Discovery Toys Back To School Sale!

Did ya hear?-
There's a Discovery Toys Sale going on!!

Four totally fun products are on sale right now until they sell out! Once they're gone, they are GONE!

1. Juggle Toss-

On Sale!! Was $18.50 NOW--$10.00!

This is a great product to get moving with! It develops hand-eye coordination as your child tosses the bean bag up and tries to catch it in the cup. Juggle Toss also is a great product to work on social skills, like turn taking, as 2 children can play together and toss the bean bag to each other.

2. I'm Going Green CD-

On Sale!! Was $12.50 NOW-- $6.50!

Music is such a fantastic way to teach new concepts!! This CD is full of very catchy tunes that teach your child (and YOU too ;)) about nature and keeping the Earth clean. Check out previews of some of the songs here. Go green with me!

3. Gearopolis-
On Sale!! Was $37.50 NOW-- $22.50!

Build your own little world with this easy to assemble gear system! Take this 80 piece set and get your creative juices flowing to put this together as you increase your fine motor skills. use your problem solving skills to put the gears in the right places and watch them turn and turn!

4. Out of My Head--

On Sale!! Was $29.99 NOW--$10.00!

I love, love, LOVE this tactile game! Work on turn taking as each player picks a card and then feels inside the alien's head to use only their sense of touch (no peeking, folks!!) to get the same object. You can even work on using descriptive language by talking about what each item is, what it looks and feels like and what you do with it.

Get yours now, before they are sold out! You can check all the items out here at my website! Have you seen the new website? It's pretty!!!
E-mail me if you have any questions!

Happy Sale-Shopping!
~Marcy

Bathtime Fun with Discovery Toys!

Bath time in the Fox household used to consist of lots and lots of screaming. And splashing. And crying.
Well, it still contains all that, but, fortunately, it occurs at the END of the bath, not at the beginning and middle. She does not want to come out. Why, you ask? I think it has something to do with

Bathtime Bugs

Bathtime Bugs is a 4 piece set made of sturdy, washable plastic. Each piece is a different bug (a butterfly, bumblebee, worm/bug and flower {yeah, I know! A flower isn't a bug...work with me here...}) so you can work on springtime and bug vocabulary!

Here's what the Discovery Toys (fancy, schmancy new) website says about Bathtime Bugs {with my commentary, too!}...and, have you seen the awesome new Discovery Toys Parent Guides?
KEY BENEFITS:

• Brightly colored and textured pieces encourage child to investigate early science concepts {Rachel had fun manipulating each piece and exploring. She also was figuring out the concept of water displacement as the worm kept popping out of the flower. It was kinda fun to push it down and squirt the water out!}
• Thinking skills are reinforced through cause and effect principles {Rachel had a blast trying to figure out how to keep all 4 bugs under the water at the same time. She also was learning that she had to keep the yellow butterfly under the water for a longer time to get it to full up so she could dump it on herself}
  
• Assists with bath time while aiding motor skill development {Rachel had to use her (cute little) fingers to spin, push, scoop and sprinkle}.
• Provides the opportunity to expand vocabulary by introducing new words and concepts and demonstrating their meaning.{Beautiful!! Read below for my speech-language point of view!}
  
• Versatile pieces are also perfect for backyard water or garden play. {we will TOTALLY have to try that!}

And, here it is...the after bath...

So, what kind of cool speech and language things can you do with the Bathtime Bugs?
Early Sound Development- "B" is one of the earliest sounds that develop in children. So, if you are using Bathtime Bugs with your little baby or with your non-verbal child, you can encourage him/her to use their /b/ sound---you've got bath, bug, butterfly, bumblebee, and even bubbles. You can put the pieces by your mouth to help your child focus on your lips. Then, /b/ away to your heart's content! "B-B-B-bubbles! B-B-B-Bee!!" Eventually, your child will join you!

Vocabulary- Remember, teaching words within a theme is one of the best ways to make sure your child is learning the vocabulary. The theme here is "Bugs." Have your child point to each bug as you name them. Then, have your child label each piece as he/she puts them in the tub.
Action vocabulary words--as your child is playing, talk about what she is doing. "Splash," "pour," "swim" and "push" are great words to learn!
Descriptive vocabulary words (a.k.a. adjectives)-- "Wet"

Using Simple Sentences-Some of the things I heard Rachel say included "I taking a bath!," "I got water," "bug go down," "I wet" and, not to mention "no all done!!!" Most of her sentences include a subject, verb and a complement (the basic 3 word sentence), which is pretty typical for a 2 or 3 year old. When she said only "I wet," I could have helped her expand her sentence by saying "yes, you are wet" "you said 'I am wet!"

Bathtime Bugs has been a great addition to our bathtime!! They are available at my website as a set of 4 sturdy pieces for $20. (But, don't forget!! If you order any product through my e-mail by August 11, you can enjoy 10% off your purchase!!).

Keep clean ;)
~Marcy

A blog that I absolutely LOVE!!

So, I was wandering around Blog-ville and Twitter-land and No Time For Flashcards came up a couple of times. Since no-flashcards!-naturalistic-stuff-only! (or as much as possible...) is a philosophy of mine with my speech-language therapy, I thought I'd check it out.

I was blown away!

Step by step, theme related, nifty-neato activities galore!! How cool is that?!?! She even has photographs of the materials needed and of the step by step directions. (Puts my most recent blog post to shame!! :/ ) And, with me being a visual learner, I LOVE the photos even more. Oh, did I mention her photos star her super cute son? Yup!

OH!! and there's more!! With each coolio activity, she recommends books to go along with them! AND, Allie even sings for us! She really knows her stuff because she's got an extensive background in early childhood education (oh, and she's creative and has her own little one!).

Sorry, I'm drooling here a little. I've totally just found inspiration for my classroom for next year. Yipee!!

I should end this now before Allie thinks she's gonna find me in her front yard or something...
Please check her website out at http://www.notimeforflashcards.com

I'm off to explore her activities some more!...

~Marcy

Fun ocean activity!

Here is great activity that we used in my classroom to accompany playing AB Seas during our Ocean vocabulary theme...it's A Blue Fishy Drink!

Here's what you'll need: a pitcher (see-through is best!), a spoon, blue powdered drink mix (maybe Kool Aid®), sugar, gummy fish candy and cups.
Since this is a great sequencing activity for students with speech-language delays, having sequencing pictures are very useful. You can do line drawings, cut out pictures or even use photographs. This is an example of what we used in my classroom, made with Microsoft Paint:The sequence is: Pour in the mix, pour in the sugar, pour in the water, put in the fish, stir and watch the fish swim, put it in a cup and drink.

The speech and language targets in this activity included:
sequencing-- we cut up the above pictures and reviewed them first a couple of times. Then, as we made our fishy drink, at each step, we had the kids pick the picture that came next. We were also teaching them the temporal concepts of first, next, then and last.

vocabulary--our vocabulary theme was ocean, so we talked a lot about water and fish. We also taught the action words of pour, put, stir, swim and drink.

turn taking--talking and conversation involve verbal turn taking, like a tennis match. Turn taking is also a basic skill preschoolers need to learn. So, when it came time to stir the fishy drink, the kids were guided to turn to their friend and say "it's my turn."

sentence expansion--my 3- and 4-year olds are typically still communicating using gestures, single words or very short sentences. My job is to get them to use longer sentences. So, as we were making the fishy drink, the students were encouraged to "use your words." We also do this through modeling and expanding-- in our own talking, we use the sentences we expect them to use (for example "I am stirring" or "The water is blue"). Then, when they say something using single words, we help them expand it into a complete sentence (for example, if they say "more," we model "I want more. Yes! You said 'I want more'").

and
articulation--I'm kind of sneaky with my articulation* therapy! (*articulation= how we form our speech sounds). Most of my students are leaving off sounds or changing sounds around, so we need to give them lots and lots of chances to say the words correctly. I chose to focus on the /f/ for Fish, and /s/ for STir. So, as we made our fishy drink, we over emphasized these sounds and encouraged the students to make these sounds. I also like to *show* the kids how to make the sounds by pointing to my mouth to make it obvious how the sound is made.

We also focused on pre-academic skills. (I love working in a preschool setting--we can work on so many things!). These included
counting--we counted the fish as we put them in

colors--we talked about the colors of the fish as we put them it. It also turned out to be a cool science activity as the clear water turned blue when it hit the powder. Magic!!

The students had a lot of fun with this hands-on activity! And, I was happy because there were so many things I could focus on in just one cool activity.
Leave a comment below to let me know if you've tried it!!

Happy swimming!!

What's Happening in My Classroom?

Well, it's Summer School time, which means a longer day for students in my class, but less kids. So, we have more time to give the students the attention they need and more time to do FUN stuff!!

The vocabulary theme (remember--one of the best ways to teach vocabulary is within vocabulary units to help them categorize new words they use as they put the words in their little "filing cabinets!") for the next few weeks is: Ocean Life!!

What's the best game to play with my preschoolers?

It's ABSeas!!

For starters, AB Seas is a fantastic way to help your little one learn the alphabet. As they go fishing, they catch sea creatures who have upper case letters written on them. They can say the name of the letter and then match it to their game board. Make it a bit more challenging and have your child match the upper case letter to the lower case letter.

And! There's a bonus!! The fishing poles are magnetic which lead to an awesome science experiment! My students had fun going around the room seeing what items the magnet stuck to (the chair leg! the white board! the filing cabinet!) as well as what it did not stick to (the cardboard box, the pocket chart, the water table). It was pretty fun watching them get so excited.

Now, how can AB Seas be used to teach speech and language skills?...
Vocabulary development: As they fish for letters, they will be encountering several sea creatures, including fish, sea horses, octopus and sharks. The box is also decorated with ocean items, like sea weed, coral, water, shells and bubbles. All of these are great for developing labels and descriptive language.

Basic concepts: While your child is playing, they are taking the sea creatures out and putting them on their game board.

Turn Taking: Often, students with speech ang language difficulties have problems with pragmatic language (that's the social use of language; how people interact with others). One key area of pragmatics is turn taking. A sneaky way to work on turn taking is through game playing--especially when you are super sneaky and only give the kids ONE fishing pole!! They need to know that each kid gets a turn and they can use phrases like "it's my turn," or "I want the fishing pole."

More pragmatic language!: Encourage your kids to ask each other "Do you have the letter B" to see if they can play together to find all of the letters.

My speech and language preschoolers are having a lot of fun with AB Seas! I hope you do, too! It's available here on my website!

Happy fishing!
~Marcy

A Discovery Toys Review!

I absolutely *LOVE* hearing what folks who have attended a party or who have purchased items think of the products they have gotten!!
Teresa was kind enough to e-mail me this review, along with some photos (and even a great video of her son, J.J.!), to let me know how her whole family loves the Discovery Toys products.

Hey Marcy;

I just wanted to let you know, I love discovery toys!! My 6 month old J.J. is fascinated by his teething toy Super Yummy. He loves the different textures, and it's bold red color is eye catching to him. He actually will pick it up and turn it to whatever texture he prefers at that moment. Also, the Rainfall Rattle is his favorite. He is aware of cause and effect now, he knows if he throws it, it makes sound, and mommy or daddy pick it back up and give it to him again. The sound that the beads make going through the holes is fascinating to him. THANK YOU for turning me and my son on to Discovery Toys. I am a faithful follower now because I see how my infant son is in awe over these educational toys.

Sincerely,

Teresa Saavedra

And, here is an adorable picture of J.J. with his Super Yummy and Rainfall Rattle!

Thanks, again, to Teresa for coming to the party and for sharing her experiences!

Happy playing,
~Marcy

A Special Discovery Toys Offer from FoxToyBox!

It's been such a crazy few weeks! The regular school year has wound down and summer school has started. Plus, I've been getting ready for my daughter, Rachel's 2nd birthday. Today is her day!! I can't believe my little preemie is 2!!

Now, I'd like you to celebrate her birthday with me with a special deal only available from *me* :). (oh, if you get my newsletter, you would already know this ;)).

For the month of July
up until the anniversary of the day
Rachel came home from the hospital (August 11),
send me an e-mail (foxtoybox@gmail.com)
with the subject line "Rachel's Special"
that includes your order,
payment information,
mailing address
and phone number and you will enjoy a
10% savings.

***Please note: this offer is ONLY available via e-mail and will NOT be available on my website. Please use the website ONLY to choose your items!!**

Let me know if you have any questions and enjoy your savings! :)

~Marcy