Low-Prep Activities and Therapy Ideas for Christmas Preschool Speech Therapy Sessions
- Anna Dalziel
- Dec 11, 2020
- 5 min read
Updated: Nov 28, 2023
I have put together my FAVORITE low-prep Christmas themed activities to target speech and language skills!
These engaging activities can be used during in-person sessions and during teletherapy sessions!
A great themed therapy session can include a few simple activities that can be used target a vareity of goals. A book, a toy, a sensory bin, a 'hands-on activity' are my must haves for a fun and simple thematic therapy session.
Here are my favorite Christmas resources for preschool speech therapy! They are low-prep, fun, and versatile enough to use with your entire caseload.
BOOKS:
These are all great books for speech therapy because they are all repetivie, which means you can get loads of trials!
If you Take a Mouse to the Movies
Snowmen at Christmas
Merry Christmas, Mouse
Dear Santa
10 Little Christmas Presents
My Presents
Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bell
Old Lady Who Swallowed a Spoon
Little Blue Truck Christmas
How to catch a Gingerbread Man
How to catch a Reindeer
How to catch an Elf
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 Christmas theme!). You can check them out here
GAMES:
A feeding game with a twist! You and your student take turns spinning the spinner and doing the action towards the Christmas characters to feed them 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 Christmas themed book and pretend to feed the Christmas character!
GUESS WHAT'S IN THE STOCKING: Put different items in a stocking. Have the child guess what the item is by touching it and by listening to your description. You can take turns guessing and describing. It’s also really fun to put in objects that feature the child’s speech sound!
DISTANCE LEARNING:
FEED THE CHARACTERS: This Open-Ended BOOM card activity of feeding yummy treats to Christmas and Winter Characters. It includes a PDF with ideas how to target speech sounds, possessive 's, negation, describing, past Tense -Ed, first sound identification, following directions, spatial concepts, requesting, comparing/Contrasting, and Categorizing in a natural way!
These Christmas WH-Questions cards are the perfect addition to any therapy session. The self correcting cards allow you to get in a lot of practice quickly and the smash mats allow for a ‘hands-on’ component. During in person session, you can use your favorite manipulatives to make it a ‘hands on’ activity. Use the BOOM Cards during teletherapy - your students will love choose a ‘mini eraser’ to cover the correct answer!
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!
PLAY ACTIVITIES:
SENSORY BIN: My Thematic Sensory Bin Product has over 30 themes - and includes Winter and Christmas 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!
DECORATING A TREE: If you don’t have a Christmas tree in your therapy room (and it’s a holiday you and your students celebrate), I encourage you consider adding one! It can be felt, paper, or a “real” tree like mine! For many kids - decorating a tree is a an exciting and fun activity. You can send ideas for practice at home, as well! I used this activity for all my sessions last week and was able to target:
🌲 following directions: I asked the student to put ornaments on in a specific order
🌲 describing: they had to describe the item before putting it on the tree
🌲 r: tree, decorations, front, trunk, glitter, sparkle, pretty
🌲 compare/contrast: we chose two decorations and talked about how they were the same/different
🌲 MLU: I used loads of language stimulating strategies
PUPPETS AND PRESENTS: Whether you're behind a screen or eye-to-eye with your students, they will love this simple activity. All you need is little boxes with mini objects or erasers inside and puppets/dolls! Open the boxes for your students and give each gift to the puppets!
By pairing this activity with my Huge Language and Behavior Visuals Pack, I was able to target:
🌲 Pronouns: Ask the student who wants the gift (e.g. he does/she does).
🌲 Answering wh-questions: (what is it? where do we find it?).
🌲 Similarities/differences: Asking how two gifts are the same/different.
🌲 Spatial concepts: Have the student request a gift based on its location.
🌲 Describing: name five features of each gift.
🌲 Increasing MLU: I like to mix up the lids/boxes so the child has to use conjuctions (e.g. I want the blue and red one).
🌲 Past tense verbs: Discuss what you did - opened, looked, touched.
🌲 Concepts full/empty: Leave some gifts empty to discuss the difference between full/empty
CRITTER CLINIC: This is such a fun way to target a HUGE variety of goals! There is something about the element of surprise that kids can't get enough of!
Before the session, hide items in the doors. You can use the paper cut outs included in the product, or for a lower prep version you ca use mini erasers, or toys!
This activity includes a huge cheat sheet for speech sounds and language goals, but some fun BONUS ideas include:
🌲 Requesting: Have the child ask you for a specific color key.
🌲 Possessive 's: Have the student tell who the item belongs to (e.g. it is Santa'S hat.)
🌲 Final Consonant deletion: The word hat and eat can be repeated many times!
🌲 Verbs: Open, close, wrap, decorate, paint, build, make, fly, pack, fill, empty.
🌲 Describing: Talk about what each elf looks like.
🌲 Spatial concepts: Have the student tell you/place the item in a specifc place.
🌲 Categorizing: Sort the gifts, people, and animals.
🌲 Pronouns: Have the student tell you wants/has the items (e.g. She wants it; He has it).
🌲 Exclamatory words: Use the words, "Wee! Whoa! Ooh! Ahh!" when opening the doors.
I hope that you can use these simple Christmas activities during your speech therapy sessions!
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