Netting Literacy Materials

By Judith Maginnis Kuster

On November 18, 2000, ASHA's Legislative Council provided guidance for speech-language pathologists regarding the "roles and responsibilities related to reading and written language disorders." (The ASHA Leader, April 17, 2001). The emergence of literacy issues evidenced in journal articles, state and national association conferences, and CEU offerings, as well as the push for literacy from the national level to the local school administrative level, has left some speech-language pathologists wondering how they can add these responsibilities while already serving a large caseload of children with speech sound, language, fluency, hearing, voice, and swallowing disorders.

The good news: there are many literacy goals that can easily be incorporated into activities you are already doing! More good news: there are many Internet resources available to help! Highlighted below are just a few of the freely available online materials that can be used to address some of the specific goals outlined in ASHA's guidelines for SLPs with respect to reading and writing in children and adolescents.

Environmental Print Awareness

• Focus on print symbols, including logos and signs for fast-food restaurants, street signs, movie theater signs, logos on cereal boxes, toys (http://trainland.tripod.com/pecs.htm)
• Include written words on picture stimuli. Caroline Bowen provides the minimal pairs pictures and consonant words and picture worksheets in Therapy Resources For SLPs (www.speech-language-therapy.com/txresources.html)

• Eight colorful alphabet books (http://curry.edschool.virginia.edu/go/wil/home.html#Alphabet)
• Alphabet Action from Learning Planet (www.learningplanet.com/act/fl/aact/index.asp)
• Weewebbies ABC's (www.weewebbies.com/htmls/web32100.htm)
• Alphabet flash cards (www.beginningreading.com/Alphabet%20Flashcards.htm)

• Nursery rhymes, alliteration, and poems.- featured in The ASHA Leader, November 28, 2006 column (www.mnsu.edu/comdis/kuster4/part73.html)
• Magnetic poetry (www.snaithprimary.eril.net/nursery.htm).
• "Word Lab" (www.primarygames.com/index.html)
• Use Rhymezone to find rhymes for children's names (www.rhymezone.com/)
• CVC Maker (www.crick.northants.sch.uk/assets/Flash%20Studio/cfslit/CVC%20Maker/cvcmaker.html)
• Reading A to Z resource offers several free sample books including two with targeted phonemes: Fox and Frog and Bears and Beans (www.readinga-z.com/newfiles/preview.html)

• Story Map from Scholastic (http://content.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=2994)
• Printable Booklets for emergent readers (www.hubbardscupboard.org/printable_booklets.html#WordFamilyBooklets)

Predictable stories/activities with repeated lines.

• A bibiliography of books with Repeated Lines - (www.aacintervention.com/repeatl.htm) includes The Very Hungry Catepillar (www.hubbardscupboard.org/Very_Hungry_Caterpillar_Printable_Booklet.PDF) and Brown Bear (www.dltk-teach.com/books/brownbear/index.htm)
• Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day (www.kennedy-center.org/multimedia/storytimeonline/alexander.html)
• Learning Colors (www.liveandlearn.com/cgame/colors.html)

• StarFall, (http://starfall.com) was created "to meet the needs of the emergent reader by incorporating rhyming games and high-interest books that teach phonemic awareness (sounds in words), phonics, decoding skills, and comprehension." The materials are designed for first grade, but are also useful for pre-kindergarten, kindergarten and second grade. Features include interactive books, activities, movies, and worksheets.
• Webbing Into Literacy (http://curry.edschool.virginia.edu/go/wil/home.html) packed with colorful materials and ideas originally designed for rural Head Start teachers features a developmentally appropriate approach to literacy instruction.
• Literacy Center Education Network's pre and early reading curriculum (www.literacycenter.net/lessonview_en.htm) provides over a million free lessons following a "Modified Montessori approach to teaching reading." The Parent and Teacher section is divided into subject areas where lessons can be chosen for specific purposes.

Judith Kuster is a professor in the Department of Speech, Hearing, and Rehabilitation Services at Minnesota State University, Mankato. Contact her at judith.kuster@mnsu.edu. All of Kuster's Internet columns are on ASHA's Web site in HTML format with active links (www.asha.org/about/publications/leader-online/archives/news.htm), although URLs change and there is no guarantee that links from previous articles are still functional.

Kuster, JM, Netting Literacy Materials, ASHA Leader, February 13, 2007, p. 20-21.