The Doctor is in...

Anyone else celebrating Dr. Seuss' birthday?! I love incorporating real world items into our therapy sessions. The students love making a mess, so in honor of the great Dr. Seuss we make "oobleck". We learn about Dr. Seuss and read a short biography, I read a truncated version of "Bartholomew and the Oobleck" by Dr. Seuss (the original takes over 30 minutes for me to get through!?) and then I present them with the science experiment.

Oobleck is a 'non-newtonian fluid'. Viscosity is the rate at which something pours. Water pours quickly and honey or syrup pours slowly. These liquids have a constant viscosity, it will never change. Oobleck pours both quick AND slow!?

When made correctly Oobleck can be molded into a ball and have properties like a solid, and when released will "melt" in your hand like a liquid.

Oobleck is a 2:1 ratio

2 cups cornstartch

1 cup water

TIPS:
*I love to find youtube videos to help the students see what should happen, before starting.
*Use disposable bowls and spoons for easy clean up.
*Buy the rolls of plastic tablecloths to work on, then just throw everything out.
*If the oobleck is too hard add water, and if it is too wet add more corn starch!
*If the oobleck spills over and out, let it dry it will turn into powder and you can easily vacuum/sweep it up!


PROMPT: *I created a short "Bartholomew and the Oobleck" on my SMARTboard, I can change the words/phrases/sentences to achieve my various targets!

LANGUAGE: scientific method, following directions/steps, math fractions

PRAGMATICS: sharing items, turn taking for measuring, following rules

Oo the messes you will make!

Listening Language

Dingle Dangle: Listening and Language! I love this app it is so adorable and silly. There are two different activities: players can listen to instructions (in noise!) or build their own scarecrow.

This app was created by the Royal Institute for Deaf and Blind Children (RIDBC) by listening and spoken language specialists.

I love to pair this app with the story "The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything". I use this with a lot of my students.

We color and cut out the pieces and make puppets. They have to listen to the sounds of the pieces and make their puppet do the actions

Shoes say "clomp clomp"
Pants say "wiggle wiggle"
Shirt says "shake shake shake"
Hat says "nod"
Gloves say "clap"
Pumpkin says "boo!"


       

PROMPT:
Phonatory Control: "ah" for on, "mm" for more
Labial-facial control: boo, shake, oh no!
Lingual control/sequenced: clomp, wiggle, clap, nod

LANGUAGE: sequencing, following directions, recall story, describing

      And the mouse went ::click click::

APP-Y HOUR: Bamba ice-cream/burger

 BAMBA: Ice-Cream (FREE)

Pick your flavors: vanilla, chocolate even robot and rainbow! Pick toppings: sprinkles, gummy bears, zombie?! Create all the different ice-creams you want. Baskets of ice-cream. Ice-cream on waffles! Don't eat too fast, you'll get a brain freeze!

 BAMBA: Burger (FREE)

Create your own fast food creation.  Burger. Soda. Fries. Put whatever you want on your burger.  Cheese, ketchup, toilet paper. Fill your soda up, make french fries, pay and eat it up! You even get a fun kids prize.


These are both simple food making apps. My kids love them for the silly factor (Vanilla ice-cream with unicorn on top, don't mind if I do).  Another one of my favorite triple threats: Articulation, language, pragmatics.

Articulation/PROMPT:
Stage 3 Mandibular: top, hot
Stage 4 Labial Facial: mmmm, yum, more, me, tap, pay, eat, cup, bun
Stage 5 Lingual: hot, top, tap, paid, eat/ate, cone, cut, bun
Stage 6 Sequenced: eat it up, pay now

Language: sequence, follow directions, WH?, yes/no questions (expressive/receptive)

Pragmatics: Sharing, asking appropriate questions, "What would you like on yours?"