More Wednesday Wins: Categories

For this week's blog, speech therapist Paul Rice is sharing his "Wednesday Win!"

My 'win' for this week has been one of my students learning to identify, label, and describe categories of food, tools, vehicles, and more during our sessions! Last year, this student struggled to group similar objects and answer questions about them, but this is now something she can accomplish much more easily!

Categorization or grouping is a multi-layered language skill that involves knowledge of similarities, differences, and functionality of various like groups, along with the expressive ability to accurately identify and describe various features. Multiple layers of complexity feature in this skill set, too; students may start by grouping items of the same color and many sessions later find themselves grouping unlikely pairs of objects that fly, for example.

Students often find interesting connections between items that may be otherwise overlooked. In an example picture of a bear, beetle, dog, and cat, there are any number of possible grouping factors, and this student surprised me with how many she could name: number of legs, fur, and ability (or not!) to fly.

I can't wait to see what this student will accomplish next! Happy Wednesday!