Archive for June, 2008

This week I tried out an idea that Deborah contributed; tube posting. I merrily spent an evening decorating a tube with sparkly paper and got some strange looks carrying it to work the next morning on the bus.

I took the tube along to my first session; I was working with a child who has severe attention and listening difficulties. He focussed on the tube for approximately 3 seconds, watched me post one ball and then got up to find another toy to play with. A disappointing first outing for my sparkly tube!

However, half an hour later, a very different child walked into my therapy room. He couldn’t get enough of the tube game! The tube (and I) held his attention for more than 15 minutes; it was a great informal assessment tool, allowing me to check the child’s key word understanding and how he was able to make choices. Thanks Deborah!

Since I started writing this blog, I have been having a nosey around the web for other SLT-related blogs. So far I haven’t found all that much out there… add a comment if you’ve found (or write) something!

I did find one interesting blog: Tower to Trenches, by Judy Stone-Goldman. I enjoyed Judy’s most recent post. I hadn’t really considered how having a favourite client puts that client under pressure. Judy suggests that we should try to be honest with ourselves about how we feel, that “we like some clients better than others.” She takes a quiet moment before sessions to think both about the child she is going to see and herself. Do you do something similar? I’m going to try this over the next couple of weeks, I’ll let you know how I get on!

Rhiannan

Hello, welcome to Therapy Ideas!

I’m so excited that we’ve finally reached ‘soft launch’ day. I first started thinking about a website for SLT resources about two years ago and here it is, one of the first projects from Jonathan’s new web agency, Together London.

Please have a look around. At the moment there are about 25 ideas contributed by me and a small number of very special therapist friends, thanks girls! I hope the number of ideas will grow as therapists discover the site; making it an expanding and relevant resource.

Talking of resources, some ideas have resources attached, check out Same and Different. Print these out and you’re good to go, while you’re at it you could print out a set for school or parents too. There is a simple way to add photos, so you might want to use the site as a way of organizing your therapy photos- go on, upload that picture of pop up frog!

You’ll notice that the site is currently a bit focussed towards therapy for children, that’s because I’m a paediatric therapist. But all the infrastructure for adult ideas is there (at least I think it is, I’d really appreciate your constructive criticism) if you’re a therapist working with adults, why not add an idea?

So, what do you think? All comments, questions, feedback (and chocolate cakes) gratefully received.

Right, I think that’s about enough excitement for me, for one day. Thanks to Jonathan and David, you did a great job.

Rhiannan