We started each morning with free play stations – we encouraged children to pause at the door and STOP and read the room – thinking about the space, time, objects and people. We encouraged campers to “point their choice” choose a free play station and supported joining play. By Day 5, many campers were able to independently “point their choice” and ask a peer to play before joining the group.  ​

We did a morning check-in; thinking about how our bodies felt and what Zone of Regulation they were in at that moment. At first, this looked like matching pictures of children with different feelings to the different Zones, and eventually grew into a participatory exercise, wherein children were able to move their name tags through the Zones throughout the day as they checked in with their bodies.  ​

Each day, we did lots of music and movement! Sometimes, this looked like sitting in a circle and playing turn-taking or cooperative games with different instruments, including taking turns being the leader and pointing at a friend to shake their music shaker, and taking turns shaking by looking at a friend. and sometimes this looked like a freeze dance party! Near the end of most days, campers were able to practice asking a friend to join them in a duet dance on “stage”, or participate as an audience member. ​

On Days 1 & 2, we took some time to get to know each other. On Day 1, we drew and wrote about ourselves, sharing what we like to think about and what we like to talk about. On Day 2, we created “friend files” for ourselves, sharing what we like to eat, play, watch, and learn about. ​

We sat together to each snack each day, and a camp leader read a story. All of the stories we chose focused on social-emotional themes, and we asked and answered questions as a group. The stories we included in our curriculum were: 

• Can I Play, Too? By Mo Willems 
• “Z is for Moose” by Kelly Bingham & Paul Zelinsky 

• “Strictly No Elephants” by Lisa Mantchev 
• “Pout Pout Fish” by Deborah Diesen 
• “Wendell the Narwhal” by Emily Dove 

On Days 2 & 3, we worked on a “Me to We” project; the campers were split into two groups and took turns working on separate “Me to We” projects. The indoor group first made individual pots of “purple stew”, and practiced combining their ideas to create a collaborative stew with Melody. The outdoor group practiced drawing individual pictures in chalk, and then worked to combine their ideas into a collaborative drawing.  ​

Starting on Day 3, we worked as a group to decide on a theme and roles for our final musical performance! The group was split into two roles; musicians and dancers, and we collaboratively decided on a theme for the show, “Animals”. This meant that each group member had a role as either a musician expressing the sound or feeling of an animal, or as a dancer, expressing the movement of an animal. The animals we chose were octopus, shark, crab, lion, giraffe and snake. We worked as a whole group to create a collaborative backdrop for our performance, see below! Campers were able to communicate their ideas for the sounds and movement of each animal, and we presented the final show to families on Day 5!  ​

It was incredible to see campers learning and collaborating throughout the week!  ​

For Early Learners: (Infancy to Toddlers) 
Pick books for their level 

• Use hardback, flap books, keeping young children engaged like "Dear Zoo" and "Where is the Very Hungry Caterpillar" 
• Use books with songs and simple illustrations. Repetition and rhyme is amazing for language learning! We love to read and sing the "Five Little Monkeys", "Down by the Bay" and "Baby Beluga". 

Explore books with your child 

• Practice exploring books. Help your child feel comfortable and excited about turning pages and the routine that goes along with reading. Take turns flipping pages just like you’d take turns in conversation. 
• Look at the pictures together sitting face to face. Point and make comments about WHO is in the book, WHAT we see, WHERE the characters are, HOW they are feeling and WHEN things are happening (daytime, dinnertime) rather than ask questions. This is a great way to model and introduce new vocabulary in a low pressure environment!​

For Older Learners: (School Age) 
Highlight narrative themes and sequencing in books

• Wordless picture books are a fantastic way to build narratives. The "Journey" series and "CHALK" are a couple of our favourites. 

• Bringing awareness to the plot of the story can help them understand complex situations and develop their critical thinking skills. Sequencing tasks involve attention, organization, planning, and working memory.

Make "I wonder..." or "I notice..." statements about the characters' potential feelings and the story's themes

• This encourages children to relate stories to their own lived experiences and develops empathetic and social thinking skills, emotional literacy, and theory of mind. 

Use books that will incorporate their speech and language goals, including:

• Vocabulary: While reading the story, bring attention to the new vocabulary words that your child is learning. 
• Articulation: Emphasize specific sounds they are working on producing within the story. 
• Wh-questions: Incorporate who, what, when, where questions. Give your child an opportunity to express what you've read together. If they need help, thats okay! Model what an answer to the question might be, giving them examples to build up from. 

For All Ages:
Embrace the emotions in books 

• So many children's books use humour, making children laugh by embracing their silly and fun imagination within the story. Robert Munsch books are a great example of this! 

Encourage independent reading

• Provide books about their favourite animals, plants, sports, or superheroes, giving them greater motivation to read. Give your child access to a variety of books that they find interesting and are reading level appropriate. This will help them develop their literacy skills and build their confidence. 

Read in your home language

• If you speak a language other than English at home, reading in that language can help your child develop a stronger connection to their culture and heritage. This ties into this year’s Family Literacy Day theme: “Celebrate your Heritage”. 

Encourage conversation about the story

• Reading with your child should be an interactive experience. Comment on what you think will happen next or how the character feels, where they might be going or how the story will end are some ways to encourage thoughts about the narrative story. This will also help develop their listening and comprehension skills as well. 

In observation and in honour of the National Day of Truth and Reconciliation day, Grow will be closed on Friday, September 30. This is a day that honours the experiences of Indigenous Peoples, celebrates resilience and affirms a commitment that every child matters. The College of Speech and Hearing Health Professionals of BC (CSHBC) has adopted a Standard of Practice for Indigenous Cultural Safety, Cultural Humility, & Anti-Racism, which acknowledges the racism Indigenous groups face in health care and supports anti-racist and culturally safe care from Speech-Language Pathologists and Audiologists in BC. This is an important step towards Reconciliation that we at Grow, as a group of health professionals, fully support in taking on to ensure Indigenous clients are treated with respect and dignity.

Helpful links:

• How to talk to your kids about Truth and Reconciliation
• A book list by Indigenous authors
• Ways to participate in Truth and Reconciliation

Respectfully,
​The Grow Team

Wow, here we are near the end of August!

As back-to-school is just around the corner, the last few weeks of August are a good time to take steps towards getting back into a routine and to talk about school so we start to pre-imagine it. Besides going back-to-school shopping, routines are important to practice to ease your child into the back-to-school transition.
 
September can be a particularly demanding time for some children as they might be transitioning to kindergarten, starting at a new school, changing classrooms and teachers, etc. Children (and all of us) tend feel more secure and regulated when things are predictable. Having some established and predictable routines in place supports children to handle the transition to school and new activities with less stress. 

Routines can help develop a child's executive functioning skills such as:

• time awareness and management
• initiation (starting tasks)
• planning and organization
• self-regulation to ease nervousness

What are Executive Functions and Self Regulation:
https://developingchild.harvard.edu/science/key-concepts/executive-function/

Having a routine can also take the hassles out of morning, after-school transitions and evenings for both your child and yourself! 
 
It can be extremely overwhelming to jump right into a full schedule right when school starts. We recommend a gradual introduction of a week to two weeks of re-establishing routines.

Here are some tips for what your family can do this week to start easing back into a routine:

• Talk about (and validate feelings) about back-to-school:
  • ​Discuss with your child how they are feeling about the start of school and that feeling nervous is normal for children and adults. Even teachers have back-to-school jitters!
  • Find books about going back to school - if you can't get the book, look for titles and see if you can find a read-aloud on You-Tube (you can turn down the volume and pause and read to/with your child).  Click here for one list of back-to-school books.
  • Some books from this list that we enjoy are:​
    • "The Pigeon Has to Go to School" by Mo Willems 
    • "If you Take a Mouse to School" by Laura Joffe Numeroff
    • "How do Dinosaurs Go to School?" by Jane Yolen
• Visualize It: Get to know what school will look like
  • Visit the school
  • Practice the walk, drive, bike ride, or bus ride to school 
  • Take pictures of the school and grounds. Find pictures of classrooms online.
• Practice getting ready in the morning:
  • Waking up slightly earlier each day - use an alarm!
  • Getting dressed/washed before breakfast 
  • Picking out clothes for the next day 
• Practice the after school routines:
  • Plan after school down time
  • Plan snack times and snacks together - include your child in picking well-balance snacks (and some treats)
  • Organize a homework space & time
  • Put after school activities on the family calendar or on a whiteboard calendar for your child. Write down the time you need to leave to get there to get there on time
  • Take a picture of your child with all the things they need to take to an after school activity or sport.  Help them to "match" the picture when they are getting ready (move towards them doing this independently)
• Ease into evening routines:
  • Consider making a visual calendar or schedule - to count the days until school starts, for bedtime and meal times, or for school break travel plans
  • Go to bed slightly earlier each day

​
We like this blog post about supporting your child's Executive Functioning and Back to School by our colleagues in Burnaby Schools:  http://blogs.sd41.bc.ca/slp/topic/executive-functions/

Here are some other helpful webpages on this topic:

• https://executivefunctioningsuccess.com/10-back-to-school-tips-for-executive-functions/
• https://blog.cincinnatichildrens.org/384/back-to-school-how-to-help-build-executive-functioning-skills

Enjoy the last beautiful days of summer - go out and play together!

- Grow Speech & Language Therapy Team 

​

We are RENOVATING! 

Our clinic is undergoing improvements. We will be temporarily closed starting on Monday, August 22, 2022 and we will be reopening on Tuesday, September 6th, 2022 

Please talk with us about alternate arrangements for appointments during this time. 
Please email info@growslp.ca with any questions. 

We will see you soon with new rooms and we will welcome some therapists from the STEPS BC team (https://stepsbc.com) 

Thank you for supporting us as we grow! 🪴

Our Cool Collaborators Social and Music Learning camps have been super fun this summer!  Thank you so much to the group who participated as we loved learning alongside those who were able to join us in our July 18-22nd camp. Our second camp of the summer is happening this week (Aug 8-12) with a new group and we are loving their energy!

In these camps we have a fun and engaging time learning about ourselves, other group members, and how to play and collaborate together. We sing, play instruments, and move our bodies to music  -cool musical collaboration! 

We practice skills like:

• showing our interest in playing with someone else by facing them and walking towards them
• asking 'do you want to play?' or 'can I join in?'
• thinking about what others like & what we like
• taking turns with others
• sharing ideas and toys during play & projects
• using our voices and body in song and dance together throughout the camp

​​​

Welcome to Grow's new home at 327 Renfrew Street, just around the corner from Wonderkids OT! 

​We can't wait to welcome you to our new space on Friday April 1st! We have been busily setting up the clinic with many toys and materials. We will continue to grow into our new home as we work with your children and you at the new location.

Thank you to our team (especially Amanda), and our families for helping with the move. We are so excited with this STEPS expansion and look forward to continuing to partner with the fantastic Wonderkids OT & STEPS therapists sharing part of the new space with Grow and working just around the corner.

Spring Break was a great time to move in!

Two of our new therapy rooms...all set up for learning and playing!

Our new location is around the corner and in the same building as Wonderkids OT.

​Please let us know if you have any questions by emailing info@growslp.ca

See you at 327 Renfrew Street in April!

Carla & Deb and the Grow Team!
​