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If You Give A Mouse A Cookie

“If You Give A Mouse A Cookie” is my favorite Laura Numeroff book, and I love when Laura Numeroff week rolls around in preschool! It has great illustrations to work on basic vocabulary and WH questions with my students as we read, and is engaging enough so that my kids love reading it more than once throughout the week, as they hear it both in class and in speech!

I have a lot of both general cookie-themed activities, as well as specific activities relating to the book to use during this week.  One of the activities I used incorporated both– my WH Question Cookie Flip activity that’s part of my If You Give A Mouse A Cookie packet in my TpT store!

I printed a picture of a cookie jar from My Cute Graphics and attached it to an empty tissue box.  The kids used a play kitchen spatula to scoop up the cookies and flip them over, and then I read the question on the back.  Some of the cookies were comprehension questions relating to the story, while others were just general WH questions (which I used to work on WH questions when I did this activity for small groups in the classroom).  After answering the question, they got to put the cookie in the cookie jar!

We also made cookies with “icing” (shaving cream/glue mix) and “sprinkles” (glitter).  I got the idea from one of the prek teachers who had her kids cover a snowman with glue/shaving cream the week before.  When the mixture dries, it’s puffy! So fun, and a fun little sensory activity! This was really fun to use with my artic kids as we practiced their words!

As for the quote, “Leave a little sparkle wherever you go” … I think we nailed it… annnd perhaps we left more than just a “little” sparkle–especially for the few kids who dumped a bunch of glitter on and then blew it off the cookie, sending glitter everywhere! Oh well- what is preschool for, if not for exploring the cause/effect of glitter explosions?!

Later in the week after I got them prepped, I used my new “Mouse” artic cards. I forgot to take a picture of them while they were out, but they’re super cute, and it was fun to change up the stimulus cards a bit for the week.

We used them while making the shaving cream cookies, and also while we did these Mouse magnet pages from Making Learning Fun.  I used the Bingo dauber paint markers, but you could use the pieces from Chipper Chat, too!

Another thing we did was a (freebie!) category sorting activity from LC SLP.  I used this for some of my lower kids during in-class small group rotations as a receptive language task, as well as a basic expressive vocabulary task for picture naming.  I also used it with one of my students who I am introducing EET to, so he named the picture, named the category it went to, and gave a feature/function of the item.

Oh, Cariboo.. Where would I be without you?! I use this game every. single. week.  Every week.  I don’t know why the kids don’t tire of it but they jump at the chance to play it every week! I have these Cariboo-sized pictures of items in the story in my TpT packet mentioned above.  I used these cards for comprehension questions.  After reading the book, I asked them questions about the story, like “What did Mouse use to trim his hair?” or “Where did Mouse hang his picture?” and they had to find the right picture that answered my questions.  When they found the right picture, they opened the compartment to see if there was a ball underneath!

Another activity we did was play Memory with my “Milk & Cookies Go Togethers” activity on TpT (also in my full If You Give A Mouse A Cookie packet).  We worked on associations and describing how items are alike/belong together.  I kept the cookies in the top row and the glasses of milk in the bottom row, so the kids had to flip over one from each row to see if they found two items that went together.

Sticking some themed pictures (in this case, cookies) on top of beanbags are an easy, go-to general reinforcer when the kids get extra wiggly and need some movement! We tossed them into an empty box and pretended like it was a cookie jar.

The Cookie Doodle app for the iPad is fun to use for this week, too! You can  choose from different recipes and mix all the ingredients together before rolling out the dough and decorating.  It’s great for sequencing, requesting, cooking vocabulary (rolling pin, dough, eggs, butter, pour, roll, cookie cutter, oven, etc…) turn taking (my turn/your turn when decorating a cookie), and working on 3+ word phrases (ie crack the eggs, roll the dough, I want sprinkles, etc…)  It’s one of my best 99 cent purchases 🙂
Last year, I had a kiddo on my caseload who was moving over the summer.  He’d ask me to play “the cookie making game” every single therapy session (no joke).  On the last day of school, his mom told him, “Tell Miss Kari ‘bye’ and that you’ll miss her” .. He turned around and said “Bye, Miss Kari! I’ll miss your cookie making game!” … ha ha. I miss that kid, and think of him every time I play this game!
PS- They have a cake doodle app, as well, that’s basically the same concept.. in case you wanted to use it for “If You Give A Cat A Cupcake!”
Those are some of the fun things we did for If You Give A Mouse A Cookie week.. What are some of your favorite activities to use to go along with this book??

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We’ve been playing with allll the bug and garden We’ve been playing with allll the bug and garden activities this month up until this week when I shifted more to ice cream.. but I’m happy to share that my companion for “Up in the Garden, Down in the Dirt” is finally up on TpT!!

I love this book because it lends itself so well to SO many play extension activities with bugs, birds, flowers, and vegetable gardens.  We are lucky enough to have an outdoor garden where I work, so the classrooms have all been helping to take care of the plants— the best real life extension activity I could ask for!

The book is also chock-full of s-blends— and isn’t anything loaded with s-blends an SLP staple? 😂 I even made lists for you of all the s blend words (and other frequently occurring sound targets within the book) so you know what words you can target if you’re seeing kids in mixed groups. 

Swipe through to see all the fun hands-on activities you’ll get to work on themed vocabulary with your students— through labeling objects, verbs, object functions, and basic concepts.  Easily target multiple goals at once with activities that target different goal areas simultaneously.

Feeling like your brain is mush by this point in the year and just want someone to give you some other play activity ideas for your theme without having to search allll the places? Gotcha covered ✅  You’ll also get a list of some extra play activities with goal ideas to target within them!

Music creates some of the best connections— and it’s one of the best ways to start out your circle times/push in lessons… but you probably don’t have time to search and find the good garden and bug related songs on YouTube, right? 

Well, good news— You’re covered on that front, too, with a separate pdf just for links to different songs WITH Target goal ideas for each song, too! Download to your iPad and go!

I’ll leave this companion on sale for the next 24 hours (through Friday night) so you can still grab it at a discount for next year even if you’re done with this theme (your future self will thank you 😉)

Link in profile! ➡️ @rockchalkspeechtalk
If you’re looking to add some diversity to your If you’re looking to add some diversity to your bookshelf with May’s garden + bug themes, check out these 4 garden books featuring black or Hispanic characters!

1- “Plants Feed Me” - Short and simple text to explain where fruits and veggies come from and the different parts of the plants we eat.

Kids work together to take care of the garden (pick, water, dig, plant, etc.. great for verbs!) No main character, but features kids who are Black, white and Hispanic.

2- Lola Plants a Garden:  Lola wants to plant a flower garden. Her mom helps her through the planning steps. Lola reads books about gardens, chooses her favorite flowers, makes a list, buys seeds, then plants them. She waits and waits, then finally her plants grow! 

This book lends itself to activities that target sequencing, gardening verbs, and object functions. Lola makes a flower book while she waits for her real ones, so art supplies AND gardening tools are depicted in this book— perfect for object function targets!

3- Miguel’s Community Farm: Great book for comparing/contrasting!Miguel is looking for sunflowers, so the book starts off describing all the features of a sunflower.

On each page, Miguel sees a plant that shares a feature of a sunflower and wonders if he’s found them. However, the book then describes one way the plants are different, too (Sunflowers have yellow petals.  Artichokes have petals, too (similarity), but they’re green, not yellow (difference).

Miguel has 2 dads, who aren’t a prominent part of the book but are part of the 1st and last page illustrations.  The last page also depicts a garden party with Miguel’s friends, who are of varying ethnic backgrounds and physical abilities. 

4- Amara’s Farm: Same author/illustrator as Miguel’s Community Garden (featuring the same friends at the end!), and another compare/contrast book in the same format. 

Amara is searching for pumpkins on the farm, but this could fit into a Spring garden theme since it compares/contrasts produce. There’s also a lot of bugs in the illustrations, making it easy to fit into a bug and garden combo theme, too!

Did you find any new books to check out? If you did, share w/ another SLP/teacher friend!
You asked, so here it is! A post about allllll the You asked, so here it is! A post about allllll the things we were able to work on with this St Patrick’s Day “party” we did last week! ☘️💚 

Swipe through ➡️ to see it broken down into separate parts! It can cover so many areas from speech sounds/ syllable shapes, play imitation, to WH questions, following directions, and categorizing!

Have a friend that would love this? Be sure to share this post and send it their way!
Who else loves interactive books?! These are some Who else loves interactive books?! These are some of my favorite things to make because they’re SO versatile for use across your caseload! You can use this one for…

➡️simple inferences
➡️labeling animal vocabulary 
➡️who questions
➡️what questions
➡️core vocab like “turn” “on” “not” “look” “see” “play” and “eat.” ➡️imitating animal sounds (great for CV and CVCV syllables) 
➡️yes/no questions

I’ve also been pairing “Let’s…” and “It’s…” phrases with my kids who are gestalt language processors working on mitigation (Let’s turn the page! Let’s see who it is, It’s a pig/cow/chicken etc…)

Swipe through to see some sample pages and to hear what other people are saying about this book!
TIP OF THE DAY: Print your science experiment visu TIP OF THE DAY: Print your science experiment visuals or cheat sheets 2 to a page to have a small, handy version in front of you to reference for yourself without taking up extra space! 

Speaking of space… Since we all know SLP workspaces can come at a premium in a school… what’s the worst place you’ve had to do therapy?

I haven’t had any seriously awful ones, but one that comes to mind was probably in the preschool/kindergarten pod, at a table just behind a noisy book fair setup.  That was the day one of my kids loudly asked me “Why you got a stick?” But she did d/st blends so it did NOT sound like “stick” and I was mortified and thought “Welp this is how I lose my job” 😂🤣 

Tell me yours below! ⬇️
Tell me with an emoji! Do you plan… 🌼 Just b Tell me with an emoji! Do you plan…

🌼 Just before a session

1️⃣ 1-2 weeks at a time

🦋 Have a weekly theme but wing it from there

😅 lol what’s planning

I always find the wide range of differences between all of us so interesting!
Story props are one of the best ways to keep kids Story props are one of the best ways to keep kids engaged during book reading- and reenacting a story with props is one of the strongest predictors of story comprehension!

Make sure you grab these free story visuals from my TPT store for Little Blue Truck’s Valentine for your therapy this week, and pair them with your farm toys! We ❤️ Little Blue Truck at home, too!

You can find these visuals at the link in my profile or let me know if you want me to DM you a direct link!
10 on the Sled has been my lifeline for planning t 10 on the Sled has been my lifeline for planning therapy since coming back from Christmas break, when every day I never know which kids will be out, which coworkers will be out, or who’s caseload I’ll be covering when I have said cancelations!

It’s been a minute since I’ve uploaded anything to TPT, and I’m super stoked about getting this 10 on the sled unit out to you!

When I was in the schools, it was always a challenge to find enough time to push in to the preschool rooms— there was always centers and literacy/language small group time, but when they’re only there for 3 hours (with recess in there, too) and there’s 30 kids to see during those 3 hours.. those two times are definitely not enough!

And, even though you’re adaptable and can make just about anything be a language activity.. sometimes it’s nice to come in with a plan vs crossing your fingers that whatever is happening during that time is relevant to you.  But, you also want to be respectful of the teacher’s focus during certain times of their day, too!

Juggling all the things.

So, when I create materials for you, I create things you can use to push in during even more times of the day to give you even more windows of opportunity.

▶️Story props to use with the class if you’re pushing in during whole group

▶️ Size concept play dough creation mats that you could use if you’re going in during a math center time.  Compare sizes.  Count how many long and short, big and small pieces you need.

▶️Fine motor-based activities like tracing lines, creating with popsicle sticks, and play dough pages so that maybe you can be a station during sign-in in the morning, too, after they work on their name with the teacher or OT!

The materials are so adaptable, though, that you can push in or pull out, use individually or in a small group, and lots of the pages can be used to target multiple goals at once.  Using real objects with the activities helps keep it play-based, too, to keep your little ones engaged!

So, whatcha think? Ready to check it out? Head over to the link in my profile or let me know if you want me to DM you the link!

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