Word Finding for Kids.com

Halloween will be here soon!  This is a big holiday for the kids I work with!  They can’t wait to tell me about their costumes and about trick-or-treating.  Be sure the word retrieval kids on your caseload have the words they need to tell about their costume, their classroom party, and trick-or treating.  Have them practice describing their costumes using the specific words they need:  Wig, make-up, skeleton, Frankenstein, mummy.  To promote word retrieval, it’s not enough to have them know what the words mean.  They need to say them aloud repeatedly. Remember that the most important factors in retrieval are frequency of use and recency of use.  So have the kids use those words a lot, and review them repeatedly.  I edited this post from October, 2014, because it describes once again the need to practice Halloween vocabulary AHEAD of the time kids need their words.

I make little trick-or-treat bags out of brown paper sandwich bags.  I have a collection of miniature Halloween objects that the kids draw from a plastic jack-o-lantern. Some items are simply pictured or written on a slip of paper.  Whatever item they choose, they name it and make a sentence.  I individualize the vocabulary to include words highlighting their own costumes and activities.

When you can anticipate the vocabulary words needed, phonological mnemonic cues are highly effective.  Use the strategy described in the Word Finding Intervention Program (Diane German, Pro Ed).  The technique is described in detail here: https://www.wordfindingforkids.com/an-endorsement-from-the-word-finding-guru/

I make little index cards for the younger kids, and older children can make their own.  Write the target word, write it out in syllables, then associate a common, easily-retrieved word with the “evasive syllables.” With my early elementary aged kids, I call this the “small words strategy,”  or “using an easy word to remember a hard word.” We write the cue words in a “thinking bubble”. The older kids enjoy using the term “mnemonic cue.”

So to remember the word “cauldron,” I associate “caul” with a picture of a witch on a cell phone (“call”).  For “coffin,” I use a mummy in a coffin, “coughin'” because he is stuck in the coffin.  I try to use as many modalities as I can  The cue word needs to be similar sounding to the target word, but doesn’t need to be similar in meaning. However, if you can come up with a clue that is also similar in meaning, so much the better. I try to use as many modalities as possible:  What does the written word look like?  What does the vocabulary item look like? What does it sound like?  What does it smell like?  Try to make as many neural connections as possible.

After you (or the child) adds a cue, have him say the target word aloud. Think the cue word, but say the target word.  Have him write a sentence using the word. He now has a cue card for the word that had previously been difficult to retrieve. At the beginning of the school year, I like to send home a “word finding envelope” to keep his cards in. That also serves as a notice to parents about what we worked on in speech therapy that day.

Once you have mnemonic cues for a word, repeat, repeat, repeat. Have the child say the word aloud 5 times.  Use it in a sentence.  Can you think of a simple song that uses the word? Watch for opportunities to use the word in connected speech.  You will soon have a child who can discuss Halloween with confidence!

Please share your Halloween word finding cues! I will add them to the drop-down menu on the home page (“vocabulary list for mnemonic cues” on the top left).

Let’s get our kids ready for the new school year!  How can we help them get started on the right foot?  One very helpful step is to help them anchor their teachers’ and classmates’ names into their easily-accessed lexicon.  This is especially important for our middle-schoolers and high-schoolers, who may have 6 or 8 new teachers’ names to remember.  Develop mnemonic cues for those new names!

Find a connection that is meaningful to them.   Use visuals when possible.  I also love to incorporate motor movements.  Here’s a quick review of the 5-step retrieval procedure for improving word finding of target words outlined by Dr. Diane German (2005) in the Word Finding Intervention Program, Second Edition (WFIP-2).

First, select a word that is difficult for the learner to retrieve.  New teachers’ names may be difficult.

Second, divide the target word into syllables, reinforcing each syllable of multi-syllable words.  You can  have the kids  touch shoulder, elbow, wrist, tap out syllables, clap, or even stomp their feet.  “Head, shoulders, knees, and toes” is meaningful for the younger kids.  Reinforce each syllable with a movement.

Third, match a mnemonic cue  (a word that sounds like the target syllable) to the “evasive” (i.e., difficult to retrieve) syllables.  This helps anchor the syllables for automatic retrieval.

Dr. German stresses that it is important to think of the cue as you practice saying the target word out loud.  She recommends mnemonic cues be written in a “think cloud” to reinforce that one only thinks of the mnemonic cues.

Finally, steps 4 and 5 involve rehearsal. While the learner thinks of his/her mnemonic cues, each target word is rehearsed three times alone and then in a meaningful sentence (German, 2005). When I do these last steps with my students, I modify a bit:  I  ask for a “word finding 5.”  Each student says the word aloud 5 times, makes up a sentence using the word, then he or she gets a “high 5.”

Some examples of mnemonics:  Mr. Hock – use a picture of a hawk;      Ms. Cunningham   – cut/ham;    Mr. Rogowski – rug/cow/ski (this is a great visual – a cow skiing on a rug!!); Mrs. Sorensen  – sore/sun; Ms. Dahlberg – doll/berg (a picture of a doll on an ice berg).   Use your imagination! Sometimes the silliest mnemonics are the easiest to remember.   Help children come up with their own cues.  The key is for the cue word to sound like the target word.  Remember to REVIEW and ask the kids to say the names ALOUD.   Encourage them to use the same strategy with classmates’ names.  Knowing teachers’ names should help each student start the new school year with confidence.

Resource: German, D.J. (2005). Word Finding Intervention Program, Second Edition (WFIP-2), Austin,TX: Pro.ed.

Have you discovered this wonderful new speech therapy resource?  “The Informed SLP” presents overviews of research into a variety of topics in pediatric speech-language therapy.  The author, Dr. Meredith Poore Harold, reads a wide variety of research journals and shares her knowledge with the busy, busy SLPs that we all are.  In Dr. Harold’s words:

“Each monthly email newsletter from The Informed SLP will include only the most important research highlights relevant to your practice. We’ll read, read, read, then cut, cut, cut, until we have just enough for you to reasonably digest. If we don’t think it’s something that will change the way you diagnose or treat clients, we won’t include it. Each of our summaries will link to the original research articles.”

To whet your appetite, I am including a link to the abstract of an article I found relevant to my practice.  I found it helpful in selecting words to use in therapy: http://perspectives.pubs.asha.org/article.aspx?articleid=2529457.  Is there anything else I can say to encourage you to check out The Informed SLP?  It’s free!  Yes, it’s free!  What a gift Dr. Harold has given us!  Here’s the link – sign up today!  http://www.theinformedslp.com/.

Kudos to my daughter, who caught this example of a word finding error on her Twitter account.  She is obsessed with “Hamilton,” the Tony Award winning musical that has taken Broadway by storm.  She shared this story from Lin-Manual Miranda’s Twitter feed — Apparently Lin was walking down the street in New York, when a woman rolled down her car window and called out, “Congratulations on Hamlet!”

I will definitely be sharing this story with my word finders in the coming week!

I’m still looking for a few good stories!  Please share your funny, embarrassing, or just plain memorable word finding stories.  Here’s one to get you started:

My friend told me about the project her 5th grader had to complete:  a diaphragm about the Civil War.  Oops!  Good thing it wasn’t the teacher’s retrieval error!  Please respond to this post or email me at jan@wordfindingforkids.com with your favorite word finding anecdotes!  I’ll use them in a future post, along with your first name.  Thanks …we will all enjoy your tales!

Despite Chicago’s wretched spring weather to date (a frost last night in the suburbs!!) summer will be here soon!  Help your students anticipate the words they will need while enjoying their summer activities. Are they going to camp?  Swimming or playing soccer, baseball, softball. or tennis?  They will be using words they haven’t needed to retrieve since last summer.  Help them anticipate vocabulary that is unique to their favorite activities.

Some ideas to get started:

soccer – shin guards, forward, defender, goalie, dribble, penalty;

softball/baseball – batter, catcher, baseman, fielder, shortstop, coach, manager, base hit, bunt, pinch hitter, inning;

tennis – forehand, backhand, ace, love, deuce, volley, lob, rally, fault, ad in/ad out;

swimming – dive, float, stroke, breath, belly flop;

And there are all-purpose words such as sunscreen, shade, shadow, flip flops, humidity, muggy, showers, swelter, voyage, counselor.

Remember to have your students say the words ALOUD 5 times, make up a sentence using the word, then earn a “high 5.” Link a similar-sounding “easy” word as a mnemonic for the “hard” word.  Remember, ease of word retrieval is largely determined by frequency of use and recency of use.

Share your favorite word finding story!  Has your student provided you with a fun anecdote?  Have you laughed all the way to the teachers’ lounge with a great comment by one of your kiddos?  Have you embarrassed yourself with your own word finding faux pas?  We can all laugh at ourselves.  Please share!

Wow!  Another fascinating article that appealed to my inner neuroscience geek.  Scientists have now mapped where specific words are stored in the brain.  “Our goal was to build a giant atlas that shows how one specific aspect of language is represented in the brain, in this case semantics, or the meanings of words,” said Jack Gallant, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Berkeley.  Not only does the linked article describe the study, but it contains a well-narrated video that summarizes what they found.  Check it out:  https://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/apr/27/brain-atlas-showing-how-words-are-organised-neuroscience

Put aside for a moment the worry of Big Brother monitoring your thoughts.  Focus on the impact this could have on understanding how we retrieve words.  When we teach strategies for word finding, we are teaching the kids to activate the parts of their brains that store their words.  It will be fascinating to see how this research may be applied to those who struggle to retrieve words.