August 8, 2025
Parent: It has been so educational getting to know all about your favorite strategies, including today’s Sound Manipulation. As we close out this series, I’m excited to meet a new friend named Rover who is a part of this strategy! How exactly do you incorporate this sweet puppy in your therapy sessions?
I work with a set of 4 year old twins who love to ask each other, “What starts with the letter A?” while walking around their home.
“A is for apple, alligator, airplane, and avocado!”
Both twins have expressive language delays and speech sound errors. Rover was a great way to introduce all the different letter names and their accompanying sounds by having Rover “eat” the different letters.
Parent: What a fun idea! I’m sure it provided a great visual for them, as well as playful interaction.
Yes! While feeding Rover the different letter cards, we also practiced the Sounds in Motion gestures to help us learn the accompanying sounds. This combination helps my twins work on their speech sounds, all the while learning literacy concepts.
Parent: Now that you mentioned literacy concepts, can speech developmental delays affect learning?
Many children who have language and speech difficulties can have difficulty with reading and spelling, so I am excited to equip them with the tools to be successful readers and writers.
Parent: Your clients are so fortunate to have someone like you supporting them. Now that we’ve met Rover, what other go-to tricks do you have up your sleeve?
I love using a song called “Silly Name Game” written by Tuneful Teaching. This jingle explores fun ways to manipulate language and learn literacy skills like rhyming and alliteration. “Silly Name Game” was included in a fabulous course that I took called Language for Littles, which focused on using music to build language and literacy skills.
Parent: The song title alone is enough to make me smile! I’m sure it’s exactly what it sounds like.
It is! In my sessions I like to write our names on a dry erase board and come up with how many different letters we can use at the beginning of our names:
“Vanessa, Vanessa, Vanessa starts with V. Banessa, Banessa, Banessa starts with B, isn’t that a silly name!”
Parent: What a contagious song, I’m sure I’ll be humming that all day. Thank you Vanessa!
If you would like a copy of Rover, please feel free to DM email Vanessa at vanessa@peekaboospeech.com