We  can target so many goals using SCAVENGER HUNTS! Not only is this a fun and engaging activity for our students, but it also provides several opportunities to work on a variety of communication skills. It’s the perfect activity for groups of kids with different goals. And it can be adapted for kids of all ages! For younger kids (preschool-1st), you can start out by practicing in your speech room. Depending on the needs of your students, you can spend a few minutes on this “practice scavenger hunt”, or an entire 30 minute session. Some kids might not need this practice phase, so you can skip this step all together and jump directly into your scavenger hunt around your school! 

For Articulation: Have your students look for items that have their target sound (e.g., /s/: look for staples, a stapler, sticky note, spoon, etc.). Or, if you have some prep time, you can pass out artic cards to teachers beforehand. Have your students ask if the teacher/staff if they have anything on their list (the student must read their list of /s/ words, lots of reps of /s/ here :). Once you complete your scavenger hunt, go back to your speech room and review and discuss the items they found (more /s/ productions).

For Fluency: Have your students practice their strategies for fluent speech. A lot of students who stutter will get really comfortable in your speech room but are not yet carrying over their tools and strategies to other environments. This is a great opportunity for them to talk to other people using their fluency strategies.

For Social Skills: You can target several different social communication skills during scavenger hunts: problem-solving, turn-taking, initiating, topic-maintenance, eye contact/body orientation, to name a few. Have your students work together as a team and assign roles- one student can be the director (holds the paper and directs where to go next), one student can be the writer (writes the answers), one student can be the speaker (asks each question/item on the scavenger hunt list), OR they can all take turns with asking the questions/writing the answers. They can practice greetings (“Hi Mrs. __. We are on a scavenger hunt. Do you have ___?”). Or they can practice using appropriate or “expected language” to gain an adult’s attention (“Excuse me, Mr. ___, we are on a scavenger hunt and…”).

For Language Comprehension: Make your scavenger hunt list using WH- questions: for example, 1. “Who helps you when you feel sick? (the nurse) Ask her for a paperclip. 2. Where do you go to check out books? (the library) Ask him (the librarian) what his favorite book is. 3. Where do you go to eat lunch? (the cafeteria) find a plastic fork there.” You could also make your list of items based on descriptive language or categories: 1. “find something that you can eat. 2. Find something that you write with. 3. Find something that’s soft. 4. Find something that’s red,” etc.

The possibilities are endless with scavenger hunts! It took me a few minutes to draft my first one, but now that its written, it’s pretty quick to go in and add/change different items on the list to fit the needs of my students.

Students especially love this activity because it gets them out of our speech room! I’d love to hear your feedback and your experiences with doing scavenger hunts in speech therapy! Thanks for reading 🙂

-Amanda, The SLP Girl