Do you need ideas on what themes you can do in May during your speech therapy sessions? Do you need ideas on themes that will keep your kids engaged and help them stay motivated during each session? Doing themes in your sessions allows you, as a speech therapist, to enjoy the sessions just as much as the kids do with new and exciting materials too!
Below is a list of some of my favorite themes that I like to do during the month of May. I have also included a few books that you can use with each theme along with activities that you can easily put together. I hope that this gives you some ideas on what you can do in your sessions during the month of May!
What themes can you do in May in your speech therapy sessions?
My favorite themes to do in the month of May are:
- Ocean
- Camping
- Fishing
- Ice Cream
- End of School
- Cinco de Mayo
- Mother’s Day
There are many other themes that you can incorporate this month, too, but the themes above are ones that I have found to be the most engaging and fun around this time.
Ocean
I love doing an ocean theme in May (and even into July)! I like to incorporate my mini ocean animal erasers into my therapy sessions when I do this theme. You can find some on Amazon! You can use these erasers and incorporate an iSpy game to work on descriptions or a guessing game. If you can’t buy the erasers, you can easily print off pictures of different animals online to use instead!
My favorite books to use for this theme include The Rainbow Fish, The Snail and the Whale, and In the Sea.
You can check out my Ocean Lesson Plan for activities to use during this theme that has language and articulation materials included in it.
Camping
With the warm weather in full swing, that means that many people will start to go camping. A fun activity would be to print out some cards of different items needed for camping or animals you might see and place them around your room for a scavenger hunt. You can also print them all out on one sheet of paper for a search and find or use it to work on descriptions, inferencing, WH- questions, and more!
My favorite books for this theme are Curious George Goes Camping, Pete the Cat Goes Camping, and S is for S’mores.
If you are wanting a lesson plan that is no prep and includes pre-made vocabulary cards and book companion activities for one of the books above, you can check out my Camping Lesson Plan.
Fishing
The fishing theme can also be grouped in with the ocean theme if you wanted to use saltwater fish, as well. A quick and fun activity would be to print out pictures of different types of fish and work on descriptions, inferencing, WH- questions, or following directions.
Some fun fishing books include Curious George Goes Fishing and H is for Hook.
My Fishing Lesson Plan includes ready to go materials for both your speech and language kids that are no prep and printable!
Ice Cream
The month of May seems like the perfect time to do an ice cream theme because the weather is finally hot enough to eat it without getting too cold!
My favorite books for this theme include Curious George and the Ice Cream Surprise and Gorilla Loves Vanilla.
You can create a sensory bin with different colored sand and an ice cream playset to use during your session. The ice cream scoop can be used to scoop up the kinetic sand and place into toy bowls or cones. You can even hide different vocabulary cards or articulation cards in the sand for your kids to find and practice.
If you are interested in using this theme during your session, you can check out my no prep and printable Ice Cream Lesson Plan.
End of School
If you work in the schools, this might be a great time to do an end of the school year theme! You can give out awards/certificates to all your kids for goals they met throughout the year along with a small gift/piece of candy.
The two books that I enjoy using for this theme include Last Day, Hurray! and I Knew You Could!
Cinco de Mayo
Cinco de Mayo happens during the month of May which makes it the best time to do this theme! When I think of Cinco de Mayo, the image that comes to mind is a sombrero. If you like doing crafts, you can create sombreros with your kids by gluing some plastic cups to paper plates and decorate them with paint and other materials!
My favorite Cinco de Mayo themed books are Chicks and Salsa, Cinco de Mouse-o, and P is for Pinata.
Mother’s Day
Mother’s Day also takes place during the month of May which makes it a great time to use this theme in your sessions. The activity that I enjoy doing during this time is, of course, making a Mother’s Day card! You can easily use this craft to target following directions, articulation, and more.
Some books that you can incorporate into this theme include The Night Before Mother’s Day and Are You My Mother?
May Speech Therapy Lesson Plan Bundle
If you are wanting to incorporate more than one of the themes above into your therapy sessions, then take a look at my May Speech Therapy Lesson Plan Bundle. There are 4 themes included with this bundle (Ocean, Camping, Fishing, and Ice Cream), totaling to over 500 pages of materials.
Each one of these lesson plans includes book companion activities, a language scene, and activities for both language and articulation. For more information on my themed lesson plans, you can take a look at the guide here.
I hope that you have gotten some ideas on May themes and activities you can do during your speech therapy sessions. Let me know down below in the comments if you do any of these and which one was your favorite!
Happy Planning!
