Winter has finally arrived!

               

It has been a relatively mild winter in MN. The tempatures have been mild and we even hit a high temp record in December of 52 degrees!  The 2010 Winter was a record breaker for snow when it was all over, 86.6″ of snow came crashing down on the metro.  This winter there has been very little snow so far… It looks like the freezing temps are finding us this week along with a few flurries.  The weather forecasters starting to use words like bitter and frigid. And we hearty Minnesotans  might even start wearing mittens and hats! So I decided it was time to make our own snow flakes inside and play with “snow” inside.

So first come the clouds:

One blog I follow is written by Laura at  Come Together Kids. She posted a fun recipe to make cloud dough. I did this activiy with one of my self contained classrooms. There were  five students and four adults and we all ended up with lots of  white on us but hey it was all about snow and clouds!  This recipe can be a little messy but it smells wonderful due to the baby oil and is pretty easy to clean up. I used a larger tin foil pan that came with a clear lid  (see example below) which I left with the class to keep. The teacher is thinking about using it in their sand table (minus the sand). The picture of the cloud dough is not from our lesson- we were too busy having fun that I forgot to take pictures.

      

The lesson was fun and we were able to focus on labeling the ingredients, what we might be making (ice cream- one boy hoped).  I divided the dough into two tubs and the kids worked on cooperative play. Not always an easy task! I had brought an ice cream scoop, mini ice cube tray, spoons, and the juice cups I talked about on an earlier post.  Of course the kids saw something they liked better in their neighbors tub – it was a perfect time to work on asking and sharing. This project cost me one small bag of flour and a cup of baby oil- not bad for all the fun and language practice! But after leaving the class in a “cloud” I decided to do a different project for the next two classrooms.

Then came the snow flakes:

I follow a blog written by Kim Lewis M.Ed., CCC-SLP called Activity Tailor. She has posted this week a fun way to make snowflakes. Since I had a bag full of beads that someone had given me and free pipe cleaners from school this project cost me nothing!  I created  two visuals using Custom Boards from Smarty Ears. (FYI there is a free version with 6 templates).  I ended up using the 5 picture visual. Funny story about this visual- I was taking the picture with my iPad but have you ever tried to take a picture of your own hands holding something? Well after twisting this way and that I finally looked out in the hallway and asked a student to help me. I think he wondered what really happens in my room!  I did this lesson in the two autism classrooms and the kids range from close to non-verbal to close to non-stop chatter. They were all able to complete this task. It did help to have the extra hands of the special education teacher and paraprofessionals. The adults know the kids well and know when to prompt, help or wait. It was a fun fun time by all.  If you are looking for inexpensive beads check the dollar stores.

Beading- 5 pictures

Beading – 4 pictures

By the way we did get colder weather but not much snow. There is just enough to cover the grass right now. It looks a lot different from last year when the snowbanks were over my head along the driveway.

Now are there any apps that might fit this theme?  I do believe snow…

snowDrift

Virtual Snow

Let's Bead Friends

Winter is

Into the Snow

One Snowy Day

Snow Globe Maker

Drum roll please…. and the winners are……plus a surprise!!

My favorite little drummer!

It’s not the Golden Globes, the Oscars or a football playoff game. It’s the winners of the giveaway for the Articulate it! App by Smarty Ears.

I picked the winners using an app called Random.  Congratulations! I have sent e-mails out with your codes!

1. Eileen Gioin Fredrick
2. Beth
3. Ruth
4. Debra Kerner
5. Kellie

I loved reading all your comments. Thanks for the birthday wishes too. Now if you did not win don’t be too disappointed as I have an added surprise!  Rob Mitchell of PaperClip Robot is gifting alternate winners some bubcaps! I wrote about these in a earlier post that you can check out here. I love this product!

The Bubcap winners are: I will e-mail you the directions to receive this wonderful product!

1. Micala Andreassen
2. Melissa
3. Carol
4. Cindy Brandon
5. Tricia

 

That’s all for now! I’m off to enjoy a long weekend and celebrate my birthday with family.  Remember all that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stood for and pass it along!

So who likes giveaways??!!

Does this even need to be a question? Of course we like giveaways… the thrill of typing your name in and the possibility of getting something free is well breathless!  Well I say we need to celebrate this new year and my birthday with a giveaway! My birthday is the same day as the distinguished Dr Martin Luther King Jr. so I always get a day off. I tell the kids at school it is because it is my birthday and aren’t they lucky they know me. Well this usually doesn’t work but this year I’m at a school with K-3rd graders so I think my chance of having believers is much better. No disrespect to Dr. King- I do always clue in the kiddos…eventually.  Oh and never mind how old I am because I look much much younger and you would be very surprised at my true age. Actually I always forget how old I am and ask my husband because having to do math is so not an SLP thing but now science…. ok ok so I digress. I did start working in the field as an SLP before you needed your masters and I worked for 7 years before deciding to go back to college and get it. Did I tell you I had a toddler and an infant at home then and drove over an hour one way to get to graduate classes? I won’t even tell you what I carried in my back pack! Oh what, you want to know about the giveaway?  Why am I doing this? Well…(sorry we are almost there) I have been very lucky winning things in contests like a big wooden cube that is now in our motor room at school, iTune cards, an iTouch, and some other stuff. And  I just won an iPad from Tj & Pals facebook giveaway (sorry Genie I know how hard you have been trying!) Finding a dollar in the parking lot after a long night of conferenes and then a quarter in the hallway, being an EdBlog finalist and having it talked about in Points of Pride at the school board meeting and more! I want to pass along some of my luck to you. No I’m not giving away my iPad! How about some app codes instead!

Here’s the deal- I have 5 codes for the Articulate it! app from Smarty Ears. Look back on my posting here for some information on the app. You can also read more about the app in action on the Smarty Ears website. There was just an update this week too! All you need to do is leave a comment about anything or nothing. I will do a random drawing on Saturday 1/14/12.

Oh there is one catch…you know the fine print…. all I ask is you do something nice for someone else. Hold a door, carry someone’s bag, smile, wish them happy birthday, pick up the gum wrapper that missed the trash can, pay my taxes (ok I tried to slip that in but nevermind!) or any small gesture to make someone smile.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

In my last post I talked about starting to clean up my clutter. Well I wasn’t planning on making a New Year resolution but it looks like one found me.

Reducing… Not the weight even though it could be an option! I’m trying to reduce the amount of therapy materials I have accumulated over the past 34 years as an SLP. I’m great at finding deals and have scooped up a lot. But I think it is time share my treasures. I started with my game cabinet at school and counted over 50 that I had bought with my own money. I was able to make a pile of at least 30 to send on to new homes…I hope. Now I need to go through my home office (insert shiver).

Reusing… I’m looking at the games that I kept with a theme eye. I can use Don’t Wake the Giant with a Fairy or Castle unit. I can use Alfredo’s Food Fight with a Food unit. In fact the News 2 You was about “My Plate” and eating healthy so we used Alfredo’s Food Fight as part of our Food unit this week! This was how I have organized my apps into folders on my iPad.

Recycling… In a way this is a twin to reusing. The items below are what the orange juice is served in at my school. Of course being an SLP I always see things through a “how can I use that in therapy” eyes. So I collected a few of the cardboard trays and cups to fill each one.

           

I used some die cut circles to add some color to the bottom of the cups.   I used this opportunity as a problem solving activity for many of my students. So the first group we worked on gluing the circles in by following directions for big, bigger, biggest etc.

        

Another student used chips to toss into the cups. First he used a picture card to create a sentence and work on using fluent speech patterns. He made up the “rules” as we played. I think we were going for four in a row. Notice the blue chips (which were mine) but he “changed” the rules after I won… I think… I’m not sure but we had fun and he was able to practice his easy speech in a variety of ways during the game. The extra cups were used to hold our chips during the games.

  

The next group decided to try using cotton balls and called the game “Snowball Fight.”  We found for this game it was easier to put the cups in a vertical position. We had to think of a winter word before we could throw our snowballs. They decided that each person aim for one row and try to get all four cups filled with snowballs. I used colored pompoms (dollar store find) with a different group. This group decided that since the pompoms happened to match (lucky coincidence) that they would aim for a matching cup. They also decided to mix up the cups so the colors were not in a row.

This idea came from 3 second graders brainstorming ideas- they called it Color Sudoku! The object was to get one of each color in a vertical and horizontal row. They were “supposed” to work together and “discuss” the options but it appeared to be a lot of hands moving cups simultaneously. After I observed this strategy for a few minutes I intervened with a few comments and they were able to coordinate their individual efforts into a group mind.

Using the same layout above another group invented a game they called “No Peeking.”  One person closed their eyes and held a pompom while another person gave directions. The object was to get the pompom into the matching color cup. The direction words they tried were: up, down, right, left, other right , other left, over there, and drop it. We were able to learn a lot about how words work when you can’t see something!

We found that the cups could be place upside down in the tray too. The one above have the corner cups up and the rest upside down. This could be used to work on basic concepts like…well corner.  We can also target these concepts: top, middle bottom, side, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, last, over, under, right, left, up down, big circle, little circle, medium circle, etc.

Here are some other ideas I may try with this “recycled” game.

• I have enough cups and holders so each student could have their own.  I can make each holder a different category (animals, food, seasons, etc.) and use small objects or stickers that fit the category. These would be put into a container. We could describe each and guess what it is and where it belongs. Or the kids could choose one and place it in their holder if it fit the category.
• Use vocabulary words &/or pictures in each cup. The definition is read and the student places a chip in the correct cup.

How about you? What have you reduced or reused or recycled?

Share your ideas in the comment section.

UPDATE: I have listed some items for sale on this site listed under meeslp: Materials for sale  If you are looking for anything just ask I may have it!

A clutter free year…. maybe?

It’s hard to believe it is the end of December. Here in Minnesota the temperature hit a record high of 51 degrees which is very unseasonal. Needless to say the ice candles I planned to light are now puddles!  While I am home on winter break from school it gives me time to work on my home to do list  which includes decluttering. We are considering downsizing which has me looking into closets and rooms with lots of “stuff” and wondering where to start.  It also has me thinking about all the therapy materials I have at home, school and the clinic. I have been using my  iPad  more than my “stuff” in therapy. This has helped me try out apps and find those that work best for different student needs but it also makes me think I need to “downsize” my materials. I’m not going to stop using “stuff” as I do believe it is important to have a mix in therapy sessions but I do believe I can get rid of a few things. One thing I like about my iPad is the need for less clutter and paper but I can’t  discount the positives of other therapy materials too.  So here are are some ideas with a mix of iPad apps to create materials to start the new year without a lot of added clutter!

                                

All of these activities were made using the app  Custom Boards from Smarty Ears.

1. This is a feeling game and Brooke was happy to be my model.  I used the Christmas Tree template and imported pictures from my Photos that displayed different emotions. I printed one master copy. You could laminate this or put it in a protective plastic sleeve. I printed one extra and cut out the ornaments. The object is to pick an ornament, label the emotion and make guesses on what the gift might have been. For example: Excited (red): she received an iPad or Upset/Mad (orange): she received a pair of used boots. It can be a fun brainstorming activity and lead to a social skills lesson on what to say and what to keep in your thinking bubble. Feelings Tree 

2. Although we don’t have any snow right now I thought a blizzard game was appropriate this time of year.  I used the Board Game (Simple) template  from Custom Boards to create a quick open-ended game that could be use for different objectives. This one is called Blizzard. You can use a coin (heads=2, tails=1) or a die to move. If you land on the purple blizzard you lose one turn. If you land on snow day you take another turn. Now landing on the red dice is the open ended part of this game. Blizzard Game Board

1. For articulation students use articulation cards or the Articulate it! App* and if they land on a die with 5 they say a word five times or five words or even use the words in a sentence. Play continues as long as time allows.
2. For language students use the Label Set #3 template found in Signs & Labels and add vocabulary words or pictures to the circles or “snowballs” and they draw from the pile when landing on a red die. You might have them provide a definition, describe and have others guess; use the concept in a sentence, etc.  You may want them to just draw one “snowball” on their turn.

3. I used the Matching Cards template found in Activities & Games to created two syllable word cards. I cut them apart and laminated them. I made them color-coded to help with matching the two pieces.

• The students can draw these in a matching game format.
• I have also placed or taped one half of the word in the room and they try to find their match.
• We placed these on the floor in a hopscotch form and they say each syllable while hopping on them. They like to collect as many pairs as they can.
• 2 Syllable words A;  Syllables B; Syllables C; Syllables D; Syllables E; Syllables F

* there are other articulation apps to use too: ArtikPix; PocketSLP; Articulation Station; Talking Tails

A big hug and thank you!!!

If you noticed the badge on the right side of my blog it has changed from nominee to finalist. I am very honored how many people voted for my blog.  I have to thank Sean Sweeney at  SpeechTechie who nominated my blog initially. He too was one of the top 5 finalists in the Best EdTech/Sharing category.  To make it to the short list was a surprise and the to come in with the top five finalists was a “you gotta be kidding me” moment. So thank you and now the posting pressure is on! Be sure to check out all the blogs at here.

Top, Middle, Bottom activities and apps

ACTIVITY ONE:

I work with a wonderful Occupational Therapist (OT) and over the years we have done many groups together. We combine fine motor, sensory, social skills and language into our sessions.  This year we noticed most of the kids had a lot of difficult working on letter formations. Not unusual for early elementary kids but it appeared that they didn’t know what top, middle or bottom meant. So we stepped back and set up an obstacle course in which they could crawl through a tunnel, wait at the bottom of the slide, climb to the top of a slide,  go through the middle of a squeeze roller, etc.  The kids hid objects in the room and told there friends where to look… Look under the swing. Look behind the door.  (We see our groups in the Motor Room which has this equipment)

Now with support from our principal and other special education staff we are having the educational paraprofessionals (ESPs) work with the students 5-10 minutes a day on handwriting with a concept twist.  My wonderful OT, Liz,  put packets together with worksheets along with manipulatives (play dough, wikki stixs, animal chop sticks, etc.). I added a handout listing the 50 Boehm concepts. We met with the ESPs and went over the materials. One ESP even had basic concept activities ready to use and share. WOW!  This is the sheet I put in the packets: Basic concepts

We always introduce a letter with a fun  music video. The kids are now asking for it. Check it out:  Alphabet Videos

Working on letter formation always includes starting at the top and involves middle and bottom concepts too. So I have been focusing on these concepts within therapy sessions. Here are some ideas to help with TOP, MIDDLE and BOTTOM.

ACTIVITY TWO:

Art Project:  During my indirect/collaboration week I enjoy doing class lessons in the three special education site base rooms. This one was a brainstorm after checking out the die cuts available in my school.  I made mine based on the winter/Christmas season.  Print out for top middle bottom words

This is the request board I used during the activity.  Request board.   This board was made using Custom Boards by Smarty Ears. This app has a wide variety templates and works like Boardmaker on my iPad. I use it for many activities and love that I can use the provided symbols or import my own.

During the activity the students were able to use the Request board to create the project. As they chose each die cut they were asked if they wanted it on the top, middle or bottom. What doesn’t show on my sample is what we added. I had some googly eyes that were added to the snowman or gingerbread boy. We used lemon head candy and red hot candy as buttons  lights and a star on the top of the tree. They all loved watching it “snow” on their creations. Some kids even requested a blizzard! Being in MN blizzards and snow are common but the day we did this project (middle of December) it was raining which is not that common here!

APPS FOR PREPOSITIONAL CONCEPTS:

This app is also from Smarty Ears. You have the option to choose how many concepts you want to present. Cost: 9.99 (Universal)

This app is from Mobile Education Store. This app is designed to help elementary aged children learn the correct use of prepositions and learn how prepositions can change the meaning of a sentence. Cost: 9.99 iPad only

This app is from Doonan Speech Therapy.  Milo the Mouse helps to teach a variety of prepositional concepts. Cost: 2.99 (Universal)

The next two apps are not made specifically for prepositions.  I have used both of these as an i Spy activity with a twist. These apps are based on books by Roxie Munro. Roxie’s A-Mazing Adventure has you hop in a car and drive along roads in search of letters, penguins and more. It has small pictures so you really have to search to find the items. When I am working with elementary kids (k-3) I often find the item and give clues it is under the ___ or next to a ___ etc.  Roxie’s Doors  take you to a fire station, train, barn, etc.  You search for various items on each screen; flashlights, apples and even a kangaroo.

Cost: 2.99 iPad(either)  and .99  iPhone (A-mazing Adventure)

I am honored to be a nominee…

My blog has been nominated for an Edublog award. I was nominated by Sean Sweeney whose own blog Speech Techie is a great resource to check out. Now that my blog has made it to the short list you can vote. So if you feel it is deserving you can vote once a day.

• Just click on image above
• Choose the category Best ed Tech/resource sharing blog
• Find my name on the second drop down menu

You can vote once a day. Voting is open until 11:59 PM US Eastern Standard Time on Tuesday, December the 13th – and the winners will be announced at the Edublog Awards ceremony on the 14th at 7pm EST

Now the pressure is on! Just being nominated is unbelievable. I posted in a previous post how this all began and has morphed into what you see today. I am still learning and need to still figure out all the bells and whistles but my main purpose is to share.  I’ve always have felt this way and love to get ideas from others too. I don’t think we need to reinvent the wheel every day. There are times it just may need a little more air pumped in. So thanks for helping to keep me pumped up!

Cindy

Voting is open until 11:59 PM US Eastern Standard Time on Tuesday, December the 13th – and the winners will be announced at the Edublog Awards ceremony on the 14th at 7pm EST

Speech Treats

Using reward charts, treats and prizes as part of speech sessions can be controversial topic and discussions often pop up on Facebook and other sites. Personally I have stopped using sticker charts and prizes a couple of years ago. It happened unintentionally and when I realized not one student had asked about charts, prizes or treats I was ok with it too. I still look at student needs and use different incentives when necessary. This has included eating lunch together or playing a game of their choice. The biggest motivator has been my iPads. I know this is not an option for everyone due to cost but it has breathed new life and fun into my therapy sessions.

There is one app that might help motivate your students not costing you any more than 4.99. This app is called Speech Treats. I received this app free from the developer to review and share with my blog readers.  There are 12 kid characters and six animal characters. The 21 treats are photographs of a variety of food items ranging from cookies, pizza, dog bones, etc. When the adult touches the green button the character will “eat” a treat placed in its mouth. If the red button is touched the treat is rejected and the character states “Try again, you’ll get it.”  If you would rather not have the character talk you will need to use the iPad volume control. I look at multiple ways I can use any therapy material including apps. So not only can I use this app as a motivator or reinforcement here are other options I think will work too.

1. Vocabulary- label the food items
2. Attributes/Describing- find a fruit, find something cold, find something hard/soft, crunchy, juicy, etc.
3. Directions/Concepts- find the treat under the grapes, next to, over, etc.

In talks with Sara Dublin the developer we have talked about adding more food items and  having the ones “eaten” replaced by new items. I suggested adding items like worms or bugs to add the “gross” effect which many kids enjoy. I also asked about moving the green/red buttons to the top of the app instead of the bottom and away from little fingers. Developers welcome ideas and contacting them is one way to improve their apps or help them fix glitches. Posting an honest review on iTunes is also recommended for any app.

• So if you want some speech treats in therapy sessions this cavity free app may be just what you need. If you would like to use charts then check out freebies posted on my blog under Awards and Sticker Charts.

EXCITING REINFORCEMENT GAMES FOR SPEECH AND LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT

      

The Speech Treats Therapy Box Set and iPad Application are fun and innovative reinforcement games guaranteed to make kids learn, laugh and play.  They are intended to aid in the remediation of articulation impairments, as well as receptive and expressive language difficulties.  They are valuable speech-language therapy tools that will have a positive impact on children’s speech and language development.  These games will prompt children to monitor and self-correct their speech and language errors and are a great way to introduce any intervention goal to the child’s therapy session.  The Speech Treats products were designed by Ms. Sara Dublin, M.Sc., S-LP (C) an accredited Speech-Language Pathologist.  She developed the product during her graduate studies and has used it with countless children with speech and language difficulties.  The benefits of the game were seen immediately.  Sara noticed that it enhanced the quality of the therapy session and the children became engaged and motivated to accomplish their speech and language goals.  After graduate studies, Sara continued using the SpeechTreats Therapy Box with her clients all the while encountering parents asking where they could purchase the game and other Speech-Language Pathologists requesting to borrow it. Realizing that no such speech/language tool was on the market, Sara decided to mass produce and market the Speech Treats Therapy Box Set and its companion App version with the help of her sister. Since its launch in 2011, the feedback has been extremely positive.  Speech Treats products have been tried and tested with continuous success!

The Speech Treats Therapy Box and App specialize in facilitating the learning of children with special needs such as:
• Autism, Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD)
• Apraxia, Specific Language Impairment (SLI),
• Articulation/ Phonological Disorders, Receptive/ Expressive Language Delay, and children with feeding issues

These games are recommended for:
• Speech-Language Pathologists, SLP assistants, Auditory-Verbal Therapists
• Psychologists, Psycho-Educators, Occupational Therapists
• Teachers, Educators
• Parents, and anyone working with children with special needs

email:  info@speechtreats.com

telephone #:  1-877-650-6667

Website : www.speechtreats.com

If you do not have an iPad then check out Sara’s Speech Treats Therapy Box session which can be viewed on You Tube from the following link:  http://speechtreats.com/products  

Now if you are looking to REALLY cook up some speech snacks check out this blog Cooking Up Good Speech which is inspiring families to help their children speak well and eat well!

This gets me hungry for a new theme! Since I have many different cultures at my school I am not doing a lot of Christmas activities. So maybe I’ve talked myself into a “Food Frenzy” theme instead! I may find this theme to be too fattening so stay tuned…….

Robot and Jellyfish Invasion

As I mentioned in my last post I enjoy doing classroom lessons during my 3:1 week. It gives me a chance to see the students in another setting and we can work on transferring skills (hopefully!).  I didn’t start my 3:1 schedule until November due to changing schools. I needed time to get my schedule set up and my position changed from two schools to one (yeah!). I was ready to get out of my speech room and shake up my schedule. I always offer lessons to teachers during my collaboration week. This week I was able to go into the three site-based classrooms and do whole group lessons. I talked about the Turkey Luminaries in my last post. Here is the fun I had in the other two classrooms.

ROBOT INVASION

This summer I found an activity that talked about making robots with tin cans and junk drawer finds in the Disney Family Fun site. So I saved cans of various sizes and pulled junk together from every drawer, recycle bin, and toolbox around our house. That was the easy part but finding magnets that were strong enough to hold these treasures and were not too expensive took more hunting.  I was able to find them at the Great MN State Fair believe it or not. Northern Tool has a store set up at our State Fair and it carries a wide variety of equipment, tools and just fun stuff. I bought several sets of disc magnets that were very inexpensive. I used my glue gun to attach the magnets to my junk drawer finds.  I did not glue all the magnets to junk drawer finds. I saved some to use with items that are attracted to magnets and could be changed out easily.

Before creating our robots we talked about robots and looked at some of these apps- Dancing Robot (free), Little Blue Robot (.99), Talking Roby (free), Talking Roby for iPad (free),  Interactive Alphabet (2.99), Toca Robot (.99), AR Robot (free) You need to print this picture to go with the app- Robot app picture.

I set the box on the table and we “guessed” what was inside-not too hard since I had robot pictures glued to it! But it was fun to give them my “wrong” guesses. It was a way to work on joint attention and joint enjoyment. I set out the cans and the junk drawer finds on the table. This classroom is one of of our autism rooms and  many of the students’ verbal skills are limited. It was best to create visual models for this group. I picked up items and placed it on my can saying this is my robot’s eye, mouth, brain, hair, ear, etc. The students did not have any difficulty creating their robots. One boy even began talking for his  robot in a robot like voice . This made my heart ping as he is not very verbal and here we were talking “robot” together.  One other student so wanted to take his robot home but  was able to dissemble his when he knew he could have a picture with his creation. I used my iPad to take the pictures and printed one of each student. I used  the Photo Collage Creator (free) to make the photo above. The faces are hidden to protect their identity with stickers found in this app.  I have a feeling the Robot box will be making more appearances!  This is the sheet I printed out so they could take their robot home- just add your name and insert their picture. I left the blank for them to create a name for their robot at home but you could add that with them too. Robot Makers

Other activities with Robot themes: Robot Dominoes

JELLYFISH INVASION

Picklebums.com

There is very funny and talented lady named Kate who I follow on Facebook, Twitter and on her Picklebums Blog. She posted a cute Jellyfish Activity and I knew I would be using it! I did not use it exactly as she presented it although I’m sure the students would have had fun singing the song. The class was another one of the  special education site based rooms and these students have a range of cognitive disabilities. I knew we would need to be as interactive as possible to keep everyone’s attention.  I cut out the jellyfish except for their tentacles. We talked about what the creatures were called and what to call the long things at the bottom (tentacles). With help or independently each student cut between the tentacles. Together  we said “cut” and said “stop” when we got to the head. I used drinking straws (from our supply room) and we taped them on the backs.                                Concepts targeted: up, stop, over (tape over straw), back/behind, front

I projected ocean pictures through the classroom smart board. The students took turns having their jellyfish swim in the ocean, away from a shark, over/under/behind/in front of a sea turtle, inside a cave, away from the beach/sand, around a scuba diver, floated on top of the ocean, etc. Pretty soon we had a smack* of jellyfish and lots of giggling. (*other terms used for a group of jellyfish are: swarm and bloom)                                        Concepts targeted: up, down, over, under, in front, behind, back, fast, slow, away from, together, apart, stop, go, float, sink, scary, friendly, cold, hot, dark, light

ocean pictures

Jellyfish Apps that could be used with this activity- Sea Life Matching Cards (.99), Funny Stickers-Sea World (free), Sounds of the Sea (free), Fraise Puzzle (free), Macaron Fraise Puzzle (free), Jellyfish Frenzy (free), Jellyfish Hunter (free)