Wow! May is almost over! I’m sure some of you are finished with the school year but my school district still has another couple weeks left of school. I thought I would finish this week out with my Farm themed activities instead of starting a new unit. I created a Farm themed Picture Identification board just like I have for other units. If you would like a copy of the board click the link – Farm Identification Board
Some of you might be familiar with these picture identification boards but I’ll just give a brief overview for those of you who haven’t used them. For my lower functioning students I often fold the paper over so the student can only see one row a time. Then we point to each picture in row 1 and I say each item. For the first row I would say “dog, cow, rooster”. If the student is verbal I have the student try and name the pictures after I say them. If the student is non-verbal I just model the words for the student.
Then I target those receptive language skills. You can break down the directions to be simple 1-step commands. For example, “touch dog” and after the student correctly identifies the dog I provide the rest of the direction, “color brown” or any color you want. I often only give the student a choice of 2 colors of crayons if we are still working on color concepts. If the student does not know colors I just give student the correct color and model the color concept several time. Depending on the students’ level, I might do the pictures in order for that row. So it would be dog, cow, and then rooster. If the student demonstrates understanding of those animals then I might mix up the order. I keep going for each row.
For my higher functioning students, I have the student name all the pictures on the board or receptively identify all the pictures as I say the word. Then I give more complex directions such as “find the chicken and color it orange” or “find the animal that oinks and color it pink”. You can complete the pictures row by row or use all 12 pictures in random order.
You can also work on requesting while completing this task. Have the student request the needed color crayon to complete the direction. Student can request the color verbally or with their AAC system. Again, just adapted the activity to meet the needs of your students. Sometimes I even have my students take turns giving the directions to each other. Then the students get to choice what to find and what color to color it. They love doing that and it works great for students working on both expressive and pragmatic language skills. There all lots of different skills you can target with this board.
If you want some additional Adapted books related to Farm animals check out my I Spy Animal series which includes “I Spy Animal Sounds, I Spy Animal Features, and I Spy Animal Environments”. These books all have the same set up. The student has to choose from the 3 animals on the bottom to match the given description and place it in the answer square.
For the book I Spy Animal Sounds, the student has to match the animal to the given animal sound. This can be a little more challenging because there are no additional visual supports and he/she is not just matching pictures. There is a limited visual field of answer choices so the student does have that visual support.
I Spy Animal Features requires the student to match the correct animal to the given animal feature again provided a choice of 3 animals. This book targets some of those less familiar vocabulary terms which are used to describe animal’s features. For example “an animal that lays eggs” or “an animal that plays in the mud”.
For I Spy Animal Environments the student has to match the animal environment or where the animal sleep/spends time to the correct animal. I did add the visual component to help the student understand some of those vocabulary concepts such as “coop” or “pond”.
I think my students got plenty of farm themed books and activities this month!
If you want a FREE copy of the Farm Identification Board click the link – Farm Identification Board.
If you are interested in the I Spy adapted books you can find them on TPT with the link – I Spy Animals
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