Recent Posts
A Fabulous Read to Ignite Your Teaching
One of my favorite things to do in the summer is read on the beach. When that reading transforms my thinking or my practice of teaching I feel doubly gifted. Edrenaline Rush by John Meehan is one such book. This may end up being a series as…
The end of one chapter, the beginning of the next
I have been very fortunate in my life to have had some amazing work adventures! For the last twelve years, I have worked at the University of Rhode Island’s Speech and Hearing Clinic as a clinical supervisor. A university clinic is similar to an educational…
Writing Professional Reports for the Speech and Language Pathologist
Clinical writing speech-language pathology is an important skill to review not just for the graduate student but also for the professional speech and language pathologist. You may have been an amazingly creative writer in school but now the skills that made you so talented then,…
What is the Clinical Assessment of Articulation and Phonology (CAAP-2)?
The Clinical Assessment of Articulation and Phonology-2 is a test used to evaluate articulation and phonology and get baseline information. Some of the fun benefits of this particular test are the little figures that come as part of the test. For some of our younger…
Writing Precise Baselines IEP Goals
One of the first things we do when we meet a new client as stated in another blog is to do an initial assessment to gather a baseline. It is very important that we clearly define this baseline so that it is clear exactly what…
How Does Assessment Drive Instruction?
Assessment drives instruction. Evaluation data helps to drive the instruction of a student. When we take baseline we get a direction for our teaching. Prior to seeing a new student/client, we read through their records to develop a picture and to make a group of…
Celebrating St. Patrick’s Day
My mother is from Kinvara, County Galway, Ireland. As children, we would go there for summers to live on my grandparent’s farm. They lived in a thatched cottage with chickens in the front yard and calves in the back of the house. My mother is…
What is Van Riper Approach to Articulation Therapy?
One of the options for speech therapy for articulation is the traditional approach. Back in the dark ages ( or when I was being trained as a speech and language therapist), the researchers prescribed a sequence of treatment for children that had difficulty saying sounds.…
Examples of Speech and Language Goals
Constructing goals can be a difficult task. If you think about this process as a multi-step activity it will assist you. You begin treatment with a student by reviewing the history of the child. In reading this and speaking with the family you may have…