When I’m working with children in speech and language sessions, I do my best to make things as easy as possible by finding one book, video, or activity to focus on for the day. Next, I adjust my activities within sessions to target varied goals (Check out another preschool language activity that could last you all day here.). Today’s themed SLP unit goes along with The Popcorn Shop by Alice Low. I’m basically a sucker for any book with a good rhyming scheme, which The Popcorn Shop has. Really, you could use any popcorn themed book to introduce the activity, but I found that there aren’t very many options when it comes to children’s books about popcorn! Maybe I need to get into the children’s book writing business…
Each session began with me (or my students) reading the book. Next, I used this free resource from Teachers Pay Teachers (created by Lauren Lacour of Busy Bee Speech) to play an open-ended game targeting my students’ particular goals. The game is similar to most open-ended games. The SLP asks a question or gives the student a task (e.g. use target sound/word in a sentence), and if the student succeeds in trying, they take a card from the pile. The card will reveal a number, and that’s how many pieces of popcorn they put into their container. There are also some cards that require students to give back pieces of popcorn. Rather than using real popcorn, I opted for some DIY popcorn made by crumpling up squares of yellow construction paper. Each student had their own popcorn box to put their pieces into. I generally try to get away with NOT counting pieces at the end of the session to determine a winner. Instead, we would have a “popcorn party” and I let the students throw their fake popcorn up into the air (and, of course, race to see how fast they can pick it up-haha!).
Try this activity out with your next elementary group and let me know how it goes! What are some of your favorite books or open-ended games for speech therapy?