January Week 2: Draw a Map

 Vocabulary an Basic Concepts:  Up/down, front/back big/little, over/under, curve/straight, draw, house, street, neighborhood, trees, mailbox, dog, school, store, neighborhood helpers, What questions, Where questions, present progressive -ing, plural -s, past tense -ed, environmental print such as fast food or grocery store signs, shapes.

Transition Song: Colors by The Learning Station.

This week, Miss Carrie showed us a picture of her house on the Apple TV.  It looked like a rectangle with a triangle on top. Then she used Google Maps to show us a picture of her street.  It looked like she took the picture from an airplane in the sky.  She showed us our school and the door we go in if we came in cars, and the door we came in if we came on the bus.  She showed streets and stores. 

Then Miss Carrie rolled out a BIG  piece of paper.  It covered the whole rug.  We were going to draw our own map.  We drew our house and street.  We talked about places near our house.  Miss Carrie has a McDonalds near her house so she drew a McDonalds sign.  Some of us drew trampolines and swings.  We drew trees and streets.  We drew curved lines and straight lines. We talked about what was near our house.

(Drawing while laying on your tummy promotes trunk support and is recommended by our district physical therapists. We had to keep reminding children to get on their tummies.)

DO THIS AT HOME:  pull our paper and get on the floor.  You could make a map of the room, your house, your back yard, or your neighborhood.  Talk about your drawings.  If the house ends up being on fire or has a dragon on top, that is okay (apparently, my house caught fire from a dragon on top of it), just go with it.  Talk about colors, straight lines, curved lines, and shapes.

Straw Cups Are Best

 One of the SLPs I love who specializes in pediatric feeding is Melanie Potock M.S. CCC-SLP from My Munch Bug. I follow her on Instagram which is where I pulled these visuals.  She explains so well the pitfalls of sippy cups that I am posting her Instagram pictures for you.

The use of sippy cups can prevent the tongue from contacting with the alveolar ridge (that bumpy area directly behind your front teeth) and promotes tongue thrusting instead (the tongue protrudes past the teeth).  This can cause so many problems with language and articulation.

She also has great articles and videos on her web page.

January Week 1: Snowballs...But No Snow!

 Transition Song:  Colors by The Learning Station

Vocabulary and Basic Concepts: snow, cold, dad, mom, girl, boy, cat, dog, string, buttons, hats, scarves, gloves, strawberry, shell, forks, bells, strings, Who questions, What questions, "I want" phrases.

This week, Miss Carrie brought in a big bag and a book. The book was called Snowballs by Lois Ehlert.

In the book, there was a snow dad, a snow mom, a snow girl, a snow boy, a snow cat, and a snow dog.  Miss Carrie used her camera to put the pictures on the Apple TV so we could look closely at what was on the snow people.  We saw forks, seeds and nuts, berries, popcorn, sticks, and buttons.  We noticed that the birds and squirrels were eating the nuts and seeds.  At the end of the book, the snow people and the snow animals melted.

Miss Carrie had a problem.  She really wanted to make snow people.  But there was no snow outside.  Miss Carrie brought a big bag full of hats, gloves, and scarves to use.  We had to solve her problem.  Some of the kids came up with the solution to dress the teachers like snow people.  Other kids decided that they wanted to dress themselves up like snow people.  There was a lot going on.

Miss Carrie took pictures of everyone and showed them on the Apple TV.  She asked "Who is this?  What are they wearing?"  Sometimes it was hard to tell who the person was and we had to look at their clothes for clues.

DO THIS AT HOME:  Dress up!  Doesn't have to be costumes or cold weather gear.  Dress up in Mom or Dad's clothes and shoes.  Take  a lot of pictures.  Talk about what you see in them.  Send pictures to other family members and have your child tell them what they did (you can support their language but really let your child do as much as they can on their own). 

If we ever get snow - GO PLAY OUTSIDE.  Be sure to drink a lot of hot cocoa afterwards.  Miss Carrie likes whip cream in her cocoa.