Knowing WHAT book to choose for your speech and language therapy session can be one of the most difficult decisions. You can use any book, but some books are definitely better than others, especially for targeting specific speech areas.
This may be one of the reasons why you don’t feel confident with using literacy-based therapy…yet. [We teach our students to have a growth mindset, so why don’t we do it for ourselves! 😉]
There are SO many factors to consider when choosing a book for speech therapy. To help you out, I’ve broken down for you 3 of the factors you should think about when choosing the best book for your mixed group students.
3 Things to Consider When Choosing the PERFECT Book for Speech Therapy:
- Theme and time of year
- Pictures and type of books
- Targets in the book
Factor #1: Theme and Time of Year
One of the EASIEST factors to consider is the theme and time of year. Ask yourself the following questions:
- Do I need a holiday or seasonal book?
- Do I want to be able to use this book for several weeks?
- Do I want to be able to revisit this at the end of the school year as a review? (Want a year-round book?)
For example, as much as I love Christmas books, I probably shouldn’t be reading them past the first week or two of January. 🙂
Some of my favorite year-round themes are food, bug/insect, around the house, and zoo and wild animals. Click HERE for some resources to help you get started.
Factor #2: Pictures and Type of Books
To make sure your students will be engaged, you HAVE to make sure the book is appropriate for your audience. For example, if you have a group of 4th graders working on their “R” sound, you probably wouldn’t want to choose a touch-and-feel board book.
- Some other questions to ask yourself include:
- Are you looking for a fiction or a nonfiction book?
- Do you want a book with people for characters? Are these characters inclusive of the population you serve?
I am definitely guilty of this second question. I have SO many books with animals as the main characters, but I have been trying to reach more audiences with more inclusive stories the past couple of years. And the great thing is, more publishers are producing more inclusive stories so they’re becoming less difficult to find!
Factor #3: Targets in the Book
This factor is definitely the most time-consuming of the three included here. It is also probably THE MOST IMPORTANT.
To know what targets are in the book, I read it a couple of times. This way I can focus on language concepts one read through, articulation during the second read through, etc.
There are some lists and search engines out there where you can search for books based on targets, which is super helpful.
If you have a huge personal collection that you can’t remember what each book targets, create a spreadsheet where you have the book listed next to all of the articulation, phonological process/patterns, and language targets. Then you can quickly search by target or theme to find what you need.
If you don’t own a ton of books and prefer to borrow them, you can still make a list of your favorite books and targets! Then you have an easy way to quickly plan and grab what you want to use with your students.
Books are such incredible tools for speech and language therapy sessions, but sometimes as a busy school-based SLP, it can be difficult to find the right books to engage all of your mixed groups!
Want to learn even MORE evidence-based tips, ideas, and strategies for effectively using children’s books in narrative-based speech and language therapy sessions? Earn professional development hours (PDH) while learning how to:
- Choose the PERFECT book for your mixed group therapy sessions (even more things to consider and examples of HOW to do it!)
- Find speech and language therapy targets in any book
- Plan narrative-based interventions
- Use books with mixed therapy groups
- Take data and write goals for narrative-based therapy
- Use books with gestalt language processors
- AND SO MUCH MORE!
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Ann D. says “Why reinvent the wheel when Stacey did all the work for you! She has so much experience using books in therapy, This course has a wealth of in- depth samples… I’m super eager to implement all the suggested books, handouts, strategies and tips from this course.”
Learn more TODAY by clicking the picture below.
Comments
Post a Comment