Page 34 - Literacy Based Speech Language Therapy Activities Digital Version

Literacy-Based Speech Language Therapy Activities

5. Choose books that align with the curriculum
As a young speech pathologist, I was confronted with a caseload that was so large and staggeringly

diverse that it nearly brought an immediate end to my early career. I worked across two campuses
with 65 Spanish-speaking students and conducted evaluations on another five campuses. Twenty-six
of my students were in a 3-year-old half day program and many of them had multiple disabilities.
What is the best way to continue exposure to what we focused on in therapy when I wasn’t with my

students?

Curriculum-based intervention materials can simultaneously enrich language and teach academic
concepts. Choose books or stories that go along with the academic theme. This way:

 We give students multiple opportunities to practice their concepts back in the classroom
 They have the vocabulary to talk about the homework they are showing their parents
 We make teachers happy because they feel supported

Speech Therapy Inclusion – Reaping the Benefits of Working in

the Classroom

Less than 30% of speech pathologists do speech therapy in the classroom. Yet, classroom-based
therapy gives us the opportunity to:

 Improve our relationships with teachers
 Have our therapy map directly over academic goals
 Reduce our therapy planning by using the content and materials that teachers are developing
each week

But how can we successfully make the transition from independent group therapy to reaping the

rewards of collaborating with speech therapy inclusion?

6 Models for Co‐teaching in Speech Therapy Inclusion
Let's talk about the six models for co-teaching to show how speech and language intervention can
overlap with academic needs.

One Teaches ‐ One Observes
The One Teaches – One Observes model is the most commonly reported model used by SLPs. We
do gain information on what is going on in the classroom, but we don’t directly have an impact.

Overall, it is a great opportunity to see the grade level content.

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