"Angry Birds" in Speech Therapy!
I was hoping to share some photos of bulletin boards in response to my last blog, "Ideas Needed: Bulletin Board!" in today's post, but I didn't get any pictures. I did, however, get some great ideas in the comments
section! If you are interested,
check it out! There are
some wonderful ideas from some creative people.
However, I DO want to share a new game I recently bought. It's called "Angry Birds
Knock on Wood."
This game was such a hit in therapy; I adjusted the rules
for every age level and goal. The game comes with 2 angry birds, a catapult, 4
pigs and cards that show a variety of "castles" you build with blocks.
This was perfect for kids who were working on giving and following
directions and using specific vocabulary and prepositional concepts. The more
advanced students took turns telling their partner what they needed to do to build
the castle without the partner looking at the card (a variation on the good
old barrier game). The user giving the directions
was not allowed to use non-specific vocabulary such as "thing" or "that," or
use his or her hands to point, which can be VERY DIFFICULT for our language disordered
students! The younger students performed versions of this, which included giving one-step directions with my help or following my simple directions (i.e. "put this
pig BETWEEN the squares").
After the castles were built and the pigs were placed
according to direction card, the students took turns launching the birds in
the catapult and trying to knock the castle down. Because this was speech
therapy, though, everyone had to take a turn answering a question, creating a
sentence or saying an articulation word before using the catapult!
I am NOT the first speech-language pathologist to use Angry Birds in therapy! I read
two very creative blogs here
and here,
which discuss very clever ways to integrate this motivating idea into therapy!
Have fun!