Stories

It was a good week.  With the break in my caseload, I was actually able to catch up completely in all my documentation and send off my medicaid billing.  I wasn't comfortable with  how far behind I had gotten, but it's nice to feel like things a bit under control.

I have now gotten some time to get to know Sandy.  Supervising an apprentice Speech Therapist is very different from supervising someone who doing their clinicals for coursework.  Supervising someone  to meet course work implies a certain level of experience.  For instance all the students I have supervised up until now have already had some experience with clients.  This is not the case for Sandy.  She has just started Grad school and outside of doing her 25 hours of observation. she  has had no experience doing therapy.

Fortunately, she has that something that just can't be taught, and I think she's going to make a great clinician.  But I am having to make sure she has solid plans for each student.

 I am a big fan of the Story Grammer Marker.

I like it because if I had to pick one single thing to teach my language delayed students to do, it would be to tell their own story.  It is one of the most important communication skills we can have.  Our stories are who we are, and not being able to share our stories, means not sharing ourselves.
Of course, I manage to work in vocabulary, grammar, inferencing, direction following, and figurative language into my lesson.  But the core is telling a story. 

I used it a great deal with my language students last year, when my caseload primarily consisted of elementary school age children.  And, because that is the majority of Sandy's caseload, I thought it might be smart to give her my lessons from last year and let her use them for her groups.

 But then Karol showed me something that was even better for a novice clinician:  The Webber Story Builder.  It has the exact same elements of the SGM, although it has different symbols.  It's more scripted and comes with worksheets that Sandy can do with her students.  It even comes with some starter stories that she can do.  I can still give her my lessons, but now she access to a more scripted program that will make sure, that even though she is new, she can still provide intensive and systematic intervention that will have a great impact on our students. 

It was a good week.  With the break in my caseload, I was actually able to catch up completely in all my documentation and send off my medicaid billing.  I wasn't comfortable with  how far behind I had gotten, but it's nice to feel like things a bit under control.

I have now gotten some time to get to know Sandy.  Supervising an apprentice Speech Therapist is very different from supervising someone who doing their clinicals for coursework.  Supervising someone  to meet course work implies a certain level of experience.  For instance all the students I have supervised up until now have already had some experience with clients.  This is not the case for Sandy.  She has just started Grad school and outside of doing her 25 hours of observation. she  has had no experience doing therapy.

Fortunately, she has that something that just can't be taught, and I think she's going to make a great clinician.  But I am having to make sure she has solid plans for each student.

 I am a big fan of the Story Grammer Marker.

I like it because if I had to pick one single thing to teach my language delayed students to do, it would be to tell their own story.  It is one of the most important communication skills we can have.  Our stories are who we are, and not being able to share our stories, means not sharing ourselves.
Of course, I manage to work in vocabulary, grammar, inferencing, direction following, and figurative language into my lesson.  But the core is telling a story. 

I used it a great deal with my language students last year, when my caseload primarily consisted of elementary school age children.  And, because that is the majority of Sandy's caseload, I thought it might be smart to give her my lessons from last year and let her use them for her groups.

 But then Karol showed me something that was even better for a novice clinician:  The Webber Story Builder.  It has the exact same elements of the SGM, although it has different symbols.  It's more scripted and comes with worksheets that Sandy can do with her students.  It even comes with some starter stories that she can do.  I can still give her my lessons, but now she access to a more scripted program that will make sure, that even though she is new, she can still provide intensive and systematic intervention that will have a great impact on our students.