Problem Solving

Anyone have good resources for problem solving skills, picking what the most important problem is etc? I have run out and we still have several months left in the year!

social stories

Does anyone have some social stories on safety? I was asked to write a few social stories for a high school student about what to do for a fire, appropriate physical contact, and also about stranger danger. Or do you know any good places to find social stories. Most of the ones I've seen aren't real "social stories" and they're honestly not very good. I've written a couple, but I'd feel better if I had some better examples to look at first.

I know you're not supposed to write them negatively, i.e. "I don't..." or "I'm not..." or "I will not..." but I don't know how to write "I will not stalk, touch, or stare at people" in a positive tone--any ideas??

p.s. If anyone's going to graduation, I'll see you there. :) It seems very anti-climactic to go, but hey, we earned it, right? (and my little sister is graduating, so I get to walk with her)

Some artic and language questions from Alyse

Alright, since I'm new to this whole blogging thing--you guys are going to have to be patient with me. Lara, I like the label idea--you're always so organized! (I just don't know how to add labels). So, my apologies in advance. This week is spring break here in Indiana, which is great, but all I can do is stress over how many weeks of school are left (how lame is that?

Does anyone else have issues with overly sensitive kids?? I have two kindergarten boys (in the same group) who cry at every single session. It kills me. (I didn't think I was THAT mean) :) One nasalizes ALL of his fricatives (which is very difficult--you should try it) and the other uses ingressive fricatives (s,z,th--also a very difficult thing to do consistently). Neither has made much (if any) progress, which gets them very upset, and it's gotten to the point where they will just refuse to do anything. I may just try to see them one-on-one to reduce the pressure. I don't know.

Another question though, I have a brother and sister (1st and 2nd grades) who have serious language deficits. The 1st grader's teacher has been asking me for suggestions, which I'm trying to provide. Next week we have an RTI/GEI meeting for her and I'm supposed to come up with some solutions for the whole "team." I can't think of any brilliant ideas to share--and it doesn't help that all of my stuff from grad school is still in UT. (very sad) So, if any of you brilliant girls has ANY ideas--I'm open. The teacher is great, she'd be willing to do anything. (It's just sad not to know what else to tell her)

Labels

I thought it might be nice to have our posts somewhat organized in case you want to search for a particular subject, so I think we should add labels to our posts. I have gone ahead and added labels to the existing posts (I hope that is okay with everyone, if you don't like the label I put you can go and change it, I won't mind) and added a label menu on the right side column below websites. So as you post either label it with one of the existing labels or if it doesn't fit then create a new one. If you haven't ever done labels before . . . when you are typing up your post if you look down at the bottom there is another small text box that says Labels for this post: :) Just write the label in there and you are good to go! The label list on the right will update itself I think so you don't have to worry about it.

Smelly Day

You know that you are in trouble when you are in the middle of a speech session at 8:45 am in the morning with a PRESCHOOL kid and all of the sudden a horrible smell hits you!

You sniff and try to concentrate on breathing out of your mouth and continuing your lesson when out of the blue he says, "I hate farts..." What do you do? Mark it down as data after all it was a spontaneous utterance...If I would have known that this would foreshadow what was to come, I would have locked up and went home early. My speech space is shared with the Guided Reading Library. It is literally a closet and has no ventilation. I usually leave the door open because there is no window to the room. However, when the air doesn't move - it doesn't move. For the remainder of the day, I had horrible smell after horrible smell come wafting over the table.

Phonological Processess

So, I really don't remember a whole lot from my phonology class. I think I took it sometime while I was at ISU....? So, do you approach therapy with students with lots of phonological processes any different than therapy with kids with distorted articulation or various substitution errors? I seem to have more with little kiddos with phonological processes than older kids with distortions (lateralized s), etc.