Generalization

Hi everyone!

It’s been quite a while since I’ve posted on my blog! Let’s play some catch up…

A couple weekends ago my family and I traveled down to Rocky Point! For those that don’t know… Rocky Point is about 4 hours from Phoenix into Mexico, and it’s beautiful! Quite the fun getaway! Take a look at the beautiful-ness 💗

Then, this past weekend my cute husband and I went back to my hometown- Salt Lake City! We had the most dreamy Memorial Day weekend, and here are some pictures to prove it…

Look at those Mountains 🏔😍

Now for a little of my speech shtuff! For those of who follow my Instagram, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. For those of you don’t follow my IG, do it.

Today I was fortunate enough to tag along with one of my classrooms to go out and about into the community! We took the kids and their communication devices over and out to McDonalds. Here they stood in a line, and ordered what they wanted to eat for lunch. It’s almost like for me- this is what we’ve been working towards all year! Am I right?!

This is generalization to the fullest. When I say generalization, I mean taking those skills that have been taught in structured settings, and moving them to less structured settings. BECAUSE we don’t live life in a structured, small, patient place, now do we?!

The best way to practice generalizing concepts is to be in close contact with your speech pathologist. Some great questions to ask your speech therapist to get an idea of what you might want to start practicing outside of therapy would be:

🎙What kinds of things is my kiddo working on?

🎙Are they close to mastering any of their goals?

🎙If they are, which goals are they close to mastering?

🎙What strategies do you use to remind my child of their goal (for example, if they are working on s-blends, I might give them a visual with my finger acting like snake by my mouth)? If you know these clues, you can use them out and about too!

The bottom line is, once your child is making great progress towards his or her goal(s), it’s so fun to take those practiced skills and go out into public.

Make it a fun treat; “Today, we get to go get an ice cream cone, and we are going to practice our /S/ sounds the WHOLE time!”

What kinds of ways do you like generalizing concepts with your children or students? I’d love to hear- share below!

Until next time, Kassi, the Phoenix Speech Therapist