nose, and linguini for the arms.  That's what happens when you wait until the night before to look back to see what you need.  You end up looking in the pantry for something to use!

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