Mastering Word Problems--Notability

A few weeks ago, we shared about the iPad app, Notability, which enables us to create visual images of characters that can be easily duplicated, rotated, shrunken or enlarged for each "scene" of the story.  Last week, we shared about the language of math, promising more information on how to use Notability to help make word problems more visual for our students with language difficulty.

When students are very young, it is easy to draw visual representations of math problems, such as 2+3.  As students get older, however, the demands of the math problems increase.  It is not feasible to have students draw representations of larger numbers.  I have noticed that we simply skip this step, expecting older students to jump over the representative step, right to the symbolic step.  If students are not yet able to make this adjustment, they can be frustrated trying to get at what is being asked.  Notability helps resolve that problem!

My student was struggling with what to do when the word problem said,  "There are eight groups of four students."  I asked her to draw four students, so she drew:

I said, "That's great, there are four students there, but how many groups do we need?" She said, "Eight groups".  I showed her the "Copy" function on the app (the scissors icon).  She circled the four students, pressed copy, then paste. I said, "Great, now you have two groups, how many do you need?" She pressed paste again, and immediately said, "Oh! I get it, I need to multiply 4x8!" Here is what it would look like with eight groups of four students:

This app is great for division and subtraction as well, with a handy eraser, multiple colors and highlighters.  Your older students who still require visual representations will appreciate your using Notability, not just for reading comprehension, but also for word problems!  

Teachers With Apps review of InferCabulary, InferCabulary3 and WordQuations

We are thrilled by our latest apps review on TeachersWithApps.com by Jackie Bryla. This wonderful website reviews apps for teachers, parents and students. They field test the apps with educators and students, write reviews about the apps, and keep us up to date on app specials.

In her review, Visual Vocabulary Apps by Communication APPtitude, Jackie writes:

"WordQuations, InferCabulary and InferCabulary3 should be on every iPad that is associated with middle school and high school students, as well as those educating that population. Every student should have the opportunity to experience the visual vocabulary that has been created by Communiation APPtitude! Bravo to the developers for these AMAZING, BRILLIANT and COMPREHENSIVE vocabulary apps!"

If you are looking for information on apps before you buy and want to know the latest and greatest on the market, go to www.TeachersWithApps.com and check out our apps on the APP Store!

WordQuations is on the App Store!

         WordQuationsTM

    We are so excited to announce our newest vocabulary app, WordQuationsTM, is now on the App Store!

    This iPad app is designed to help students master the subtle meanings of verb synonyms. This app will help students understand the distinctions between synonyms such as plod, meander, saunter and slink. The formula presented throughout this app provides clues about character motivation and feelings for improved reading comprehension. Students can also use the app to improve verb choices in their writing eliminating random thesaurus choices. You'll be able to see our actors from The Simpletons act out each synoynm so students can see the body language and facial expressions associated with each word. More information is located on our website.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/wordquations/id938397661?mt=8

Language of Math Word Problems

The language contained in math word problems is often abstract, causing difficulty for students with language deficits.  It is essential that students realize the mathematical operation that these words signal.  Although I am not a math tutor, I have spent many an hour working with clients on the setting up of word problems.  

First, they need to learn these concepts--which is hopefully being done in a multi-sensory manner by the math instructor.  We, as language educators, SLPs and parents can reinforce these concepts, moving from hands-on materials, to representative methods, using paper and/or technology.  I usually start by creating pictorial representations, discussing with the student what is happening in the language "story" (word problem). After this, we set the problem up using numbers.  

As students move into higher elementary and middle school years, this pictorial step is often omitted; the assumption being that this step is unnecessary.  Next week, I will share how to use Notability to easily draw, duplicate, combine, etc., which is difficult to do using paper.

This chart of words and operations was accessed from the purplemath website, which is a helpful site for math:

Stapel, Elizabeth. "Translating Word Problems: Keywords." Purplemath. Available from
  http://www.purplemath.com/modules/translat.htm. Accessed 05 November 2014

Copyright © Elizabeth Stapel 2000-2011 All Rights Reserved

Addition	increased by more than combined, together total of sum, plus added to
Subtraction	decreased by minus, less difference between/of less than, fewer than
Multiplication	of times, multiplied by product of increased/decreased by a   factor of (this type can   involve both addition or   subtraction and   multiplication!)
Division	per, a out of ratio of, quotient of percent (divide by 100)
Equals	is, are, was, were, will be gives, yields sold for

Formulating Definitions

Definitions are tricky.  They need to be succinct, conveying the essence of the word or concept without including unnecessary details.  Many students who have expressive language difficulty find definitions very tricky.  Providing them with a formula, and practicing category and function skills will help them improve this necessary skill.

Basically, common nouns can be defined by providing the category label, the function of the item, and whatever additional salient details make the item distinguishable (e.g., the parts or what the item is made of.)  This sounds easy enough, but let's think about what is required for each step.  First, in order to retrieve the appropriate category label, one needs to have words stored categorically, for example, if I say, "sofa--what are some other things that are sort of kind of like it?" I would want to make sure the student has the ability to call to mind words or pictures like, "chair, table, bed," that are also contained in the category.  Secondly, it is from this framework that the category label is retrieved (or not, with many of our students with word-retrieval issues.) Once the student has gone through this "bottom-up" type thinking, they are then required to perform another complex task--that of comparing the item to be defined with all the other items contained in that category, so that important differences can be highlighted. The third step in the definition process for many common nouns is to identify the function.  I might ask, "What does this do, or what do we do with it that makes it special and different from all the other items in that category?"  So if the student says, "You sit on it", I might challenge him with, "I can sit on a bench, a chair and a stool, can you be more specific? How many people might sit on it?"  Once they formulate, for example, "A sofa is a kind of furniture that two or three people can sit on," the fourth step would be to think about the component parts or what the item is made of.  If additional information is needed (e.g., defining a lemon, an airplane, or perfume,) we focus on other salient details, such as size, shape, color, texture, smell, taste, sound, etc.  Many times, so long as the category label, function and parts/made of information is provided, the word has been adequately defined.

Above is a formula that helps students successfully work through each of these steps.  Have fun defining!

 

"Seeing" the Story with Notability

To follow up on our last post, Bring Your Own Device Advice, I wanted to share how I use one of my favorite iPad apps, Notability, to help students with reading comprehension. Many tutors, teachers and SLPs use the Visualizing & Verbalizing (VV) method by Lindamood-Bell to ensure that students are visualizing language. This is such an important component of comprehension.

With my iPad handy, the student and I read the first sentence or two from a paragraph. We discuss what the student is imagining, focusing on character and setting. One of the great features of Notability is the drawing feature. If the student is comfortable drawing, he can select all the colors he envisions, draw the main character or setting on the first page of Notability, and put in a significant amount of detail. when we were limited to using pencil and paper, the student (or I) had to re-draw the character in every scene, which was time consuming. It often resulted in the use of stick figures which isn't quite the same.

With Notability, the drawing of the detailed character can be copied, shrunken, rotated, and pasted into new pages so that, as new sentences (and scene/scenarios) are added, the character can be pasted into each scene. Here is an example of a VV story about a ferret getting into a dresser, opening a pantry door, eating his food and going into the clothes hamper. I find taking the time to draw the main character takes a bit of time up front, but pays dividends when the student can see the details throughout the drawn story. This helps when students are required to remember and re-tell stories. I hope you find Notability helpful!

BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) Advice for Students

In many parts of the U.S., schools are enacting Bring Your Own Device (BYOD). It means students can bring their laptops, smart phones and/or tablets to school. Here in Howard County, Maryland many of our middle schools and high schools are now BYOD. For students with language disabilities, this is a big help if you know the students' needs and can provide apps to support learning. Here's advice I have been giving parents to promote learning with smart devices.

Word Processing
First, you need software on your device to write papers, take notes and keep up with the enormous amount of information students are navigating daily. For iPad users, Pages, is free and has all the bells and whistles needed for documents and beyond. I love that students can import pictures easily from Safari to add visuals to any projects.  Microsoft also has Office for iPad and Microsoft Word for iPad and for other tablets (Office Mobile) which requires a subscription. If you are not a fan of Pages, you have alternatives. Let me suggest your student try Pages first for two reasons: (1) many times  figure out new programs faster than the rest of us, and (2) it is designed for the iPad (and free), so it's a great choice.

Pages

Microsoft Word for iPad

Note Taking

Most of my students use Pages for note-taking on their iPads, but others like one of two programs: Notability or Penultimate. Both allow students to type, draw, import pictures, capture audio during lectures and organize their notebooks. If you want to use the audio capabilities, make sure you get the teachers' permission before recording anything in class.

Notability

Penultimate

Planning and Organization
Each of my students learns to use Inspiration Maps on the iPad when we are working on written expression. Students can brainstorm information for paragraphs, essays and research papers. They can plan in diagram mode or in outline mode. Outlines have never been easier in this software and they can be exported to Pages or Word so no re-typing is needed.

Inspiration Maps

Current Events
Many students have current events assignments and sometimes write about these events. Zite is a wonderful app on the APP Store, Google Play and Amazon Fire. Students choose categories they need to stay abreast of (health, news, sports, etc.) and the app refreshes itself constantly with the latest articles streaming. Having the latest articles at your fingertips takes the work out of finding the article and they can spend more time focusing on writing about the event chosen.

Zite

Time Management
How many times have we heard, "He did the work, but he didn't turn it in on time." One of the most useful functions of a smartphone, tablet or computer is the ability to schedule due dates for homework, projects and events. For kids with Executive Function difficulties, help is usually needed in keeping up with due dates. There are many different options. I prefer Apples iCal because it syncs across all of my devices with reminders built in to help students stay on top of due dates. However, there are many apps for just this purpose. Cruise the App Store or Google Play to find the calendar that works best for you. If your student uses Google, they have a great calendar systems, as well.

iCal

Vocabulary Apps
We've talked about how important vocabulary is for learning and reading comprehension in past posts. I'd be remiss if I didn't plug our own vocabulary apps - InferCabulary and Word Quations. InferCabulary is on the App Store and focuses on nouns and adjectives. WordQuations for verbs will be on the App Store in October. Go to our website www.CommunicationAPPtitude.com to sign up for an email alert so you'll will know when WordQuations hits the App Store!

InferCabulary

Have fun exploring the apps world!

SLPs and the iPad

My parents gave me my first iPad, the original iPad, for Christmas in 2010. It was one of my most exciting Christmas presents, although the Barbie Camper ranks a close second. Almost immediately, I imagined what I could do with my new iPad in my speech language private practice. Isn't that what we do as speech-language pathologists? Take a personal gift, game or toy and repurpose it for use with our students?

I dreamed of creating SOAP notes and using articulation pictures - all within easy reach during a session. I imagined using YouTube clips for oral expression and finding games to inspire students. A dictionary and thesaurus at the touch of a screen made me giddy. Now almost four years later, the iPad has become indispensable in therapy. The App Store has exploded with speech language apps and ideas are shared about how to better engage our students in the technology age.

I do have some suggestions if you are new to the iPad in the therapy world and some wisdom to impart for those who are old hat with the iPad.

Buying an iPad. Make sure you buy an iPad with a large amount of storage. The iPad Air now comes with up to 128 GB of storage. Why so much storage? Speech language apps typically are large apps and will eat up space on your iPad, so plan for this. Can't afford the 128 GB now? Then wait until you can afford it, because having to delete apps to run other apps is a pain in the neck. Consider this as important an investment as your computer.

Crashes. I read a lot of comments about crashes. While you have a lot of storage on your iPad the processor is not always as fast. To keep apps from crashing, close out apps regularly.  You can do this by using 4 fingers to sweep up on the iPad screen or hit the home button (round button on the bottom) twice. You can close one to two apps at once by sweeping the app to the top of the screen.

SOAP Notes. Taking session note are so easy with my iPad. I used to have a 3-prong folder for each student that I would fold and sit on the table next to me. It took up a lot of real estate on my therapy table, not to mention time to handwrite notes. Now I sit my iPad Air in a wireless keyboard case next to me and it takes up less space than a sheet of paper. I have a document for each student that contains their treatment goals and daily notes. Keep in mind...

• Use the highest password encryption to protect students' information.

• Using only first names and last initial for students can also protect their privacy.

• Back up your notes to your computer once a month just in case. 

• If you have to reset your iPad, never fear - your notes are all in the iCloud and will come back once you reset using the same Apple account (email address and password).

Student use. Let's face it, students are now light years ahead of many of us because they are adapting to the technology age. We need to learn to adapt, too. I'm fortunate enough to now have an iPad3 and an iPad Air. The iPad Air is mine and I do all of my note-taking on it. The iPad3 also has it's own wireless case - I got an inexpensive one for $35 last week and it works great. Students plan writing assignments in Inspiration Maps, export the information or outline to Pages, and then fully flesh out their paragraph on the iPad. They use Siri to read back their written work and learn valuable editing skills.

Students teach me. I learn just as much from my students about what they know about technology as they do with me.  One day, a middle schooler walked into my office and asked to use Siri. Skeptical, I said, "okay," ready to pounce if it turned out to be negative. He said to Siri, "tell my why fire engines are red, please Siri." I won't spoil the surprise, but the answer is quite cute. Unbeknownst to my students, they are actually working on pragmatics, oral expression and a whole host of other language skills by allowing them to teach me a few new tricks.

Monitor use. Always be close by to monitor your students' use of the iPad. You can put on parental controls. I make sure I have a passcode on both iPads so they can't just grab the iPad and start using it. They need my permission. Think about it. You would not leave students alone with a computer and the same precautions apply to the iPad.

Next time, we'll talk apps for iPads in business practices and in treatment....and if you have time, check out InferCabulary on the App Store! 
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/infercabulary/id796698831?mt=8

Tips for Teachers of Students Who Stutter

How do I help a child in my class who stutters?

We all can think of at least one teacher who made a difference in our lives. It's important to give the teacher of a student who stutters some tips on how to create an environment that supports the student. The Stuttering Foundation (www.stutteringhelp.org) offers great tips for classroom teachers:

• Don't tell the student to "relax" or "slow down." This just increases the anxiety a student may feel when they are trying to tell you something or contribute to a classroom discussion.
• Don't finish a student's sentence or put words in his mouth. Good talking manners apply to everyone in the classroom, not just the stutterer.
• Listen to what he says, not how he says it.
• Treat him like the other children in your class, expecting the same quantity and quality of work.
• Respect the needs of the student by talking with him about oral speaking requirements in class. If the stuttering is mild, he might be willing to speak in front of the class. Don't count his dysfluencies against him! If he is a severe stutterer, allow him to do the report for you individually instead of in front of the entire class.
• Don't talk about stuttering like it is something to be ashamed of.
• Make your classroom a "no ridicule zone."

Talk to the speech language pathologist who works with your student. S/he will have suggestions and offer advice about your student. Caring enough to make a few changes will go a long way to making a big difference in the student's life. It's important to create an environment that supports a healthy self-esteem for all students and especially those with communication difficulties.

Parenting Stutterers

Working with school-aged students who stutter, I find parents have lots of questions about how to parent their child who stutters. The Stuttering Foundation has a wonderful book, Stuttering and Your Child: Questions and Answers that I highly recommend to parents and teachers.  This book is available in paperback form and on e-readers.

Why?
A common question asked is, "Why does my child stutter?" The answer: no one knows why. The book points out that we usually want to know why something happens so we can eliminate the cause and stop the stuttering. Unfortunately, this is not possible.  Some think imitating stutterers will cause stuttering. This is a myth - most stutterers begin stuttering on their own without having heard someone else stutter. There are genetic dispositions to stuttering. You may know of another family member who stutters. Most importantly,

Parents should not blame themselves for their child's stuttering.

The way you raise your child has little to do with why your child stutterers. But, there are things you can do to help your child.

Suggestions for Parents
You can change some of the ways you do things at home to help your child. Too often family members try to finish her sentences, interrupt while she is talking, or encourage a fast rate of speech. To help your child, consider these suggestions to parents from Dr. Richard Curlee:

1) Accept your child. Find ways to show your child that you love and value her, and you enjoy spending time with her.

2) Listen patiently. Respond to the "message" rather than how it is relayed.

3) Avoid filling in or speaking your child's thoughts and ideas. Her thoughts and ideas should be her own.

4) Maintain natural eye contact. Don't look away or stare at your child while she is talking.

5) Don't interrupt - allow your child to complete what she is saying.

6) Spend 5 minutes a day devoted to listening and talking with your child in a relaxed manner.

7) After your child speaks use some of the same words she did, but in a relaxed way. By doing this you will be modeling a good speech pattern.

8) Pause at least one second before reponding to your child. Don't hurry the response.

You should know...

• More boys than girls stutter (4:1)
• 3 million Americans stutter and 68 million people world-wide stutter
• 5% of all children go through a period of stuttering that lasts 6 months
• 3/4 of children who stutter will recover by late childhood 
• 1% of children who begin stuttering, continue to stutter
• If your child stutters, see a speech-language pathologist who specializes in stuttering right away.
• Early intervention is the key to treating children who stutter
• There are no miracle cures for stuttering, but progress can be made.

For more information, visit www.stutteringhelp.org.

Storytelling (Narrrative) Practice

Storytelling is ultimately a creative act of pattern recognition. Through characters, plot and setting, a writer creates places where previously invisible truths become visible. Or the storyteller posits a series of dots that the reader can connect. - Douglas Coupland

In our "Storytelling and Language-Learning Differences" post, we discussed the "recipe" or pattern for telling a story: 


Usual events + Unusual events + Problem(s) + Solution(s) + Ending = Narrative


With all new skills learned, there has to be a time of practice that allows the student to perfect their technique and adapt it to a variety of narratives. Take the pattern for storytelling and have some fun with it.


Toys and Pictures


One way to practice other than just creating stories aloud, is to use toys such as Legos or Polly Pockets (really any figurines) and create a scene from each part of the story. Using an iPad or camera to either take pictures of the story is fun. Print them out or send them to the students' parents so they can practice telling the story at home.


Create Books


There's no better reward for a student who created a story than to see it in print. Books can be low tech with craft supplies and paper or high tech using a tablet or computer. Check out teachthought.com's website for apps that let student's create their stories on iPads (http://teachthought.com/apps-2/15-literacy-apps-to-create-books-on-the-ipad/).


Videos


Videos are my new favorite way students can practice their narrative skills. iMovie on the iPad is a great way to make a video and if you don't know how to do it, your students can most likely show you. My new favorite app is Toontastic. Try it for free with Toontastic Jr. - I used their pirate app. We quickly graduated to Toontastic where you can buy unlimited settings, characters, etc. for $9.99. Students are pattern of storytelling and use each step to create their movie with moveable cartoon characters, lots of settings (backgrounds) and music. I sit with my student while they make decisions and guide them in creating their story. I write while they dictate and then one of us reads the story after making each section of the movie. They can add credits and a title. Upload the movie to YouTube* and their family can watch it at home. Many of my students have been using Toontastic at home honing their narrative skills. Check out one of my students' creations:


http://youtu.be/K6hbS9RNYeE


*If you have a gmail account, you have a YouTube account. If you don't have a gmail account, it's easy to sign up with Google.