Life on the Other Side!

Wow, I still can't believe I've been on extern for 3 weeks now! It is such a different experience than working with clients at the university clinic. I LOVE IT! Everyone has been extremely nice and welcoming which has been great and the kids are adorable! Each day the kids make me laugh and I never know what they're going to do! In the beginning each day was such a whirlwind. I felt like every time I was starting to understand something I learned 3 new things! Now I'm getting in the flow of how everything works in the school and really getting to know the kids. It's been really great to see how a team approach works. The preschool has integrated classes, with OT's, PT's, Psychologists, and SLP's all working together with the classroom teacher and teacher aids. Each week the team meets about a different child and talks about how things are going and what else needs to be done or put in place for the child. I've realized how important it is to communicate with your team and really work together for each child. I can't wait to see how the rest of the semester goes!

-Erin

Phonological Awareness Fun!

This week I have been going through my school work, notes, and materials from my three semesters at Syracuse. It is crazy to think of how much we did this year and that there's not much between now and graduation. As I looked back on everything, I started going through materials I made for one of my clinic assignments- Phonological Awareness camp. This was a prevention program that worked on preliteracy skills including alliteration, syllable manipulation, rhyming, and sound indentification. Each week, materials were created based around a theme. Before this assignment, I had been interested in phonological awareness and through working in this group, I have fallen in love with all things phonological! I believe phonological awareness is an important skill to work on and a great deal of success can be seen when targeting these skills in therapy. I have added jungled themed syllable segmentation worksheets that can be used to count the number of syllables of different animals. I have also added worksheets targeting alliteration. These can be quiet activities for a group and children can count syllables independantly or as a group. Clapping syllables is always a great way to physically count. Another way that I saw children have a lot of success was by using a tactile cue with his or her hand to feel the chin go up and down. Does anyone else have tricks they use when teaching syllable segmentation or any phonological awareness skills?

 

Happy Thursday!

~Rachel