As a Speech Language Patholgoist, you know just how challenging it can be to keep your students engaged and motivated throughout their therapy sessions. However, what if Itold you there's a way to make those sessions not only fun, but also incredibly effective?
Introducing, dinosaur speech therapy lesson plans! By incorporating these prehistoric creatures into your child's learning experience, you can unleash their inner explorer and help them develop vital language skills.
In this article, we'll explore the benefits of using dinosaurs in speech therapy and provide some engaging activities for your child to try out. So get ready to embark on a journey through time and bring language skills to life with these fun dinosaurs speech therapy activities for kids.,
Before we dive in, let's talk about why we would want to use a Dinosaur theme.
Dinosaurs have been a popular topic among children for decades. Not only are they fascinating creatures, but they can also provide numerous benefits for children in speech therapy. Here are a few benefits of incorporating dinosaurs into your child's speech therapy sessions:
1. Increased engagement: Children will be more engaged in speech therapy when the topic is something they are interested in. Dinosaurs are exciting and fun, which can help keep children motivated during their sessions.
2. Development of vocabulary: Dinosaurs have unique names that can help expand a child's vocabulary. By learning about different types of dinosaurs and their characteristics, children can add new words to their vocabulary and practice using them in sentences.
3. Improved comprehension skills: Many dinosaur books and activities require children to follow directions and answer questions. This can help improve their ability to comprehend and process information.
Now that we've introduced the benefits of using dinosaur speech therapy lesson plans, let's dive into some engaging activities for kids. Your students having fun with their prehistoric friends with these activites. Here are some dinosaur speech therapy activities for kids:
DRILL ACTIVITIES
If you need a little bit of structure to get loads of trials - make sure to incorporate an activity that keeps your students engaged and encourages lots of practice. One of my favourites is this Themed Drill Sheet.
Paired with mini erasers, mini objects, or a dry eraser maker this activity will keep your students practicing and engaged the entire time (honestly, I don’t understand why - but it’s true!). You can write in your own targets or use any of the over 60 goal strips included covering receptive language, expressive language, articulation, phonology and more!
BOOKS
Old Scientist Who Swallowed a Dinosaur: A spin on the classic "Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly", this book is fun, silly, and engaging. It is a speech therapy fave in my room because is features loads of theme related words (it's perfect for kids who are little bit older and working on vocabulary!). The receptive nature also makes it great for getting in loads of trials!
How to catch a Dinosaur: This witty story is about kids who are trying to a dinosaur and create variety of traps in attempts to do so! Follow along on their journey and see if they are successful! Another great story for vocabulary, as well as predicting, verbs, and describing.
If you are interested in an easy preschool craft to use with these prek books, check out these No Prep Book Craft Sheets!
Each of the listed stories has a one page craft sheet that can be used for story retell, to answer questions about the story, to act out the story while you are reading it aloud. The top part of the sheet is the setting of the story and the bottom half has the characters/items in the story. Your students will love this fine motor activity and it can be used all year round (not just for a dinosaur theme!). You can check them out here!
GAMES
Dino Crunch is a quick turn taking game and is on my own list of games to buy!! It is included in my Game and Toy Companions, which make it super easy to target sooo many speech therapy goals (there are over 100+ games and toys included and over 60 goals you can target).
You can mix and match the goals and games and use this resource all year long!
TOYS
DINOSAUR FINGERLING: This toy is SUCH a hit with kids of all ages! Different actions make him do different things (e.g. you can pet his nose or rub his back). This Dinosaur Fingerling can be used to target:
Predicting: Ask the student what they think will happen if they X. (e.g. what do you think will happen if you clap?)
Expanding MLU: Because the dinosaur reacts in different ways to different actions you can easily target two + three word phrases such as mad Dino, happy Dino, loud Dino, quiet Dino, mean Dino, sleeping Dino, roaring Dino.
Adjectives: Talk about the dinosaur. Talk about his bumps, spots, sharp teeth and more.
Verbs: Since the dinosaur does so many things, you can talk about his actions. For example, roar, sleep, move, and blink. (This also lends itself to working on verb tenses!).
If/Then Statements: Talk about what happens IF you do something.
Cause/Effect: Ue with younger students as a Cause + Effect Toy.
Body Parts: The dinosaur moves different body parts and has sensors on different parts of his body. You can talk about the parts while playing.
SONGS
These songs are so adorable to see little ones enjoy! They love to act along to the song, dance and move, and singe the lyrics! Here are some of my favorite preschool dinosaur songs:
CRAFTS:
These craft scenes include over 100 different scenes, including some for dinosaurs. You can mix and match the scenes and the goals to create a personalized speech therapy activity for your students! With over 100 goals and 100 scenes to choose from - you will definitely find something for your student. This is the perfect print and go activity that you can use for an entire session or to fill in any extra time at the end of a session. They're also perfect for homework!
SENSORY BIN
My Thematic Sensory Bin Product has over 30 themes - and includes a Dinosaur theme!
Each theme comes with a Sensory Bin Cover, Legend, and pieces to put in your sensory. You can create over 30 sensory bins with this one product!
You can create either mini sized Sensory Bins (perfect for on the go therapists) or full size Sensory Bins! These are perfect for your preschool speech therapy sensory bin activities!
PLAY ACTIVITIES
Dinosaur Scavenger Hunt: Hide toy dinosaurs around the room and give your child clues to find them. Remember to use spatial concepts!
Dinosaur Rescue: Tape some toy dinosaurs in a muffin tin, using painter's tape. Rescue them by taking the tape off!
Free play with toy dinos: This is the best kind of play because you can really tap into the child's interests. Incorporate their goals into the play activities they are interested in!
MOVEMENT ACTIVITY:
Dinosaur Feed and Move: A feeding game with a twist! You and your student take turns spinning the spinner and doing the action towards the yeti to feed him a themed snack! Don’t drop the snack or you will have to start again! There are loads of therapy ideas included so you will be able to use it with your entire caseload! It also includes other winter characters so you can use it for a long time! I love to pair this game with any Dinosaurthemed book and pretend to feed the Dinosaurs!!
This combination of activities will allow you to use an dinosaur theme with your entire caseload to target expressive language, receptive language, wh-questions, articulation, and more!!
Incorporating dinosaurs into your child's speech therapy sessions can be transformative, offering a unique and enjoyable way to work on speech and language skills. By tapping into their love of learning and igniting their curiosity, you can help unleash their inner explorer and set them on a path towards success. Through the activities outlined in this post, your students can embark on a thrilling journey of discovery and development. So don't hesitate - let's start exploring! As the great paleontologist Jack Horner once said, "Everybody starts out as a scientist. Every child has the scientist's sense of wonder and awe."
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