My Board Game Wishlist

Ah, sweet summertime. You know, the time of year when school SLPs & speech students can just sit back, relax, and forget about therapy for a few weeks. Just kidding, do we ever forget about therapy? I know I don't. My favorite part of summer (in the 4 days that I've had so far) has been planning out future therapy sessions.

A few weeks ago I found my new obsession-- going to thrift stores. Ohhh man, do I love a good deal. In the past few weeks I have accumulated more than 16 games for around $30. Make sure to show your student I.D. if you go to Goodwill because there is a good discount. Another store in my area has student discounts on Wednesdays and other great deals the other days of the week. The other day I found a brand new Apples-to-Apples Jr. game for $1.80. Love it!

I know that if I let myself, I will buy every game in the stores so I have limited myself to a list of games. I've done a lot of sleuthing online and have compiled a list of some of the best speech games out there. I also kept a list of the most-loved games at my summer practicum. My rule for myself is that I can't buy a game that isn't on the list... UNLESS I google the game name + "speech therapy" and come up with few hits on my phone. I've heard a few people say that they don't know which games to even look for so I figured I share my list. I can't guarantee each game is perfect so I'll make two lists-- one for games I own or know work well and a list of games that I haven't played but have heard good things about. So here is a list you can take with you everywhere (I have it in a note on my iPhone) so that you are always prepared :).

Own or Know  

• Sorry
• Don't Spill the Beans
• Mouse Match
• Scrabbled Eggs
• I Spy-Eagle Eye (or any I Spy game)
• Let's Go Fishing
• Hullabaloo
• Leap-in-Line
• Cariboo (If you find this game, BUY IT)
• Outburst
• Blurt (LOVE this game)
• Cadoo
• Jenga
• Hanging Around-- Monkeys
• War
• Candy Land
• Don't Break the Ice
• Operation
• Guess Who
• Apples to Apples Jr. 
• Barnyard Bingo
• Dudley Dino Dinner
• Kerplunk
• Monkeying Around
• Pop Up Pirate
• Hi-Ho Cherry- O
• Twister
• Crocodile Dentist
• Memory
• Buckaroo
• Chutes & Ladders
• Zingo
• Whoonu
• Balloon Lagoon
• Operation
• Conga
• Cootie
• What's In Ned's Head
• Buckaroo
• Taboo Jr. 

Games I Still Want

• Hedbanz
• Bafflegab
• Funglish
• Rory's Cubes
• Aggravation
• Oodles of Doodles
• Password Jr.
• Spot-It
• Funny Bunny
• Pop the Pig
• Battling Tops
• Don't Wake Up Daddy
• Dignity Dog
• Go for the Dough
• Guess Where
• Buzz Blast
• Who Am I?
• Storymatic Kids
• Feed the Woozle
• Sound It Found It
• Elefun
• Don't Say It
• In a Pickle
• Funny Bunny

Lovely Laminator

mommyspeechtherapy.com

I've gotten a little obsessed with my laminator lately. It's funny because I got it fall semester but didn't even take it out of its box until a few weeks ago. Since I've been doing so much lesson planning lately I've tried to cut down on my paper use. Now that almost everything in my life is laminated, I almost never have to print new things. Today I laminated a huge collection of articulation words. I found great word sets at mommyspeechtherapy.com. These are great because they have both the word and picture for kids that are still not reading. The site has initial, medial, and final positions for words along with sentences, love it!

After printing out all positions and almost all articulation sounds, I laminated and cut them out. Since I'll be using them so often, I printed out each sound 2x just so I'll have enough. I have them stored in plastic baggies based on place and position in word. I printed both large size cards and booklet size cards because you never know what size you will need. Now I can easily tape the words onto activities and then reuse them later. No more wasted paper and ink!

Articulation Bingo
Speaking of taping words onto activities, I also printed off some bingo cards for tomorrow. Once again, I was looking for a way to save paper so I laminated my cards. Then I grabbed my /k/ and /g/ baggies and randomly taped on the words to the bingo cards.

      

To play:

• Have the child pull a big picture from the bag
• As he says the target word, he will find the picture on his board
• Once he has a bingo, he will say all of his bingo line cards to win

Fly Swat Articulation (From Let's Talk Speech Therapy)

This weekend I spent a lot of time doing nothing, like taking naps, eating, reading, and watching TV. Needless to say, when I woke up this morning I knew I needed to buckle down and get some therapy planning done. Since I have gotten progressively lazier since last fall I decided to find my therapy ideas online today. All of my kids tomorrow are working on articulation so it was pretty nice to just find a few activities that can work for all of them. 

Fly Swat Articulation

I saw this activity on teacherspayteachers.com which is one of my favorite sites. If you haven't been there, you should look.  Let's Talk Speech Therapy had "articulation bugs" available for free so I downloaded the blank bugs. Then I found a frog template (also by Let's Talk Speech Therapy). 

                                                

First I cut out everything out and laminated everything. I glued the frog onto a used granola bar box and used a box cutter to cut out his mouth. I also picked up a 99 cent fly swatter from Walgreens. 

To play:

• Lay the bugs across the floor or table
• Tell the child that the frog is hungry and needs to eat bugs
• Have the child pull out a picture from the bag of pictures
• The child will find the bug whose picture matches and swat it with the fly swatter as he says the target word on the bug
• Then as he feeds it to the frog, he will include the word into a sentence

The finished project

Articulation Jenga

There are quite a few articulation Jenga activities floating around the web so mine is just one of many. I have an older client working on articulation so I wanted to bring in a game that he would actually enjoy. I thought Jenga would be fun but I didn't own the game. After class yesterday I searched through the closest thrift stores but couldn't find any cheap versions. I was pretty close to giving up and then saw a Jenga set on the top shelf hidden behind Trivial Pursuit. Unfortunately, this was the version:

Yep... dirty, dirty Truth or Dare Jenga

I thought Truth & Dare Jenga would be just a little inappropriate for my speech kids but I wasn't about to pay $12 for a new Jenga set. This ratty, tatty, old Truth & Dare set was too good to pass up at $2. The blocks are really pretty shocking though. Here is a taste:

 

No wonder it was at a thrift store...

When I got home I thought I would just write articulation words on pieces of paper and stick them on the blocks but then realized that would be a lot of work for just one client. I pulled out my laminator that has been hidden in my closet for 6 months and decided that it would finally be put to work. I laminated white pieces of paper to fit the blocks and taped them on. This way, I can reuse the blocks over and over by just using white board markers: 

The finished blocks

Luckily about 1/3 of the blocks were just plain wood with no writing so I left those alone. When we play, I will say those are freebies. Also, I figure that if I ever need to use Jenga with the kiddos that can't read yet I will just use different colors for the blocks and have the colors correspond to the articulation cards. I'm pretty happy with my $2 thrift store game. 

I'm Terrible At Updating This

I realize that I haven't updated this blog in way too long. Spring semester was easy to pass over because I was at Head Start working with birth-3 kiddos, which did not take really any lesson planning at all. We were focused on child-directed play so I really just went into the classrooms and followed each client's lead. This was very fun and did not require much outside thinking but did require a lot of in the moment planning. I discharged a few of my kids and ended the semester with only one client.

I also had a preteen who was working on or, ar, and er. Since he was older we could focus on therapy instead of "making therapy fun & engaging" so we spent a lot of time on self-monitoring strategies and we played with Linguasystem /r/ cards. I discharged him from therapy about halfway through the semester because he made such huge gains on his goals.

This summer I'm out on practicum at an outpatient pediatric rehab facility. Most of my clients are birth-6 but we have some older kids, too. I love the environment because parents usually come into the sessions and there is a lot of educational opportunities. We also have more severe cases than what I have seen at the university clinic or at Head Start. There are two supervising SLPs at my placement so it has been interesting to see different styles of doing speech therapy. I'm slowly taking clients away from my supervisors and building up my caseload. It is way different planning for 8+ different kids every morning than having a few clients multiple times a week. I'm learning how to do therapy by the seat of my pants. However, I'm still holding onto my love of lesson planning and trying to cater activities to each individual kid.

Lately I've realized the wealth of activities that are on the internet. So, instead of reinventing the wheel, I've been trying to utilize what is out there. This blog is going to focus more on a place for me to look back on someday to see what I have done instead of just being new and innovative stuff. I'm going to cite where I've gotten my ideas but most will also have little twists on them.

End of the Semester Catch-Up

I'm back. It's been awhile. While I haven't failed at much in life (other than trying things from pinterest), I think we can all agree that keeping this blog updated has been a failure. Life got crazy: my TA hours went up, time spent studying went up, and therapy got easier. So guess what got put on the wayside? Yep, creative planning. I can tell you that we did a ton of amazing things that never got posted (too many science experiments, plural -s races, and long vowel hopscotches to count) so don't think I got completely lazy. Just lazy in the fact that I went straight to bed at night.

But now the semester is over and I'm back. Everything turned out great-- remember the grad school blues post? Yeah, that was not pretty. Thankfully, juggling my life got easier and now it's wonderful, beautiful Christmas break (after I correct 50 more language samples).

My client reached 4/6 of his objectives (yay). During assessment in September, I asked him to write a story. He wrote one sentence with no punctuation, capitalization, beginning, or end. Two weeks ago, I asked him to write me a story and, without any help, he wrote a setting, problem, action to solve problem, and results. Then, he went back and edited for punctuation/capitalization all by himself. I WAS AMAZED. Like so amazed that I wanted to simultaneously cry hysterically and make this face:

I also finished up with my dementia group at a SNF. The ladies were so wonderful and I'm going to miss them so much. This experience really opened my eyes to working with the elderly. I love it! I can't wait until I get another placement with adults. 

I've been on break for about a day (if you can consider it break if I spent 3 hours at school today) and am already excited to crack open the books for next semester. While the classes are not as interesting to me as this semesters', I'm looking forward to adding more knowledge into my brain. I found out that I get to do a practicum at Head Start next semester so I am over-the-moon excited! I'm not sure where else I will be or what other client I have so I'll keep you posted. 

To end this last blog post of the semester, I want to give hope to all the undergrads that I may have scared away with previous grad school horror stories. Looking back, it is not as bad as it may have seemed. While being a TA definitely added unnecessary stress to my chaotic life, I kept my grades up to my usual standards, still had a semi-social life, and learned a lot. I'm sitting here grading language development papers and realizing how much I now know. It is unbelievable. And the best part is that there is so much left to learn. We are so blessed to be in this profession. I'm so happy that someday I will get to call myself a speech-language pathologist. I truly think it is the best job in the world. 

Story Structure Hop

This is an activity that I have been using for the last month but was too lazy to take a picture/write about it. My client has problems writing and retelling a complete story. During assessment he would either say a few words about a story or else write down a sentence to tell a story. I have been explicitly teaching him 4 main parts of a story: setting (including character, place, and time), problem, action to solve problem, and result. We started by just listening to basic oral stories and then matched direct sentences from the story to the different parts. Once he recognized the 4 parts, I wanted to do something a little more active.

I bought cheap foam rectangles from Joann's and printed off category cards for each story structure component. I let him choose which color he wanted for each element (e.g. red for problem). After direct teaching and modeling the use of the story squares, we now use them for brainstorming and retelling. For example, as I read a familiar or unfamiliar story, he will hop to the part of the story as I read. He also creatively plans a written story by hopping to each square and brainstorming that part.

Yesterday proved that the squares work because as I read him a spooky Halloween story, he asked if he could use the squares to remember all of the parts. He also used his finger on the desk to point to invisible space as he was visualizing the squares in his head. It was pretty cool. His storytelling has improved drastically since the first day of therapy.

Sorry for the horrible picture; I was lazy and forgot the category cards and blurriness :)

Superhero Pow

Right now in therapy we are working on editing sentences. My kid tends to leave out punctuation and capitalization. He also doesn't differentiate between a sentence and a full story. In order to make him aware of his capital and punctuation errors, I have him do checklists after he writes stories.

Yesterday I copied his writing sample and cut it into sentence strips. This way he is able to edit his own story in his own handwriting. First, I had him read his story out loud. Then, he had to guess which sentences were actually sentences and not just run-ons or just phrases. Finally, I gave him the checklist and he had to be the capitalization & punctuation detective.

Here is the checklist I made:

I originally got this idea from pinterest, specifically from an anchor chart for "superhero swag" but I didn't really like the swag part of it. He was really cute when I explained the checklist to him. We both did the pow gesture and then, at the end, I asked him if his story had pow and he said, "Double pow! Pow pow!"

Oh Hey Mediocre Life

So here is the thing: just like everything else, this blog has fallen to the wayside. Not only am I super busy, but my therapy session today was cancelled so I haven't made up any new activities for a week. Let me tell you though, having a cancelled session hasn't decreased the chaos of my life.

For the first month or so of school I didn't allow myself to watch TV or really do anything fun. This was great, I focused solely on school and did not let myself have any fun. Unfortunately, this weekend I made the mistake of watching TV, and then, the dam broke. I can't stop. Not only did I watch all the reruns of The Voice, Teen Mom, and Glee, I also went to the pumpkin patch and a wedding with my boyfriend. This weekend=school fail.

The point of this story is this... I got a B+ on my research methods midterm yesterday. That B+ has been haunting me for the past 24 hours. Every time I close my eyes it flashes before me. I asked one of my friends yesterday, "When did I turn into a mediocre student?" Last year an A- felt like failing and now I'm consistently doing an underwhelming job in school.

This isn't an "oh I'm so sad about my life" blog post. It's just a reality check. Life will never go back to how it was. I don't think I'll ever be a consistently A+ person again and that's a hard thing to accept. But I'm learning to deal with it. Case in point: I'm sitting here watching The Voice and eating ice cream. And I have a quiz tomorrow. Oh well, bring it on quiz, bring it on.

One last thing, grad school has turned me into a much crankier person. I find myself glaring at people and thinking about the many idiots in the world. I used to be so sweet and forgiving but not anymore. Here is a video that reminds me of myself:

Plural -s Race

We are working on adding plurals onto base words. He is great at adding -s but struggles when the base words require -es (words that end in s, ch, sh, etc). Since he loves competition, we are going to do a word find race.

Before we begin,  I'll ask him what to add at the end of a word to make it plural. If he just says –s then I will write dress on the board and ask, “what if the word is dress, would you add a third –s onto the word?”  I will explain the rule that when a word ends in –s, you need to add an –es to the end to make it plural.

My absolutely horrible plural -s/-es story

Then, we will each get a reading passage. I'll set the timer for 1 minute and tell him to find as many -s and -es words as he can before the time runs out. I'll remind him that it is a race so try to find as many as possible. We will each race to find and highlight the words. When the time runs out, we will count our words and compare. Then, he will use write his words on Post-It notes. Using a sorting chart written on the white board, he will place each word in the correct category (-s or -es). 

After sorting the words, he will pick 5 -es words that he likes. He will then use the sentence worksheet to write a sentence about each one. Using a writing modality helps the meaning/spelling stick in his head. Here is the sentence worksheet:

Long Vowel Word Wall

One of my goals for this semester (not an official goal, just my own personal goal) is for my kid and I to create a word wall every month. He can keep track of words we are working on plus it is a good transition task from academic to fun. However, when I started thinking about a word wall, I got so bored. Usual word walls are just a poster board with the word written across it. I decided that I'll do themes for each month: October Halloween, November Thanksgiving, and December Christmas. (I'm lucky because my kiddo's family is a-okay with celebrating the holidays in therapy.)

Since I'm focusing on the long vowel a spelling pattern, I'll have a ghost "head" for each pattern. This week at least we are focusing on -ay, -ea-, and -ai-. My kid will write the words onto white slips of paper, sort them by pattern, and attach them to the ghost heads using glue:

Here is an easy ghost head that I found on google images

Our goal is to make each ghost a body. With each white piece of paper, the ghosts will get longer and longer. He can cut each slip so that the ghosts take shape. This also means he'll have to manipulate the words smaller and smaller so that they will fit onto the ghost.

I'll connect all the ghosts together using coat hangers so that we can hang them around the therapy room as visual cues. This will also make comparing them easier.

At the end of the month we can do some comparisons:

• Which spelling pattern ghost is the longest?
• Which ghost is the shortest?
• Predict which long a spelling pattern has the most words (probably the longest ghost)
• Count the # of words that we have found that fit into the spelling pattern

The word wall after the first day, these ghosts are going to be huge!

Hit the Pattern

Pick three different spelling patterns within a broad category (long vowels). For example, choose 5 spelling words for long a silent -e (crate, rate, lane, frame, ate), 5 spelling words for long ai (paint, faint, rain, main, train), and 5 spelling words for ay (day, Monday, pay, fray, clay).

Work on these patterns earlier in the week so that the kid is familiar with them. For the game, print off the three patterns (-aCe, -ai-, and -ay) on large paper and make them big & bold. Lay next to each other on the floor. Give the child time to look over the patterns and think about words that fit. Explain that you will tell him a word and he needs to toss the spike ball onto the right pattern.

Imagine these cut out and even bigger

Call out spelling words one by one. "Crate" and the child should throw the ball onto the correct pattern -aCe-. If he lands on the wrong one (intentionally), ask him to write the word on the whiteboard. If he spells it wrong, tell him to correct it by using a different pattern. If he gets it right, he gets a point. If not, correct the spelling on the board. Repeat activity.

Extra activities:

• add the words onto his long vowel a word wall poster
• write a sentence using each of the words
• draw a picture of the word (if possible) and make up a story about it 
• "The bunny crawled into the crate for a rest but then he got carted across the ocean..."
• have him find the words within curriculum text 

This is an easy activity to use to see if teaching is being generalized to other words. It is also easy to take data on: if he spells it right, you know the pattern is known. If he gets it wrong but then can apply the right pattern when he spells it out, then he needs more scaffolding. If he gets it wrong each time, he needs to be re-taught the pattern.

My spike "ball"

Roll, Write, Rewrite

I got this idea on pinterest. I saw that someone had made a roll and revise sentence dice game here: thefirstgradeparade.blogspot.com. But, since it is not age-appropriate for my kiddo, I decided to tweak it a bit for my lesson this week.

One of my goals for this semester is to have my client write accurate and complete sentences within a narrative. After evaluating the three writing samples that I collected the past two weeks, I realized that he typically leaves out punctuation, capitalization, and cohesive devices. For this lesson, I really want to focus on the punctuation and capitalization. I also added in some long vowel pattern and past tense -ed spelling errors to see if he could catch them. 

First, I made sentence squares. Each square has three sentences that are incorrect. I'll cut the sentence squares out after I print them and glue them onto an empty Kleenex box. 

Examples of inaccurate sentences

After the kid rolls, he will correct the sentence that he lands on. First, he will go through and mark everything that is wrong. Then, we will check to make sure he has all the errors marked. After that, I'll give him a fill in the blank worksheet so that he can fix the errors without having to write all the sentences out again. He hates writing so I figured that I would limit the amount he has to do with this activity. We might not get through all the sentences in one day so it would be a nice carry-over activity.

Fill-in-the-blank editing worksheet

Homemade Plastic

Since I'm being lazy this weekend I decided to just do an experiment using ingredients that I already have. I typed Borax into google and found an experiment called homemade plastic here: http://listverse.com. It is pretty easy. Just combine water, Borax, food coloring, and Elmer's glue. The child can experiment adding more liquid or more Borax and see what type of plastic is made (softer or firmer).

Hopefully mine turns out like this

Here's the science worksheet. It'll be easy to compare and contrast because he just did an experiment using Borax and glue but they are different experiments.

After the experiment, I'll have him brainstorm at least 5 adjectives that describe his experiment. On Thursday, we will use those words to write a story about the substance. 

TA Thoughts

Last night I corrected 95 tests. Each test had 6 pages and 44 questions. That's 570 pages and 4180 questions. Let me tell you, not the easiest thing I've ever done. If I ever hear about semanticity, productivity, and displacement again I might scream. When I first got the tests I was excited to grade them; I wanted to feel like a real TA. For most of the semester I have just been organizing a literacy lab, correcting homework, and holding office hours so this was a big moment. After the first 20 tests the enthusiasm waned. Spelling errors started haunting me and my hand cramped up from holding my red pen so tightly. Why do educated people (I mean, these are juniors in college) think it is okay to not differentiate between here/hear and when has semantics ever been spelled symenticks?

I've learned quite a bit from grading these tests. First of all, I really wish that I would've graded them before taking my language test last week. Now I feel like an expert on the foundational theories, definitions, and logic behind development.

Secondly, I learned that professors could absolutely, positively care less if you write a novel for each question. I had so many tests where the test-taker obviously wanted to impress someone with their knowledge. They would write on the front, back, and into the next question. My eyes would start to hurt and I just skimmed to look for the right answers hidden in all that writing. My advice to all you "I'm going to write as much as possible people"... stop! Be concise and right. Your professor/TA will like you better for it. Not only that, you look a little silly spending all that time writing 4 paragraphs for a 1 point question. Just stop it.

Third, the people who fail and the ones that get 100% are the only people I remember. If you are in that slim majority, I'll remember your name and have either low/high expectations for the next quiz. The other people are just part of a very large herd of people that kind of slip off the radar. As I was grading I was thinking about how my professors have viewed me and got really self-conscious. When a professor dedicates 3-5 minutes solely on grading your knowledge, they are going to make pretty solid judgments about you. Think about that the next time you take a test and don't study. Your professor is judging, judging I say!

Finally, I realized how hard it is to grade. I really wanted everyone to do well. And when people did not do well I tried to understand their answers the best I could. However, some answers just are not right no matter what (if you answer that theory of mind is being able to theorize about theories of the mind and theories, you have most definitely chosen the wrong answer). The thought of an angry mob of students breaking into my TA office is a scary thought. I'll let you know if it happens.

Story Structure Match-Up

I need to keep assessing his story structure knowledge and since he consistently forget the problem and result of a story, I figured I would give him some scaffolding as I assessed. We're going to read "Just A Mess" by Mercer Meyer.

He will make predictions about the book and then read it out loud. Instead of doing follow-up comprehension questions, I'll have him match up pieces of the story with the different story structure parts.

Don't mind the fact that the problem is in different font, technical error 

For the specific story cards, I used one real name and a few fake, along with one real setting and a few fake. I also pulled sentences through the story for him to identify as the problem and result.

Just an example of the character cards

I'll cut the cards out so that he can lay them across the table and work on solving which card goes under each story part. He is really good at identifying character and setting so those should be an easy way to start this activity.

Things I'll Assess:

• Making predictions about a book
• Reading fluency
• Story structure knowledge when presented with examples 

Spinning Top

While I was hurriedly trying to put together a lesson plan yesterday, I was trying to think of other ways to probe past tense -ed. Are you sick of past tense -ed activities yet? Because I sure am. And I'm really sick of probing. It has gotten to the point that I know exactly what I want to work on this semester but I'm required to finish out this week of evaluating/assessing.

Anyway, I decided to use a spinning top game that I saw on pinterest. After class I raced to the White Elephant since they have the best toy selection in town. Of course they had cute old-fashioned spinners. For some reason, I got home and promptly forgot that I was going to do this activity. I think I just got too caught up in failed bouncy balls. Fortunately, I was compiling all my stuff this morning and realized I never planned this activity out.

I just threw together a really quick container for the top to spin in. I found a shoebox lid and taped construction paper to the bottom. Then, using various straight-edged materials, I tried to draw straight lines. Of course I'm impatient and messy so my lines weren't straight and my words turned out crooked. Oh well.

Don't mind the ink smear :)

Here is the plan:

• Child will spin the top
• He has to add past tense -ed onto the word the spinner lands on
• He has to write the new form of the word onto his worksheet
• Spin again

The lazy worksheet: I'm just so tired, I don't want to design a worksheet!

Homemade Bouncy Balls

My science experiment for tomorrow comes from www.sciencebob.com again. I'm moving away from the vegetable oil/vinegar/baking soda concoctions and into more direction involved experiments. It might be a little difficult but tomorrow we are making:

Bouncy Balls!

I went on a mad goose chase this afternoon looking for Borax and finally found it at Safeway. Kinda expensive but hopefully I'll get some more use out of it than just tomorrow. The ingredients for this project are:

• Warm water
• Cornstarch
• Borax
• White glue
• Food coloring

The directions are on the link that I listed above so I won't waste your time going over the whole experiment. Here is the typical science worksheet:

Rationale behind this activity:

• Reading instructions
• Making predictions
• Motivation (for each activity that he finishes during therapy he earns an ingredient)
• Following directions
• Thinking about first, then, finally
• Using compare and contrast thinking 

WHOOPS:

So I just tried this. 5 TIMES. From 5 different recipes. And it didn't work. My hands are now covered in glue, stained blue from food coloring, and have a weird smell. So I wouldn't recommend doing this. However, since it is the night before my lesson and I have a full day tomorrow, it is either do this experiment or nothing. And I think my kid would riot if I didn't have science. So... I think we'll probably do it. Then, I might tell a white lie and say that the ball needs to dry over the weekend. Since I know it won't work, I'll just go buy a bouncy ball and give it to him on Tuesday and explain that the experiment didn't work. I'm not a horrible person, right? Yay, failed science for everyone! 

The mess I got left with...

Bouncy ball fail

Quick Update: Volcano = Success

I have a test and a quiz tomorrow and a lesson plan to write so I don't have time for more than just a quick update. The session today went great. The "Johnny Appleseed" book was so cute and he loved tossing the bean bags into my homemade toss game. But, he loved the volcano explosion activity best of all. My wonderful boyfriend volunteered to make a volcano for me and it turned out great. The kid's eyes got as big as saucers when he saw it. It was the usual experiment with baking soda and vinegar. Here are pictures of the volcano:

Here is the science worksheet I created

Beanbag Toss: "Planting Apples"

So just like Johnny Appleseed tossed seeds to grow apples, I thought that I could have my child toss beanbags to grow words... aka, add the past tense -ed onto words. The idea is simple: just like the bowling game, there will be base words and the child will have to write the past tense form of the word on a worksheet. 

I thought of a beanbag toss earlier today but gave up on the idea because 1. I don't have a bean bag toss game and 2. I was feeling too lazy to even think about it. Then my guilty conscience came into play: "Jill, if you don't include fun games he isn't going to listen. And if he doesn't listen then you'll fail." So I decided to make my own bean bag toss game.

Not as easy as one might think. Especially for me. I tend to get impatient and sloppy when making crafts. Funny how I forgot that about myself until I had already started the project. This is what I started with:

3 boxes and some construction paper

I ran to the Dollar Tree to grab some construction basics: duct tape, more construction paper, and a utility knife. Without having a plan, I grabbed the knife and just started cutting holes. Like I said, I'm impatient. And the result was-- uneven circles. "Oh well," I said to myself, "It gives it character."

Next, I used double-sided tape to attach the construction paper to the boxes. After I started, I realized that maybe I should have applied the construction paper before cutting the holes. It was very difficult to try to get the construction paper completely lined up with the edges and I finally gave up and just taped on bits and pieces. After looking at it, I said to myself, "Oh well, maybe no one will notice."

Then, I had to find some way to tilt the boxes up so that bean bags could be tossed through the circles. I decided to use another box. Big mistake. Since the Dollar Tree only had cheapo duct tape (in leopard print, I might add) it did not hold up. I went on a treasure hunt around my house: eating utensils, nope. Bunny stick treats, nope. Paper towel rolls, nope. Long skewers... yes! I taped 5 skewers together on each side of the box and, voila, it worked perfectly. 

Let me explain the concept behind the game:

• Each hole has a base word attached to it
• When the child tosses the bag into the hole, he has to add past tense -ed onto the word and then write it on his apple worksheet
• Retoss

My next problem was: how will I attach a base word beneath each hole? After looking around my craft box I found these:

Dry erase message boards

I cut the message boards in half and then into thirds. After attaching them with double-sided tape, I wrote a base word onto each. This way, I can reuse this bag toss for many other themes/ideas.

Here is the finished result (it's bigger than it looks)

Close-up of the dry erase board on the box

I also created this worksheet for him to write the full past tense word on:

Just like the bowling pins, I need to write the line in once I print it