Welcome to the Say & Play Blog from Jill B, Owner and SLP at Speech & Smile
Welcome to Speech and Smile
Maria Montessori once said that “play is the work of the child.” We here at Speech and Smile embrace that line of thinking wholeheartedly. We understand that communication is vital in today’s world, and that helping children achieve the milestone of language through play is a key to expanding their horizons, helping them make sense of the world, and helping others understand them. We aim to show you, our readers, that learning can be fun and that, armed with some basic strategies, anyone can help their child or student learn to communicate effectively and to overcome some of the hurdles they might be facing in trying to achieve the goal of clear language.
Who we are
Speech and Smile is a team of loving, caring, innovative, and creative professionals who work toward the goal of helping children communicate and learn, as well as providing their parents, caregivers, and educators with tips, tricks, products, and tools to foster a love of learning and communicating in the most fun and engaging way possible. Our team is comprised of speech and language pathologists (and those in grad school, training for this profession), teachers, parents, artists, and tech/social media whizzes. We bring decades of experience to the workshop and are constantly striving to expand our services to meet the ever growing and changing needs of today’s children.
Why a blog
Here at Speech and Smile, we aim to reach as many people as possible. Being tucked away in Northern Michigan, proximity to our onsite services is not an option for everyone. For that reason, we want this blog to be full of weekly learning ideas for parents and teachers. We will be giving practical tricks and tips on a whole host of topics. Among other topics, we will cover:
Helping toddlers with their earliest words
Helping the hard-to-understand toddler
Using pretend play to help communication
Dealing with the frustrated child when communication is tough
How to model speech sounds that you want your child to imitate
Turning everyday practical activities into fun play
Building communication into daily routines
Playing with bubbles to build language skills
Using the Say and Play kits to help build language
It is our hope that this blog becomes a go-to for parents, caregivers, and teachers who are searching for the best ways to help their kiddos. We welcome your input on topics that might interest you.
What we do at Speech and Smile
The offerings at Speech and Smile are wide ranging and diverse. First and foremost, we offer play-based speech therapy services. This can look like:
One-on-one sessions with one of our awesome speech and language pathologists
Play therapy sessions with a teacher or pathologist, where children learn through child-driven play and conversation
Play groups which offer children the chance to use language in a meaningful way with their peers
Special events like book readings, painting parties, or craft parties.
In addition to all this, we offer tutoring for school-aged children. Our awesome teacher will help your child tackle reading, writing, math, or really any subject where they are struggling. We are keen to help homeschooling parents who might not know where to turn to help their struggling student. We accept students of all ages.
We also run a full product workshop aimed at providing parents and educators fun and useful learning tools. We offer a wide variety of kits in our Say and Play shop such as:
Alphabet mini-object kits
Fidget and focus tools
I spy
Play dough kits
School bundle sets
Book collaborations/story kits
Sensory sets
Sorting sets
Mini-object kits
Themed mini-object kits
Toys, games, and books
And so much more!!
Come back soon
We hope you will be a regular visitor to our Speech and Smile Blog. We look forward to presenting you with compelling and helpful topics, to highlight our services, to showcase our amazing line of products, but mostly to be a place for you to feel comfortable and at home, where you can feel heard and understood as you navigate the world of trying to help your tiny humans grow into happy, healthy, and articulate children. Our mission is to aid you in helping your kids in a practical, fun, and engaging way. We want to make learning to speak and communicate, to master language, a natural part of your family or classroom’s everyday life. As Diane Ackerman, noted author, poet, essayist, and naturalist once said, “Play is our brain’s favorite way of learning.”