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Writer's pictureGail Ebenstein

3 Holiday Speech Therapy Ideas for your Little Elves

Christmas and the holidays are a jolly time. But let's be honest, this time can also be hectic and tiring. With kids at home more often than usual and the burden of keeping up on skills falling on parents and caregivers, any shortcuts or ideas are welcome!


A snowman toy or decoration

That's why we asked our Better Speech elves to come up with their top 3 at home, low/no prep speech therapy activities. Each activity can be modified to address your child's speech goals and we give a few ideas for each item.


Do you have questions on how to use these activities to address your speech goals? Feel free to contact our clinical director at Better Speech, Michelle. She's happy to chat. Reach her at michellel@betterspeech.com.


1. Christmas Story Books for Speech Therapy


Head to the library (are those still open!?!?) or your local bookstore to pick up a favorite holiday story. Can't find a hard copy? You can always watch a read-aloud with your child on You-Tube.


books to improve speech therapy

Here are some for pre-school and elementary school students. You can target some of the following speech or language goals:


- Articulation: the L sound

- Rhyming

- Feelings (we all get frustrated!)


- Colors and other adjectives (we love the illustrations in this book)

- Articulation: S blends (Snowmen, snowballs, scarf)

- Verbs: walking snowmen, flying snowmen, laughing snowmen


Christmas activities for you and your child.

Speech therapy for child and adult

- Articulation: K sound (cat, cold)

- Opposites & Other Concepts: big/small, up/down, day/night

- Idioms: What does "Give it your all" mean?

You can also check out a digital copy from your local library from Overdrive Media Console. With one of the largest collections, it is used by more than 30,000 libraries so there is a good chance your library is listed there.



2. Holiday Countdown Calendar

speech therapy ideas

You probably have one around anyway right? Or even the one from last year. Take a moment to repurpose it by filling each pocket with a card or photo that targets your speech or language goal. Your speech therapist can give you a printable with articulation or language target (like pictures of words starting with the /s/ sound or /g/ sound, or pictures showing action words like 'run' or 'sleep').


Just cut them out and put inside each pocket. Every day your child can take one out and practice their speech goals.


To motivate your child and keep the practice going, you can offer them a prize every 7 days. It can even be in the form of a clue as to what they may get as a holiday gift. Simple clues can also be a great way to practice inferencing for older kids.


3. Sensory Stockings


These are our favorite at Better Speech, and so many of our Better SLPs end up taking a session to put on together with little elf and their parent.

holiday speech therapy ideas

Just grab a stocking (from this year or on left over from last year) and stuff it with objects targeting your child's speech goals. Let your child feel around inside without looking at the object. They can describe what they feel and try to name it. Then they can pull it out and see if they guessed correctly. Depending on the objects you gather, you can work on:


- Articulation: S words like snowflake, Santa, string

- Language goals: put any objects you find in your child's room like small animals (dog, cow), cars, blocks

- Adjectives: blue/red/yellow cars, big/little cat, soft/hard ball

- Sensory items: for those kids that love to feel the texture of different items, stuff the stocking with all the goodies around during the holidays like string, wrapping paper shreds or tinsel.

 

At Better Speech, we offer online speech therapy services convenient for you and tailored to your child's individual needs. Our services are affordable and effective - get Better Speech now.


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by Patricia D. Myers

I'm not an English native speaker and I wanted to improve my speech. Better Speech onboarding process is AWESOME, I met with different people before being matched with an AMAZING Therapist, Christina. My assigned therapist created a safe place for me to be vulnerable and made all the sessions fun and helpful. Thanks to her, I received great feedback from my clients.

by John L. Wilson

Better Speech is a great program that is easy to use from home and anywhere online. Shannon was amazing at engaging our shy son - and building on their relationship each session! Her commitment to knowing him improved his confidence to speak and practice more. Truly appreciate her dedication. She cares for her clients.

by Christy O. King

Better Speech is an excellent opportunity to improve your speech in the convenience of your home with flexible scheduling options. Our therapist Miss Lynda was nothing short of amazing! We have greatly appreciated and enjoyed the time spent together in speech therapy. Her kind, engaging and entertaining spirit has been well received. She will surely be missed.

by Patricia W. Lopez

This service is so easy, i signed up, got a therapist and got to set up an appointment right away that worked with my schedule. so glad to see that services like speech therapy are finally catching up to the rest of the convenience age! therapy is great, i can't believe how many good tips, exercises and methods in just the first session. really recommend it!

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