Collection of Ducks

 Planning for children's interests doesn't always mean activities but the resources you provide to support play, and other areas of learning through a play based situation. This area was set up to encourage speech sounds/ symbolic sounds of a child with limited speech. He had shown an interest in ducks and liked some simple songs.

 All children enjoyed this and the ducks were displayed alongside in baskets, daily it would get back to this. There was exploring, sorting, some duck sounds made by said child LOTS made by everyone else.

Suplemental materials include books e.g. nine ducks nine and song card.

Stammering Poem

I generally don't share much of myself on this blog, and I originally set it up to share ideas etc. relating to SEN and inclusion, it has evolved along the way.

But this post whilst relates to inclusion/ SEN is actually a poem written by myself to describe the experience I have with stammering. This was a big issue when I was a child, but I kind of grew out if it with some occasions when I would but limited impact. At present however whilst not major (by many's terms) it is a feature of my daily life and somewhat frustrating! I hope that you will find it interesting:

I stammer, I stutter

But nothing at all

I stand there in limbo

As I try to recall

The clock it is ticking

My words stuck inside

Not supposed to be hard

But the word it just hides

A repetition of sound

Or a curious stop

Brain in a frenzy

Find a word to just swap!

The options are thus

Words remain hidden

Or lexical battle

Till fault overridden!

The British Stammering Association has so good advice sheets (particularly for children)

Photo puzzle

So it's been forever.... since I posted doesn't time fly? I've had rather a lot going on sorry, so here we go.

 Simple shape puzzle bought from supermarket (or charity/ thrift store) select photos of child and their family and stick under the shapes. I laminated mine to make it durable and also can be pulled up eventually with a sharp knife.

You could also stick photos underneath that relate to words a child with language difficulties is working on.

Funky Foam Fishing

From boats to fishing....

Funky foam makes most wonderful fish (if a little dead, floating on water), when accompanied by a tea strainer, mini fishing net or in this case a spoon? It provides a great fishing activity. I originally did this a responsive activity in pre-school sunday group where I wrote words on one side, with affirming words about what God thought of the, subsequently a memory verse. You could equally do the affirming words with any group of children, even allowing the children to each pass thier fish to a friend. This group of fish had various emotions drawn on to allow discussion about emotions, there are any number of possibilities (speech sounds, numbers, phonics, colours...) and plain simple free play too.

Ribbon Sticks

I have coveted these ribbon sticks called carnival sticks fromJabadao national centre for movement, learning and health, the most wonderful organisation dedicated to creative movement opportunities.

In a moment of creative inspiration with only a short time on my hands and a need for something extra for a gift for a baby I made a couple of similar sticks. All I used were a pair of old think stripy tights, craft ribbon/ braid (non fray) and pencils with the end blunted (I didn't have any dowel).

Having a bit more time that originally thought I made a little container to put them in, and to work on fine motor skills too. I think I'll be making a rather large set of these.

Poundland Creation

So, used the "great" football match to create resources to support the bucket of plastic fruit ice-cubes.

Transferring

Transferring fruit into dish using tongs

Transferring fruits using tongs into matching coloured cups.

Transferring using tongs into compartments with matching picture.

Transferring using tongs into matching coloured silicone cases (only enough space for two fruits)

Repeating Patterns

Following and continuing ABAB pattern. Using velcroable matching fruits onto a velcro strip, allowing easy adapting or children creating their own patterns.

As above but permanent patterns following an ABCABC pattern.

Feeding Monster

I made this cute little model out of a food can (coffee mate) for feeding him the pieces of food. You could obviously use verbal instructions for a receptive language activity, particularly for stepped or sequential instructions e.g. "Feed monster an orange, banana and a strawberry." But for independent activity:

Pictures of fruits placed on a velcro strip, child feeds that "menu" to the monster. Ideal for use in a a workstation.

Laminated cards with numbers written on with a dry wipe pen, child feeds the monster that amount of each fruit. Ideal for use in a workstation.

Children select what fruit they want to feed to monster, velcro onto menu and feed him (or a friend feeds him). The menu can be used in imaginative play, to select fruits for fruit salad.

More about that Monster tomorrow.

"The only kind of learning which significantly influences behavior is self-discovered or self-appropriated learning - truth that has been assimilated in experience." Carl Rogers

Speech sounds

Some children have difficulty developing individual sounds within speech. Generally these will solve themselves through maturity other children need support from a speech therapist, who will ascertain the precise nature of their difficulties and recommend the best course of action. In my experience the resulting recommendations either to hearing the sounds and discriminating and or producing the sounds in isolation moving on to blending with vowel sounds and eventually whole words. Black Sheep Press produce a range of great resources to support, but due to the generic nature often do not tap into the individual child's needs and interests, which we in the early years are expert at.

These resources were developed with that in mind, if a child is interested in threading make pictures with things beggining with that sound or make that sound to thread (in this example I use newspaper letters simply because the child knows their letters and interested in identifying letters in the newspaper. I am planning on doing this for all the letters as we now want to spell with them!). Play various games e.g. turn up cards and name upon threading, place cards face up and take it in turns to ask other to find "c" etc.

Moving on from that posting can be a firm favourite, create a posting box to post individual items, letters in naming as you do so, initially starting with just the initial sound.

Remember just enjoy playing with sounds do not exert pressure, if a child says a word wrong repeat it back in the correct manner emphasising the sound that causes difficulty, e.g. "I want the tat" "Ok, where's the Cat"

There are loads of really useful ideas and resources on this local NHS Speech and Language site

The Inclusion Development Programme for Speech and Language is also an invaluable resource, especially for auditing your provision.

"Speech both conceals and reveals the thoughts of men."

Latin Proverb