Speech Bananas

Join us in wishing Ms. Allison good luck and goodbye on her last day at Speech Bananas! We are so excited for her new opportunities to continue her professional development. Thank you for being a part of the Speech Bananas team, we’ll miss you!

Welcome to *Favorite Friday* Today, Ms. Miranda tells us about one of her favorite books, Goodnight Gorilla! We love this book for so many reasons: we can pair it with animal toys and the Critter Clinic to play along with the story in the book! we can target power words like open out and goodnight! the book has few words, but great illustrations that elicit natural language opportunities... we can use it for early inferencing and predicting by talking about what happens next! Goodnight is a great target word for the /g/ sound and so many more! Do you love Goodnight Gorilla too?

Looking for a way to get out of the house during Distance Learning? Take a Nature Walk! It’s officially fall and while the color change is harder to find in Southern California, it makes it that much more fun to search for it! While you’re walking: talk about the different colors you see talk about why the leaves change colors when it starts to get cooler outside see who can find the coolest or prettiest leaf use words to describe how things feel - soft, smooth, crunc...hy, prickly, hard, scratchy! see what animals and insects you can spot, then look them up when you get home! point out the sounds you hear: cars, bikes, planes, birds, dogs sing songs, like the Walking Walking song, or Walking in the Forest What would you do on a nature walk?

A dollhouse with furniture and lots of friends is a MUST-HAVE for any speech room, and we highly recommend it for at-home practice for both girls AND boys. We target so many goals with this one toy, including: Following directions Answering who, what and where questions Learning verb tenses such as present progressive -ing verbs (sleeping, eating, washing) Using pronouns such as he, she, and they... Telling and retelling stories Developing imaginative play And so many more! How do you use your doll house at home?

Meet Julianne, our graduate clinician this semester! She’s currently attending Emerson College, is a mother of 2, and loves to go to the beach. Julianne will be working with Speech Bananas clinicians a few days a week so if you see her in one of your virtual sessions or around the office, say hi!

This is an awesome way to incorporate language and literacy every day in the month of September!

These Fisher-Price Stack & Roll Cups are one of our FAVORITE toys! We use them to hide animals, play food, and cars. They snap together and usually need a helping hand to open them, which creates an excellent *communicative temptation* to practice using Power Words like help open and more. For Auditory-Verbal Therapy sessions, we love using them to practice our Say Before Show strategy, by hiding Learning to Listen sound toys inside. First, we make the noise: moooo, then open to reveal the toy cow inside! How would you use these at home?

It’s Meet Us Monday! Say Hi to our owner and director, Jennifer Reeder! Jenny is a licensed Speech-Language Pathologist, certified Auditory-Verbal Therapist, and SLPA supervisor. She started Speech Bananas 11 years ago, and the rest is history! When she’s not in her office, she loves doing Hot Yoga 26&2, going to Disneyland, and taking her daughters to the beach

We LOVE using Boom Cards by Boom Learning in our Teletherapy sessions! They are engaging and interactive digital flash cards. We have Boom cards for answering "Wh" questions, learning pronouns, practicing articulation, and much, much more! Our friends love to hear the "Ding!" when they get the answer right (and some friends pick the wrong answer on purpose just to hear the fun "Whoops!" sound). The best part is that Boom Card decks can be shared with families to practice at home. They are a great resource!

It’s Work From Home Wednesday! If you’ve had a session on a Wednesday in the last few months, you may have noticed a change in scenery. To reduce time in the office, our Wednesdays have been completely virtual, so our therapists pack up their toys and laptops and work from their couches and kitchen tables! We are grateful for the technology available to continue providing excellent services to our families. @ Speech Bananas

Our favorite app for articulation practice is having a Back-to-School sale starting tomorrow! Articulation Station is a great tool to have on your devices to make at-home practice fun and engaging. If you purchase the pro version it comes with all the speech sounds!

Some great information from The Moog Center for Deaf Education about how face coverings affect speech perception in the classroom with and without remote microphone technology!

When our therapists transitioned to conducting therapy through telehealth platforms in March, we noticed something special: meeting families in their homes (through the wonders of technology) gave us the opportunity to learn about our clients and their families in a whole new way. Kiddos have shared their favorite toys, books, and told stories from the comfort of their couches, kitchen tables, and backyards! We’ve met newborn siblings, grandparents, and new pets! Our friend Nico was so excited to show Miss Claire his new puppy Koda a few weeks ago We’ve loved getting to know you all in this special way over the last few months and we are excited for the future

We love to hear about our families' experiences! Click the link below to review us on Google!