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Episode #017: Creative Ideas for Therapy with Older Students – A Chat with Chris Wenger of Speech Dude

Chris Wenger, whom you might also know as Speech Dude, comes
from a family of educators. He started off as a special ed teacher, but he
moved into the speech language field when he realized that the tools he needed
to help students was in speech pathology. Because he’s been on both sides of
the IEP table, and because he was a teacher first, he’s seen a wide variety of students
and he knows how to write an IEP that ropes in parents. Today we have a
fantastic conversation about creating a curriculum that teaches older students
about how to interact online or with their peers on social media.

Starting with the phrase “How you do anything is how you do
everything”, Chris’s interactions with his students online often inspire his
TikTok videos and Instagram posts. Students need to be able to make inferences
and they need the ability to perspective-take. If you see a picture that you
like, you comment once on it. But five times? People will wonder what’s going
on with you. If you comment on a really old video or post, it can give away
that you’re doing a deep dive on a person’s profile. These are the kinds of
scenarios that Chris identifies so he can teach his students how to interact
appropriately online.

What’s a digital footprint and why should a student care?
Even for kids in the AP classes, they still need some explicit instruction on
online “netiquette” so that they understand that what happens online can affect
their offline life. The idea that kids today instinctively understand online
behavior doesn’t help kids who actually don’t. That’s where Chris tries to fill
in that gap.

Chris’s best advice for a future or present SLP is simple:
You don’t have to be a perfect SLP; just do your best to be a happy one. Your
positive vibrations can be felt throughout your classroom. Check out Chris’s
social media channels or his Boom Learning store for more strategies or
curriculum for older students.

What’s Inside:

  • How to get a teen to turn their camera on when no one really wants to.
  • Chris teaches his students about “the hidden curriculum”, or the unspoken rule about how to act online.
  • If you want more engagement out of a classroom or an audience, Chris’s positive energy and approach fires up participants.

Today’s Guest:

Chris Wenger is an enthusiastic school-based SLP and nationally-acclaimed presenter who loves to share his knowledge about current trends in technology and practical ways to infuse it into the school setting for older students. Chris’s experience in using confidence building strategies in his own speech therapy sessions has provided him a depth of knowledge for making effective connections between self- confidence and education. Chris is widely known on social media as “Speech Dude.” A prominent thought leader in the field of education, Chris motivates and entertains fellow educators and clinicians through his humorous and inspiring posts and videos.

Mentioned In This Episode

— Speechdude.com
— @speechdude
— Speech Dude on Youtube
— Speech Dude TPT store
— Boom Learning
— @speechdude on Tiktok

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