3)  Book reading:  After reading a book, I allow my students to take turns being the “teacher” by “reading” the story again to us.  I of course am listening to their language as well as observing if they are using the pictures of the book to help sequence the story correctly.  However, with regards to literacy, I am looking to see if my students can point to the words on the page and seem to know when one word stops and the next one begins.

4)  Selective use of word labels in play:  In play I will selectively use some word labels for the purpose of additional exposure to words.  For example, if I am playing with animals and my goal is to sort zoo vs. farm animals, I will label one area on my therapy floor as the “farm” and another area as the “zoo”.  Another example, I will add the label “airport” onto my airport when we play.  I will add the label “park” in an ares where we will “park” our planes.

5)  Word labels in language activities:  I ALWAYS add word labels with any picture I use in therapy.  Again, word labels are there for exposure only.  For example, if I am working on prepositions and we are playing a directions game.  I will give my direction, and have the student attempt to follow it.  After the direction is correctly followed (independently or with assistance) I will restate that direction while holding up a picture representation of the preposition with the word label  (if the student needs a visual to understand the meaning of the preposition, I will use the picture as a visual cue).

6)  Picture Sentences: This is an easy way to target simple grammatical sentences by placing each picture (with their own word labels) in the correct order (left to right as if reading it) to create a picture sentence.

When using word labels, I never place too much emphasis on the word itself as the goal of therapy is language development.  I just use words for exposure so students understand that every word we say is actually represented by letters as well.