Common Core Standards Vocabulary Giveaway!!!
I am having a back to school giveaway over the next 7 days of my 4th grade English/Language Arts Common Core Standards Vocabulary Activity. This packet has 60 multiple choice questions that assess several English/Language Arts standards that are relevant to what speech-language pathologists instruct during language therapy.
It is important that language therapists integrate these national standards in our weekly therapy sessions with our students. The students’ IEP goals and objectives should of course relate to their needs, but they should also relate to curriculum standards.
These questions have been used in my language therapy sessions with my students last school year. I paired it with my basketball challenge game (http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Basketball-Challenge-Speech-Language-and-Academic-Skills-717131) to maintain my students’ engagement. However, it may be paired with your students favorite turn taking game during therapy or used as a stand alone activity in a literacy center in a regular or special education classroom.
This school year, I plan to give my 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade English/Language Arts Common Core Standards Vocabulary packet questions to my students in order to collect baseline data at the beginning of the year. I will note my students’ areas of mastery and needs so that I may effectively plan and implement future speech-language therapy lessons. These learning packets/task cards may also be used to review skills throughout the year and then as a reassessment prior to end of year state testing.
In order to enter the contest for a chance to win, you are required to “like” my facebook page, follow my blog on Blog Lovin, or follow my Teachers Pay Teachers (TPT) page. Best of luck to you!!
So, head on over to my Facebook Page and sign up if you are not currently following BSL Speech Language there. Once there, click on the blue giveaway box for further details on entering the contest.
Best of luck to you!!
https://www.facebook.com/BSLSpeechLanguage
Thanks for stopping by!
Tamara Anderson, M.S., CCC-SLP

Basketball Challenge- Speech, Language, and Academic Skills
Wow! I can’t believe it’s June already. I am thankful to have completed another successful school year. My summer break started 2 weeks ago. Hooray! The last 2 months of school was quite busy with the usual tasks of group speech-language therapy sessions, testing students, IEP meetings, special education team meetings, staff meetings, committee meetings, and tons of paperwork/computer work. Let’s not forget our beloved high stakes CRCT, the state test here in Georgia. Among all those important and urgent activities, I made a deliberate effort that my students have fun while learning and practicing their speech and language skills in my therapy classroom.
I am pleased to share with you one of my newest resources that I created and used with my students during the months of April and May. The Basketball Challenge-Speech, Language, and Academic Skills is an awesome interactive activity that kept my students engaged during their 30 minute speech-language therapy sessions. I primarily used my English/Language Arts Common Core Vocabulary questions (http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/4th-Grade-EnglishLanguage-Arts-Common-Core-Standards-Vocabulary-652220) with this activity. Here is how to play this basketball challenge. Most of my groups have 4 students, so they would divide into 2 teams, and select a name for their team.
I would write the name on the statistics sheet shown here.
Then, they would choose a basketball player.
I would place the basketball court and 2 nets on the table.
I would then place all the basketballs face down on the table.
Each student took turns answering a learning question, then they would pick up a basketball, dribble the ball to the net, and shoot the ball. It was the luck of the draw if they would get 1 point, 2 points, or 3 points.
During the game, I recorded the number of basketball points each student earned and the number of learning points they earned by answering questions correctly on the statistics sheet.
The game would end when their speech-language therapy session time was over. I would then calculate the accuracy percentage for answering their speech, language, and academic questions.
My students were so excited to see if their team won the game and also what individual player had the most basketball points and learning points.
This activity is definitely a win-win for both the students and the SLP. You can purchase it here to use with your students: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Basketball-Challenge-Speech-Language-and-Academic-Skills-717131
Thanks for visiting my page today!! I will have several new posts and therapy/educational products available next school year.
Tamara Anderson, M.S., CCC-SLP
Speech-Language Pathologist on Summer Break!

March Mania & Spring Fever: English/Language Arts Common Core Style
My school district is already in the final stretch for the school year as we are in the midst of the final nine weeks of instruction and have ONE more week before SPRING BREAK!! This is the time of year when speech-language pathologists and teachers focus on the remaining skills we desire for our students to learn. In the speech-language classroom, the typical vocabulary echoes throughout the room: story elements, main idea, supporting details, fiction, non-fiction, antonyms, synonyms, homonyms, word associations, BREATHE, basic concepts, following directions, idioms, similes, compare, contrast, cause, effect, fact, opinion, BREATHE, parts of speech, irregular plural nouns, irregular past tense verbs, types of sentences, summarize, and REPEAT!! Last month, my school had a “March Madness” theme and many students received extra instructional time during SPECIALS (e.g. music, art, P.E., etc.) to improve either English/Language Arts or Math skills that needed remediation.
For the past 3 weeks, I focused on reviewing English/Language Arts common core standards questions with my 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grade speech-language students in their usual therapy sessions. I created a set of 36 English/Language Arts questions based on common core standards relevant to skills that I address in my speech-language therapy sessions with my students.
During each session, I put a red token next to each learning question card. Each page had 6 questions and 6 tokens. Students got to pick up a token when they answered a question correctly. They were very competitive and eager to see who would earn the most tokens. I told them that their goal is always to try and beat their highest individual score. I have to admit that it has been quite exciting and interesting in the speech room lately. Most of my students are happy and cheer when they earn the most tokens or “learning points” while I’ve had one to cry because he didn’t win. The latter moment is when I switch into my unofficial title of counselor, mentor, listening ear and shoulder to cry on! YIKES! The joys of elementary education…I digress…
Anyhow, here are links to the awesome and time saving materials I created:
After a few sessions reviewing questions using my classroom original, I photocopied individual learning packets of these questions for my students. We completed the packets in class by circling the correct responses from a field of 4 choices and writing the correct vocabulary word in the cloze sentences. My students took the packet home after each session for independent practice.
This is a great way to incorporate the English/Language Arts Common Core Standards into speech-language therapy sessions and also help prepare students for end of year state tests.
The 4th grade and 5th grade learning sets are coming soon!!! The 4th grade set has 42 learning questions including questions related to idioms and similes!
These learning activities may be used with an accompanying basketball game. The custom made illustrations and game pieces will be available soon. Check back again soon!!
4/8/13 Update The 4th grade English/Language Arts Common Core Standards learning packet is available and now has 48 questions. Don’t hesitate to click on the link below! 🙂 http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/4th-Grade-EnglishLanguage-Arts-Common-Core-Standards-Vocabulary
Thanks for visiting today!! 🙂