Favorite Halloween Books to Use in Preschool Speech Therapy
Halloween is one of my favorite holiday themes to use in preschool speech therapy! As soon as Oct 1st hits I’m pulling out all of the tricks and treats! That means that I go through a couple of books during the month and wanted to share some of my favorites along with companion activities.
1. The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Linda Williams
This book follows a little old lady through her walk in the forest where she encounters several spooky items. One thing I love about this book is that all the items have their own unique sound (e.g. clomp, clomp, clap, clap) making it interactive for the child. Another thing I love is that this book has repetitive phrases, which every SLP knows is great for language acquisition. I use this book to work on several targets such as vocabulary, sequencing, prepositions (e.g. behind), articulation, pronoun usage (“She walked a little bit faster”), wh-questions, recall and negation (“She was NOT afraid of anything).
If you are doing therapy virtually below is a great read aloud link. This video has animation and fun spooky sounds!
https://youtu.be/2jaEAVxl5Rk
I like to also pair this book with a craft activity. Linked below is a great template.
http://www.makinglearningfun.com/themepages/LittleOldLadyWhoWasntAfraidofAnything.htm
2. The Berenstain Bears’ and The Spooky Old Tree by Stan & Jan Berenstain
I just stumbled upon this book, but who doesn’t love a Berenstain Bear book! I don’t know about you, but just using this book gave me such a shot of nostalgia! It was nice to see that it still held up well with the kiddos today. To take you even further down memory lane the read aloud that I linked below is from a story on tape book! Do they even make those anymore? It’s fantastic because it incorporates so many sounds and music making it very engaging.
This book is great for vocabulary (e.g. light, rope, stick, dare, shiver), simple inferencing, recall, sequencing and wh-questions. It also contains repetitive language and little bit of kid-friendly suspense. We have a winner!
I also found this great and FREE boom card companion. It has a story re-tell activity using word recognition or visual recognition depending on the what is appropriate.
https://wow.boomlearning.com/deck/spooky-tree-retell-7yhzhfeaLxJdKDNuj
3. There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Bat by Lucille Colandro
The “There Was An Old Lady…” books are a staple for me. There are so many great books in this series for the various holidays and seasons. In this story the old lady swallows many odd items, but each item is themed to the holiday making this a great vocabulary book. The child gets exposed to high frequency words for this time of the year, which in turn makes the vocabulary functional as well. Other than vocabulary I LOVE using this book to work on sequencing and answering wh-questions. Kids love all the different characters and the silliness of this story!
Here is a freebie from TpT. I like to use the visuals by laminating them and putting them into a sensory bin.
4. Go Away, Big Green Monster! by Ed Emberley
This is a really fun book to work on simple vocabulary and describing words (e.g. sharp white teeth). The book uses the repetitive phrase: “Go away___ Go Away!” so it’s also great for expansion of utterances. The video linked below is animated so I’ll have the child imitate me (“Go away squiggly purple ears!”) before the object disappears in the video illustrating the concept of cause and effect. So many great targets with this simple and fun monster book!
Here are some fun activities to pair with the book: http://www.makinglearningfun.com/themepages/BigGreenMonster.htm
I also like to pair it with this song from SuperSimple
Check out the links below to purchase books featured in this post. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases at no additional cost to you.
Additional Links
I love using the holiday themes to encourage language development! If you do too check out my post on fun ways to use toys this Christmas! https://lifewithbecks.com/gifts-speech-language-development/
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