Back to School Lesson Plan Ideas!

My creative juices are flowing right now! I'm so glad I'm not staring at my cursor with no idea what to do with my groups. It's been great to get that part of my brain going again!

I wanted to give you an idea of what I'm doing with my groups this first week back to school.

Here's what my lessons have been covering this week:

5 Minute Artic 1:1 Sessions:
We've been talking about summer (i.e. collected conversational baseline data on their targets) and also reading The Very Lonely Firefly by Eric Carle. I found this freebie on TPT for sequencing so we'll be doing that once we've finished reading it: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/The-Very-Lonely-Firefly-991038  Right now, I'm taking data on productions while reading, answering questions, and conversation. Once we've finished, we'll sequence the events of the story and I'll have the students retell it using their best speech.

Speech & Language Groups:
We've been reviewing rules, procedures, and routines of the classroom. Then, we're having fun getting to know one another! I found these great (FREE) "getting to know you" cards on TPT (http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Quiz-Quiz-Trade-Beginning-of-the-Year-Activity-1273409).  The questions are easy enough for even my language-impaired kindergartners to answer! I'm trying out Kagan Structures in my room this year and these cards were perfect for that! Here's how I did it (completely ignored the directions that came with it):

1. I gave each of the kids a number (1-4) written on an index card.

2. I asked one of the questions from the packet and gave some think time (3-5 seconds).

3. I spun a spinner (numbered 1-4). If it landed on number 3, number 3 went first. If it landed on number 2, number 2 went first (etc.).
4. They were getting a little antsy by this time so when it was their turn to answer the question, I had them stand up. Get the blood flowing!
5. We did a RoundRobin, so every one had a chance to answer the same questions and we all learned a bit about one another! I answered the questions too! They all thought it was funny that I was 31 years old!

We did that until our 30 minutes was up and I heard no complaints!

Autism Classroom:
We've been reviewing school supply vocabulary with this fun freebie on TPT: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Whats-In-My-Backpack-Adapted-Book-for-SPED-FREEBIE-1356100
I brought in a backpack from home and filling the backpack with actual school supplies and pictures as well. We've been answering function questions (What school supply do you use for writing?), following oral and written directions (put the X in the backpack, put the X under the backpack), answering "where" questions with and without PECS visuals (positional PECS), answering objective Y/N questions (Is there a pencil in my backpack?), asking questions (Do you have scissors in your backpack?), and using possessives (What's in John's backpack?). I love bringing in actual objects paired with pictures and drawings to help these students generalize skills across settings. Tomorrow, I'm taking this group on a scavenger hunt around the classroom to find various school supplies. You can grab a copy of my scavenger hunt for school supplies here: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Back-to-School-Scavenger-Hunt-for-School-Supplies-1402132

I'm excited to be back with my students! I love my job!

Kagan Cooperative Learning in the SLP's Classroom

Last week (or was that 2 weeks ago...summer brain!), I went to a Kagan training offered through my district. I absolutely loved it!

Do you ever find yourself in this scenario:

You have 5-6 students in a group and you're playing some sort of game. You are collecting data with each student's turn, but at the end of 30 minutes you only have 6 data points/student! That's not enough to get a true picture of how the student is progressing with his/her goals!

Kagan Cooperative Learning solves this problem!!!!

How??

If you have four students, assign each one a shoulder partner (person sitting next to them) so that you have two groups of two. If you have five students, have a trio and a 2-person group. If you have six students, arrange them in three groups of two. Each person is also assigned A or B in each group. You may want to label their seats: 1A, 1B, 2A, 2B, etc. They also have some neat mats shown here:

This works best with 4 desks pushed together.



I have a kidney table, so that arrangement doesn't quite work for me.

Anyway, for each question during a game, you can have the students do Timed-Pair-Share. This structure works best for open-ended questions (e.g. "What was your favorite part of the story?"). They get with their shoulder partner and you say, "A's are going first. You will have 30 seconds (or whatever time works for you) to share your answer. B's can only listen and ask A's questions during this time. When the 30 seconds is up, B's will respond with their answer. A's may only listen and ask questions at this time."


Another structure, Rally Robin, is perfect for list responses (e.g. "Name as many pets as you can."). Students get with their partners and you say, "B's are going first. B's will name one item and then A's will name another item. You will keep taking turns until I call time."

The wonderful thing about Kagan structures is that students are engaged. There is no hiding! Students must participate! There is more opportunity for data collection! I can't wait to try it this fall!

I will post more about this soon but I just wanted to give you a couple ideas to use when your school year starts!