This coming Sunday is Father’s Day, and while many families we work with have plans to celebrate the day with Dad, we also see Father’s Day as an opportunity to recognize the diversity of family structures. Inclusive celebrations can serve as important learning experiences by providing opportunities to discuss and acknowledge the many kinds of families in our communities and the many caregivers who are in children’s lives.  This blog provides a host of ideas for making Father’s Day activities more welcoming.  It also outlines ways you can add language to the activities and traditions of the day.

Check out three ways you can celebrate all types of families in this week leading up to Father’s Day.

1. CRAFT

Craft is a great way to address a variety of speech and language goals! You can easily target following directions, wh-questions, description, summarizing steps required to complete the craft, and carryover speech sound practice at the sentence level. Here are a few fun and simple craft ideas that you can complete at home:

  • Salt Dough Ornaments – This non-bake activity is lots of fun. Of course, you do not have to use just handprints (though I know lots of parents and caregivers who love having their children’s handprints at different ages).
  • 10 Things I Love About ______ – Have your child paint their hands and put both palm prints on a piece of paper. For each finger, have them write something that they love or appreciate about their family or a specific caregiver.
  • Create an Award – Your child can paint and decorate the back of a paper plate sharing what they appreciate and love about their caregiver(s).

2. ALL ABOUT BOOKLET

One of the most entertaining gifts to receive as a parent or caregiver is an ‘All About My _______’ booklet.  These provide a way to peek into our children’s minds! For example, when asked to finish the sentence, ‘My ____ is the best at making…..’ there is sure to be any number of hilarious answers to keep you smiling for days.

You can grab this ALL ABOUT BOOKLET FREEBIE that can be adapted to celebrate ANY member of the family or caregiver! This booklet is perfect for children working on articulation (can your child can use words that use their sound to complete the pages?), language, or fluency (have students practice describing their person using their strategies) when the booklet is complete.

3. BOOKS!

Books are a great way to teach kids about all different kinds of families and the importance of kindness, acceptance and love.  Not only can quality literature help to celebrate all families, but it is also an easy way to target a variety of language goals (receptive vocabulary, expressive vocabulary, function, description, compare/contrast, sentence formulation, wh-questions, sequencing, etc..) and speech sound goals (identifying words with sound, placement of sound in the word, rhyming words, minimal pairs, articulation carryover using language tasks). Check out the books below about different types of families.

Wishing all of our families a wonderful day this coming Sunday – no matter if or how you choose to celebrate the day!