Sunday, November 20, 2016

Create Simple and Easy Construction Paper Crafts

Do you love crafts? They are one of my favorite things to do and it is reflected in the therapy I provide.  Every month I plan a craft activities that can address multiple goals.  This year I have some large groups of 4-5 students with different goals.  Crafts, play, and books are all activities that I have been using. I love using crafts, but prepping crafts can be time consuming.  As I plan for the month of December I wanted to share a craft activity that is very easy to prep.

This Christmas tree activity uses 1 inch squares of green construction paper, and stickers.  For me if it is December I have to add glitter.  I start by using my paper cutter to cut small green squares and a few brown squares. 


Next I gather card decks that I need to target goals.  (I have a collection that I'm almost a little embarrassed about.  Last time I counted I had 38 commercial decks of speech cards. That doesn't count all the decks I have made myself.)  This month I am using my articulation decks, who and what question decks, and my category deck of cards.  That is all that I need to do and this craft is prepped. I like to make a sample so that my students have an example to follow, but you can also make one with your students.

When I use this craft in therapy I will be using the decks of cards to get multiple articulation productions, have the students answer questions or generate items in a category.  Throughout the activity I give my students 1-3 step directions that they need to follow.  After the student practices they glue on 1-5 pieces of paper in the shape of the tree.  I like to give directions about placement of the squares, but if I have a student that needs more help I will put numbers, letters or marks where they have to glue the squares.  After the tree is assembled we add a trunk and stickers.  Then it is time for GLITTER! 

Crafts are such a great way to target multiple speech and language goals.  My directions can be individualized for each student.  It is easy to incorporate basic concepts as well.  The concepts of first, second, last, next to, under, over, and in a row are all easy to use throughout this activity.

This December if you are looking for fun holiday activities think about crafts.  They can be fun and easy to prep.

Other craft activities that I will be using this month that are low prep are Christmas characters and another Christmas Tree decoration.



I hope that you give crafts a try this December in therapy.  Enjoy the holidays and have fun.
Cathy