Last-Minute Halloween and Autumn Speech Therapy Ideas
Are you a last-minute planner like me? We’re more than half-way through October and I’m just starting to think about Halloween. Fall is my absolute favorite season, but with extra work stressors like returning to hybrid, finishing a backlog of paperwork, and having to completely redo my schedule, I haven’t been in the Halloween-spirit until now! With my kindergarten through 12th grade caseload, here are a few things that I’m doing these last few weeks before Halloween.
1. Reading Free Halloween/Autumn Books on Epic
Any educator can get a free Epic account right now! This site has a ton of free, colorful books for my elementary students. To get the most “bang for your buck” out of these books, I typically spend 2 (sometimes 3!) sessions on one book.
Week 1 - review vocabulary, predict what will happen, preview the pictures, read the book, answer some comprehension questions along the way
Week 2 - read the book again, fill out a graphic organizer for story retell (focusing on story grammar), review vocabulary by putting it in a sentence
Week 3 - Skim the book & make our own parallel story (use a similar theme, but change-up the characters, setting, and action plans). This is great for working on both story grammar and grammatical sentences!
This week I will be reading, “Scaredy Monster Loses a Tooth,” by Meika Hashimoto with my 1st and 2nd graders. I love the Monster theme because not all of my students celebrate Halloween.
2. Apple Orchard Virtual Field Trip
My students of all ages love watching Youtube videos, especially when they get to learn about a new place! This week, I plan to watch a Youtube video about an Apple Orchard with some of my elementary, middle, and life skills students. Before watching the video, I will preview theme-specific vocabulary and we make predictions about what we will see on the Apple Orchard. While watching the video, my students and I will discuss what we see, hear, and think. After the video, we will go over some comprehension & discussion questions. For higher-level students, we may fill out a graphic organizer & describe our virtual trip!
3. Baking Time - Apple Crisp Edition
I’m lucky to work with some amazing students within a substantially separate life skills program & we sometimes make yummy recipes together. Next week, we plan to make an apple crisp (following our Apple Orchard Virtual Field trip!). I found a very easy & small-ingredient recipe online from the blog, Kid Friendly Things To Do (check it out here). I made a quick Google Slides presentation with step-by-step visuals to help them make the apple crisp. The class plans to pick up the ingredients on their next trip to the grocery store and I’m hoping the paraprofessionals will help me peel all the apples! The following week, I will use the same recipe and visuals for a no-prep sequencing activity :) Cooking activities provide a ton of functional language opportunities (and it’s fun too!).
4. Free/ Low-Cost TpT Halloween Activities
There are a ton of Halloween activities on Teachers Pay Teachers! I really wanted a no-prep resource (that could be done in-person or remotely), so I made a Halloween product with 9 activities to cover all of my language & social students in mixed groups! I created this with my 3rd-5th graders in mind and plan to use this the next two weeks before Halloween! This low-cost product has got your goals covered - comprehension questions, story retell, comments/follow-up questions, idioms, problem-solving, context clues, and sequencing! This product will be half price on the 21st of October! Check it out here!
Hope this gave you a little inspiration for the next few weeks & will carry you over into November! Happy Halloween!
