5 Fun Language Activities for Pig the Elf in Speech Therapy

Today, we're diving into the always funny world of “Pig the Elf” with five creative activities designed to enhance language development in your speech therapy sessions. This delightful book is not only a festive read but also a fantastic tool to engage your young clients. Let's unwrap the gift of language together!

Activity 1: Story Retelling with Sequencing

Using this story to improve narrative skills and sequencing abilities! Read the story aloud, utilizing shared book reading strategies to encourage engagement. Provide visuals for the story, you can make your own or use these, and have the children put the props in correct sequence and practice telling the story.

Activity 2: Emotion Exploration

This series is really great for talking about different emotions! In the story, Pig experiences a wide range of feelings, which you can focus on in your read aloud. Then, create emotion cards! Using index cards or construction paper, have students draw different faces to represent all of the feeling words that you discussed while reading. You can match the cards they create to corresponding scenes in the story and encourage discussions about why Pig might be feeling a certain way, promoting empathy and emotional awareness.

Activity 3: Crafty Character Creations

You know that I love a good craft, it allows for so much language and creativity! Have each child choose a character from the story and discuss their traits. Then allow them to recreate their character using crayons and markers. Once completed, each child can share their character depiction while describing their character's features, personality, and actions.

Activity 4: Rhyme Time with Pig

This book utilizes rhyming text, so it makes a great phonological awareness activity! Together with the children, identify rhyming words from the book, such as “elf” and “self” and create a list of rhyming pairs from the story. Engage the children in a rhyming game, encouraging them to come up with additional rhymes, make sentences, or create a new story. This is also a great way to reinforce speech sounds!

Activity 5: Pig's Predictions

Strengthen inferencing and critical thinking skills by prompting predictions about what might happen next at strategic points in the story. Encourage reasoning by asking why they think a particular event will occur, then discuss the actual outcomes, comparing predictions to the story's progression. You can extend the activity by having the children create their alternate endings, promoting creativity and narrative expression.

If you're looking for even more ways to use the story in therapy, check out this book companion! It will save you tons of planning and prep time by giving you everything you need:

“Pig the Elf” offers a treasure trove of language-rich opportunities for speech therapy sessions. These activities not only make learning enjoyable but also provide a foundation for developing essential speech and language skills. Incorporate these ideas into your sessions, and watch the magic unfold as you share the joy of language with your young clients. Happy storytelling! 📚✨