We are excited that you’re visiting our blog at IEP Therapy and wanted to take a minute to introduce ourselves! We’re Erin Johnson, MA, CCC-SLP and Chrissy Mooney, MS, CCC-SLP, ASHA certified SLPs who work as the therapy managers and support a school-based team of IEP professionals at IEP Therapy. Erin attended Southern Illinois University for her bachelor’s degree in Psychology and then Northern Illinois University for her master’s degree in Speech-Language Pathology. Erin has been working for IEP Therapy since 2009. She has a passion for working with children using creative literacy-based language activities! Chrissy attended Indiana University for her bachelor’s degree in Speech and Hearing Sciences and then Western Illinois University for her master’s degree in Communication Sciences and Disorders. She loves finding ways to help IEP professionals stay organized and be efficient with time.
We will be sharing ways we are using books and materials with students. Since Halloween is just around the corner, we chose a brand-new book called “Snowmen at Halloween” written by Caralyn Buehner and illustrated by Mark Buehner.
“Snowman at Halloween” is the newest addition to the Snowman at Night series, which is a New York Times Bestseller. There are many opportunities to work on speech skills and language concepts in this book! We’ve outlined a few below help you keep targets in mind for grab-and-go therapy.
Vocabulary
- Basic – pumpkin, Jack-o-Lantern, snow, snowman, trick-or-treating, parade, spooky, bats, owls, costume (witch, ghost, pirate, cowboy, vampire)
- Advanced – autumn, moonlit, village, beckon, heap, disguise, anticipate, maze, fortune, fate
Compound Words
- Moonlit, Everything, Outside, Snowmen, Snowstorms, Overnight
Verbs (use the actions words to create present and past tense verb forms and to formulate descriptive sentences)
- Regular – Carve, glide, beckon, heap, follow, paint, bob, wink, paint, anticipate, wander, giggle, settle, melt, pass
- Irregular – bite, hang, give, see, tell, begin, make, get, find, think
Adjectives (to help form descriptive sentences)
- Gooey, scary, twinkling, spooky, afraid, full, twisting, orange, warm, fun
Wh Questions
- What costumes are the snowmen wearing?
- What did the snowmen get to carve?
- What beckoned the snowmen into the village square?
- What filled the snowmen’s buckets?
- What message did the snowmen leave for the children?
- Who made the snowmen?
- Who wore the costumes?
- Who painted the snowmen’s faces?
- Where did the snowmen go?
- When did the kids make the snowmen?
- Why did the snowman?
- Why did the sister have a box of dress ups?
- Why did the snowmen go see the fortune teller?
- How did the snowmen get gooey grins?
- Which costume is your favorite?
Other Activities
- Compare and contrast – pumpkin and jack-o-lantern; Witch and pirate (both wear a hat and have a spooky smile; different – one wears a cape and one wears a vest); autumn and winter; Snickers and Milk Duds; bat and an owl
- One of the best parts about using any book in therapy is that you can always find words that contain targeted speech sounds!
- If you’re working on phonological awareness, there’s a lot of rhyming in this book! Pile-smile; ghost-most; afraid-parade, etc.
- Practice trick or treating with your students to work on manners
- Make broader connections with your students by
asking them personal questions such as
- What are you going to be for Halloween?
- Where do you go trick or treating?
- What is your favorite candy?