Teletherapy: Do a book study!

I spent 12 years as a literacy coach. Yes, I am an SLP. Believe me, I received some smug puzzled looks from teachers when I bounced into their classrooms as their coach for the year. My favorite reaction from a classroom teacher was always, “You’re just an SLP. How are you going to coach me?” Being an adept actress. I would often look at them apologetically and say, “I know. I am just an SLP. But I noticed your kids in line for lunch. Wow, you have some needy ones. I can definitely help you with your struggling students.” The needs of the kids became our common bond. I actually loved coaching. No IEP’s. No paperwork. No report cards. Just kids. Kids and lessons that promoted access to the curriculum for all students, but most especially the students who were having difficulty. I privately cried a lot my first couple of years as a coach, wondering what the heck I had done to myself. But during that intense decade, I fell in love with using books as tools for learning. I fell in love with revealing to children the writer inside themselves and that their words were powerful and important. Heady stuff. Seeing the learning candle lit was addictive. And so often it was a book, a piece of art, an illustration, or a poem that served as the catalyst. Since returning to speech therapy, and embarking on this journey in telepractice, I felt that pull to bring books into my therapy sessions in a meaningful way. I now use a document camera to read aloud with students while sharing the printed text. One of the books I am using this year with some of my middle and high school students is Maniac Magee by Jerry Spinelli. The chapters are short and packed with figurative language and great sentences, perfect for analysis and inferential thinking. I created a playlist in YouTube with videos of teachers reading chapters aloud and collected favorite quotes from the book on Goodreads. When I read aloud with students, I write my thinking on sticky notes and use these notes to model questioning, inferring, and synthesizing.  Another book I am using with some upper elementary and middle school students is The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo. I created a playlist in YouTube with video of the author and illustrator talking about the characters and clips from theatrical productions based on the book.  This text also contains short chapters, rich language, and engaging characters. 

Sticky note on text from The Miraculous Journey of
Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo using a document camera.