More Classroom Pics!

Here are some new pics of updates in my classroom!

New netbooks and desks!

Color coded stations

Completed SGM Station! Narrative text structure on left, expository text structure on right

Narrative & Expository Maps and Materials

Story Grammar Marker tools

Data Wall

(stages of narrative development)

Book units display by grade

My room finally feels complete! :)

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S/L Goal Rings

So I came across this post on Pinterest about how this teacher uses Strategy Rings in her classroom. I thought it would be cool to put a different spin on it and use it in the speech and language classroom! 

Hers looked like this:

Mine look like this:

Each of my students have a key ring that they take off the wall every time they come into therapy.  I tell them which of their goals to flip to and they set it out in front of them. This way they know that they're working on and I remember what goal each student is working on that day!  Each goal is color coded; lime green=phonology, orange=pragmatics, blue=semantics, yellow=syntax/morphology, and pink=discourse. The students know these primary areas of language.  Please see my previous post on how I give the lessons on the Six Strands of Language at the beginning of the school year.

Grab the 'Today I am Working On' template here.  I just printed them on colored paper, laminated them, then wrote the goals on with dry erase marker.

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Entertainment Break!!

Here are my high school dancers performing my routine at a girls basketball game last week:

Does anyone else out there coach a dance team?!  I would love to know how your season is going and maybe see some videos too! :)

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Conversation Unit Reflection

So I have mixed feelings about my Conversation Unit....

For those of you who haven't read previous posts, the focus of my first trimester was on conversation, based on MindWing Concepts program/materials.  I used their Facilitating Relationship manual to guide my assessments, lessons, and goals.  

My initial assessments went pretty well.  I followed the assessment guide in the manual as I looked at three specific things with regard to clarification skills- Repairing Receptive Conversational Breakdowns, Repairing Expressive Breakdowns, and Preventing Expressive Breakdowns.  I recorded the conversations on my iPad for later analysis.  To be honest, the beginning of the school year was so busy I didn't really get around to scoring all of my assessments that I took so much time completing :(.  It definitely requires a lot of time to listen to all of the recordings again and keep track of all the different areas.  

For the intervention aspect of it, we learned about Six-Second Stories (a sentence containing who, did what, where, and when) and the kids did really begin to latch on to the concept and loved using the Story Grammar Marker tool to help them.  We learned the 4 SGM icons used to tell a Six Second Story (character, action, setting-where, setting-when) and had a discussion about why we must include all of those things when we begin a conversation with other people.  

To teach the kids how to Repair Receptive Breakdowns, I would tell them a Six Second Story WITHOUT one of the 4 elements. So I might say, "Maria rode her bike to the store" (purposefully leaving out the WHEN).  The kids would fill out their Six Second Story Therapy Sheet (4 boxes labeled Who, Did What, Where, When) and figure out which element I missed.  They would then have to ask me the appropriate question to get that piece of information.  So in my example above they would be expected to ask "WHEN did Maria ride her bike to the store?"  We specifically talked about appropriate questions for each element prior to this activity.  Eventually, I faded out the use of the visual therapy sheet and they had to mentally determine which element I omitted and ask the appropriate question.  Many of the groups got really good at this skill.  It allowed them to Prevent Breakdowns (knowing they had to include all 4 elements) as well as Repairing Receptive Breakdowns.  Those two topics took longer than I had intended, therefore we did not get to Repairing Expressive Breakdowns.  The manual explained for instruction in that area, the SLP would teach the child to read body language of their communication partner to determine confusion and need for clarification.  

I guess what I realized after this unit was that even though many of my kids leave out important information in conversations and have trouble with requesting clarification, this unit would be more beneficial for students with autism, Aspergers, etc.  I would have loved to do this in a social skills group, but unfortunately I do not have one of those this year!

If anything, the kids learned how to write a good sentence, which is something the majority of them didn't previously know how to do!

Oh well, lesson learned.  On to the Narrative/Expository Units! :)

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Behavior Management System

When I first started my job in the schools, my plan was to NOT put a behavior management system into place.  I felt that my 3-5 graders should just know how to behave in school and shouldn't get a prize if they do.  Well, after only a few weeks, I realized that was not going to work!  Most of my groups did behave very well during our sessions, however there were a few that did not.  I thought maybe I could just have a system for those particular groups but with this age group that just does not work.  Plus I started shifting my thinking and realizing it wouldn't be so bad give them something to work hard for.

Last year, my district started requiring data walls in every classroom, so I focused that wall on behavior management.  Since we usually only have 30 minutes with each group 2-3X per week, behavior is definitely something that impacts the success of those sessions.  My data wall last year looked like this:

Each student had a snowman/leaf/flower (depending on the season) with their first name on it.  Through out the session I would keep track of how many times I had to redirect each child.  If they never had to be redirected, they put their snowman on a level 3.  If they had to be redirected 1-3 times, they put their snowman on a level 2.  If they had to be redirected more than 3 times, they were down at a level 1.  At the end of each session they would move their snowman to the appropriate level and I would write the level number on the snowman so I could see the their whole behavior history!  If they got 10 3's in a row, they got a prize.

Now the kids absolutely loved this data wall as they could visually see their progress and didn't want to be embarrassed by being one of the few on a level 2 or 1.  HOWEVER, it was a pain in the butt for me!  I was already in enough of a hurry trying to get my entire lesson crammed in 30 minutes so having to keep track of redirections for each kid then go over to the wall at the end of EVERY session and move them to the correct level and write down their number just wasn't efficient.  And trust me, the kids ALWAYS noticed if I forgot to write their number down from the previous session!  It just wasn't working.

So this year I tried something much more simple.  I went and bought a plastic fishbowl from Petco and put it on the welcome table by my door (got the idea from Pinterest of course!).  I bought some letter stickers from Michaels and wrote Peachy Speechy Behavior on it, then jazzed it up with some star stickers. 

At the beginning of each session I tell the kids that they are working for tickets.  I say that in order to get a ticket, they must be good listeners, stay on-task and on-topic, participate in group discussions, and follow directions immediately.  I put the tickets right on the table or carpet where are sitting so they can see them as a reminder.  At the end of the session I simply use my judgement to determine whether or not they deserve a ticket.

Tickets are from the 50/50 Party Store in my town.

Each month I draw 7 names out of the fishbowl and post the winners' names on a piece of paper on the back of my door.  The winners get to pick a prize.  The kids have been loving this system and haven't said a word about my system last year so I think it's a winner!  And since I only do the drawing once per month, I am not spending a ton of money on prizes.

Simple. Manageable. Gets the job done.

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"I Can..." Wall

Just thought I would share with you a fun speech display I created on the boring wall outside of my classroom!  I always make sure my kids are reminded of their speech and language goals so they always know why they are with me and what they are working toward.  I decided to have them create "I Can" statements to put a positive spin on their goals and in words they truly understand.  It is nice to have a display outside of my room so teachers and students walking past know what we are working on in here!  During parent/teacher conferences the kids were really excited to show their parents the display and explain their goals. 

Here is what it looks like:

 (Sorry the lighting isn't very good back in my corner of the building!)

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IT'S BEEN A MONTH ALREADY?!?!?!

Wow, I can't believe it has been almost a month since my last post!  Between all the IEPs, lesson planning, parent/teacher conferences, working my other SNF job, high school poms, and my new 4th and 5th grade dance team, I just haven't had the energy to sit down and blog!  I am very sorry about that and I will do my best to catch up within the next week or so :).

Upcoming topics: Speech and Language Curriculum Makeover (yes, I have already made changes-no surprise here!), Thematic Language Units, Goal Rings, Using Edmodo in the S/L Classroom,  Oral Writing, 'I Can' Wall, and possibly others.

In the meantime, please enjoy the Dancing Tigers first performance!.... (fast forward to 45 seconds)

(Our matching t-shirts and pink/black pom poms will be arriving within the next few weeks)

Hopefully these adorable 4th and 5th graders have made up for my lack of blog updates :-D

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