Using Speech Notebooks for Therapy

This year, I decided to try doing speech notebooks. The reason I did this was two-fold. I wanted my students to be able to keep their speech stuff in one place, as well as provide something for them to take home to practice over the summer.

I waited until Office Depot was having their big back to school sale, so I could save some money. I ordered a few different colors and then made a label to affix to the front of each student’s notebook. They got to pick what color they wanted and I told them that this notebook was their responsibility. I said I was giving them one free pass (meaning I’d replace it once if they lost it), but after that no more. I also wanted to see who would actually remember to bring their notebooks to speech without me having to remind them.

Surprisingly, it was my kindergarten students who were best at this. The teachers had them keep the notebooks in their seat sacks and they got into the routine of grabbing them before heading out the door. My older kids needed more reminders (go figure).

As far as what we put into the notebooks, it really varied depending on what goals of each student. Sometimes we glued in worksheets and other times, I (or they) wrote sentences or words in it. It really opened my eyes to their writing skills. Writing is something I have tried to incorporate into speech in the past, but this gave more of an opportunity.

Overall, I think I’ll do it again. There were some students who just never remembered to bring their notebook and I gave up constantly reminding them to. A vast majority of them managed to keep their notebook all year and had something to take with them to practice over the summer (negating the need for me to make summer packets – which I only do for articulation students anyway).

I’d love to hear if you’ve implemented speech notebooks for your caseload and how you like it!