TPT Seller Challenge: Dare To Dream

I am a little late posting this. Better late than never right? We just finished week two of the TPT SELLERS CHALLENGE hosted by: Third in Hollywood, Sparkling in Second, Peppy Zesty Teacherista, and Teach Create Motivate. 

To learn more about the challenge click HERE!

This weeks challenge was Dare to Dream. For this challenge we were asked to blog about our goals and dreams. So here is what I came up with:

1. I want to own my own pediatric therapy clinic. I have dreamed about this since college, and hope to achieve this in the next 10-15 years.

2. My dream is to retire early and travel the world with my husband. I want to visit all of Europe. While I am still young, I want to travel the U.S.. So far, I have been to 17 states and Mexico.

3. I want to continue to grow my TPT business. I was so blessed to find this creative outlet. TPT has  provided me a way to connect with other wonderful SLP's, share my creative works, and have extra income for my family.

4. I am sure most of you can relate to this one: Be debt-free! We just payed off both of our vehicles, thank goodness. Hopefully in the next 5-10 years we will have all of our debt paid off.

I would love to hear from you. What are your goals and dreams?

Making Previews With Picasa

Have you heard of Picasa? This amazing site is such a time saver when making previews. If you are a seller on TPT or TN then this is an awesome tool. And it FREE!!! I downloaded this program a few months ago, but didn't have the time to play around with it and figure out how to use it. Today I did and I couldn't be more excited! 

Let me first confess, I have been saving my PowerPoint presentations as jpeg files, then clicking, dragging, re-sizing, and positioning each and every one..... one by one! Yes, it was extremely time consuming!

Let me show you what I learned, so you don't spend all your time clicking, dragging, re-sizing, and positioning when making previews. 

Open the folder of pictures that you want to turn into a preview. See the little button that says CREATE PHOTO COLLAGE? Viola! You just created a preview in seconds.

You can choose the type of collage you want for your preview....pile, mosaic, frame. You can add text, bring pictures forward and backward. Isn't it fantastic. 

Once you choose the type of collage and crop your image, click the button that says CREATE COLLAGE. After your collage is created you will need to export the file to a folder you save your preview files in. YAY, NO MORE CLICKING, DRAGGING, RE-SIZING, AND POSITIONING!

What programs do you use to edit photos and create previews?

Happy Monday!

Fab Friday Freebies

I recently finished a huge project I have been working on for a few months, and I couldn't be more excited to finally get it posted in my store. Last year I created a ton of book companions and comprehensive language packets, but not a whole lot for my artic kiddos. I got to the end of the year and was completely burnt out on artic cards, games, and worksheets. I wanted something fresh and new to start out the year with the had a variety of activities for a variety of ages. This week I decided to focus on articulation freebies. 

Here is the newest addition to my store. This packet is one of the activities in my Articulation Kits. These cards are designed to be used with students pk-5th grade. I call them iTalk cards, and YES they really talk. Your students will scan the QR code using a smartphone or tablet and a voice will say the target word on the card. There are 9 initial position words, 6 medial position words, and 9 final position words.

You can grab this freebie here Articulation Kits /S/ Freebie.

Here are some other awesome freebies I found this week:

Final Consonant Flies by: Kari Radovich 

I can't tell you how much my preschoolers love this activity. It is so motivating for them to feed animals. We added a twist to ours and catch the flies using fly swatters with Velcro attached to them. This download includes 100 words targeting final consonant deletion:/p,t,k,s,m,n,f/.

Sentence Frame Activity to Target Final Consonant Deletion- Freebie! by Expressly Speaking

This is another favorite of mine for my pk-kg crowd. It includes 9 worksheets targeting final consonants /t,p,m,n,d,k,g,s/. You can practice articulation at word, phrase, or sentence levels. 

Articulation Game Boards {FREEBIE!} by Speech Is Sweet

She makes some awesome articulation worksheets. My students always LOVE her work. These worksheets are perfect for an on the go SLP. No prep work needed just print and go. Not only do your students get to play a game, they get to decorate the game board as well. The following sounds were included in this set: /k,f,t,s,th,r/.

Hungry Hippo Artic by Lauren LaCour

This is a fun twist to a childhood favorite of mine. You will attach the hippos to a tissue box, then your students will feed the hippos as they practice their speech sounds. The following sounds are included: /r,s,l,k/ and additional blank cards for you to write on.

Articulation Cans Add On FREEBIE! {more sticks for /r/,/s/,/z/,ch,"j"} by Mia McDaniel

If you don't have her Artic Cans, this is the perfect time to try them out. I love using them. They are an easy to grab and go activity. 

What do you love to use with your artic kiddos?

I hope you enjoy using these freebies with your students. Remember to follow my blog so you don't miss out on these awesome freebies each week.

Fab Friday Freebies

I began a diet this week. This is my third or fourth time beginning this diet. It's not that the diet is hard...okay it is hard, but not for the reasons you think. I like the foods I have to each and I feel full all day and have energy. To be honest, I feel really good when i'm on it. The problem is, I really miss all of the yummy foods I can't have...pizza, sandwiches, desserts, etc. That's all i think about. So it only seemed fitting to create an awesome freebie all about food (the yummy food I can't have). Maybe I will crave them less if I talk about them and create activities where I pretend to eat them.

I have had this packet for a while, so I am super excited to share it with you all. I love to engage my younger students in activities that simulate real life experiences, such as grocery shopping or going to a restaurant. I wanted to create something simple that covered a variety of language concepts and would allow for pretend play with my older elementary students.

This packet was designed for elementary age students k- 5th grade. Your students will pretend to be in a restaurant, take on different roles, and work on different language tasks: ordering food, social skills, following directions, compare/contrast, categorization, sequencing, and auditory memory.

You can grab this freebie here What's on the menu?

Here are some other awesome freebies I found this week:

Let's Have A Picnic: An Auditory Memory Activity by The Dabbling Speechie

She always has such awesome ideas and this game looks like a lot of fun as well. Students will sit in a circle, each person will say" I am going on a picnic and i'm going to bring ____."  As each person takes a turn, they have to remember all the foods that came before them. 

Open Ended Pizza Game by Speech Gadget Deb

Who doesn't love pizza and it's an open ended game! It doesn't get much better than that!

Picnic Picks...What Doesn't Belong? by Jenn Alcorn

Great product for vocabulary, comprehension, categorization, and reasoning skills. My students always have a hard time with this concept and Jenn made it in to a fun game.

Bountiful Basket: Multisyllabic Fruit and Vegetables by How Speech It Is

This packet is jam packed full of awesomeness. It target 2, 3,4 syllable words related to food. It includes a game board, syllable sorting mat, color sorting mat, reinforcement page, EET companion, compare/contrast worksheet, and related books. 

SUPERMARKET SORT by Figuratively Speeching SLP

This is perfect for targeting categorization and has three was to play: Go Fish, Matching, and Sorting.

I would love to hear from you! What fun toys, activities, crafts, or books do you use when talking and teaching about food?

I hope you enjoy using these freebies with your students. Remember to follow my blog so you don't miss out on these awesome freebies each week. 

TPT Seller Challange: Makeover Madness

I am thrilled to join in on the TPT seller challange hosted by: Third in Hollywood, Sparkling in Second, Peppy Zesty Teacherista, and Teach Create Motivate. 

Week one is all about makeovers and who doesn't love a good makeover! I chose to makeover one of my top selling products, My Planner. While I love the layout and content of the original, I wanted a new look for this school year. So out with the old and in with the new.

Here is a look at the old planner.....

And here is the new 2015-2016 Editable SLP Planner....

Upgrades include:

completely editable

new fonts

a bold new design

a table of contents

3 front covers and 2 back cover designs

 13 additional pages  

If you purchased my planner last year, you can head over to your purchases on TPT and download the revised product! If you don't own it yet, now is your chance to grab it on sale for 15% off.

Click here to check it out.

This fun summer challenge has me motivated to makeover a few other products in my store. I will keep you posted! In the meantime, head back over to any of the awesome blogs at the top to check out other makeovers.

Fab Friday Freebies

We are definitely into summer now, or at least I hope everyone is. I don't know about you but I spent the first week or two of summer break soaking it all in; sleeping late, relaxing, anything and everything but school. Since then, I have found myself planning periodically okay a lot for next year. I decided to offer a bunch of new freebies to make your planning easier. Each week from now until July 3rd., I will bring you Fab Friday Freebies. It will showcase a new freebie of mine and 5 freebies from other sellers. Make sure you follow my blog as some of my new freebies will be available on TPT, while others will only be available on my blog. 

This week I went with a camping theme. Let me say, I am not a huge fan of camping. I love to talk about it, but actually doing it is not my thing. One thing I do love that goes along with camping is s'mores. Yummy, gooey, chocolaty s'mores need I say more. Who doesn't love all of that goodness. So of course my freebie has s'mores all over it. Your kids will love learning about categories while staring at those tasty treats. I would definitely suggest having a s'more party or at least let them sample some. Not only are they delicious,but also fun to make. I'm getting hungry just talking about them!

This pack includes 48 cards with pictures for sorting into categories. It can be used two different ways:
1.) Spread the ingredient cards out on the table. Give each student a s’more card and have them find the ingredients for their s’more.

2.) Lay the s’more cards in a horizontal row on the table. Have students sort the ingredient cards under the correct s’more card.

This packet can be found in my TPT store: S'more Category Fun

Here are some other awesome freebies I found this week:

Gone Camping FREEBIE Open Ended Board Game from The Dabbling Speechie This open ended game board is perfect to make therapy fun while targeting various skills.

Camp Speech Homework Packet! from The Talkin' Teacher 

Love, Love Love these! The clipart is adorable and I used these at the end of the year with my articulation kiddos. They really enjoyed using these as reinforcement.

Camping Language {Freebie} from Queen's Speech 

This packet includes 5 engaging worksheets for teaching camping vocabulary.

Summer Camp: Categorization {Milestone Freebie} from Speech Universe 

This packet has a game board, visual aid for categorization, cards for convergent and divergent categorization and homework pages. Oh, and did I mention adorable clipart!

Freebie: Camping and Forest Vocabulary/Match cards from Jessica Finch 

I used this packet at the end of the year with my kiddos during our camping theme. It has excellent vocabulary cards which can be used for a matching game.

So there you have it, the first Fab Friday Freebies! I hope you enjoy using these with your students. I would love to hear what other awesome products, crafts, or activities your do with your students when talking about camping!

Weekly Summer Link Up: An Accomplishment I Am Proud Of

I am excited to be linking up again with I Heart Grade 3 for her weekly summer linky party. This weeks topic is: 

This one definitely made me stop and think. There are so many things I could list for this one, but I think the one thing I am most proud of at this moment is returning to school. I graduated in 2010, moved to a completely different state and began working while my husband went to school for his Doctorate of Chiropractic. I had wanted to go straight into a masters program once I finished my undergraduate degree, but God had different plans for me. I worked and raised our son while he went to school, which i'm glad I did. I don't regret my decision one bit. Once he graduated in 2013, we moved again to a different state. We talked about me returning to school, but to be honest after being out for what seemed like an eternity I was very intimidated to go back. Not so much because of the work, but more fearful about how I was going to juggle everything and school. I am basically a single parent during the week (my husband works out of town all week and is only home on the weekends), I work full time when school is in session, I develop products for my TPT store and blog. So, I waited and finally this year I built up the courage to do it. I began taking classes about three weeks ago and have really enjoyed it. Some how it all worked out and I couldn't be happier. 

What is an accomplishment you are proud of?

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