Teaching what questions in speech therapy intervention can be a challenge, especially when there is never enough time in your day to plan effective therapy. I’m here to simplify your therapy by giving you an easy-to-follow plan when it comes to teaching what questions.
After reading this post, you will have a structured speech therapy intervention plan for teaching what questions that you can implement tomorrow. Here is an overview of the 5 steps that will make you the expert at your school when it comes to writing and addressing those what question IEP goals.
- Step 1: Start with pre-intervention data collection for what questions.
- Step 2: Analyze the data from Step 1 to determine where to start your intervention.
- Step 3: Write your student’s speech therapy goals.
- Step 4: Implement therapy.
- Step 5: Complete your post-intervention data collection.
Note: This easy 5-step process is included in my What Questions Flashcards resource. If you would like to skip the rest of this article and jump right into your intervention, click the picture below.
Step 1. Start with pre-intervention data collection for what questions.
Determining IEP goals and planning speech therapy intervention depends upon knowing how the student is currently performing with a specific skill. Using an informal WH question test for data collection in speech therapy is a must.
If you don’t have a data collection tool for WH or WHAT questions, don’t worry. Download my FREE WH Questions Baseline Assessment today!
Here is a completed what questions examples baseline assessment from my free printable speech therapy data sheets resource.
Step 2. Analyze the data from Step 1 to determine where to start your intervention.
Knowing where to start your what questions speech therapy intervention can sometimes be tricky. After completing the baseline assessment from step 1, use this free flow chart to help you analyze your data. This will help you determine your therapy plan.
If you would like a free copy of this flow chart, click on the picture above and print.
There are three primary columns on the flow chart. Here is what each column means.
- Left Column: Focus on teaching prelinguistic skills and building receptive language.
- Middle Column: Work on teaching what questions.
- Right Column: Work on increasing vocabulary. Making IEP accommodations might also be appropriate.
Step 3. Write your student’s speech therapy goals.
First, keep in mind normal what question development.
When planning what question speech therapy goals, it is important to keep in mind normal what question development. Here are the norms that I use from the resource Guide to Communication Milestones (Lanza, J. R. & Flahive, L. K., 2012).
WHAT Question Development
- Answers simple WHAT questions (i.e., What’s this?): 1-2 years of age.
- Points to objects when described (i.e., What do you wear on your feet?): 2-3 years of age.
- Verbally answers questions about functions of objects (i.e., What are scissors used for?): 3-4 years of age.
Then, determine a starting point for speech therapy intervention.
Using the flow chart from step 2, while keeping in mind normal what question development, determine your IEP goals.
Left Column: Focus on prelinguistic goals and receptive language goals.
Prelinguistic Goal for Joint Attention: The student will demonstrate joint attention in 8/10 trials when the adult points to/shows an object or talks about an immediate event (something that is happening in the child’s present environment).
Click here to learn more about joint attention.
Prelinguistic Goal for Attending: The student will attend to a reading and/or play activity for ___ minutes with minimal adult support in 4/5 trials.
Receptive Language Goal for WH Questions (Play Based): The student will respond to WHO, WHAT, and/or WHERE questions during a play activity in 8/10 trials by pointing.
Early Developing WHAT Questions Goal (Skill Based): The student will answer basic WHAT questions by answering with an object or action when a picture is presented with 80% accuracy. (i.e., What is this? What is he doing?)
Middle Column: Focus on teaching what questions.
Although you can get very detailed with your IEP goals, I recommend keeping things simple. It’s important that other team members understand the student’s goals. Here are two simple what questions example goals.
What Questions Speech Therapy Goal: The student will answer WHAT questions with 80% accuracy when picture choices are presented.
What Questions Speech Therapy Goal: The student will answer WHAT questions with 80% accuracy. (no picture choices)
If your student is working on generalizing what questions to conversational and reading comprehension tasks, these are some suggestions.
What Questions Conversational Speech Therapy Goal: The student will answer WHAT questions during conversation with 80% accuracy.
WHAT Questions Reading Comprehension Speech Therapy Goal: The student will answer WHAT questions for reading comprehension tasks with 80% accuracy.
Right Column: Increasing vocabulary to support answering what questions might be the best course of treatment. Considering IEP accommodations for addressing language complexity might also be appropriate.
You might also find that it is more appropriate to focus on accommodations and modifications to decrease the barriers that might exist when answering questions. Here is a list of possible accommodations and modifications.
- Simplify questions by decreasing the amount of complex language used in the question.
- Supplement your verbal question with a picture scene or picture cue.
- Give the student visual or verbal choices of answers.
Step 4. Implement therapy.
Now that you have your student’s IEP goals written, it’s time to get your speech therapy intervention tools ready. You might already have a resource that works well for addressing what question goals. However, if you are looking for a more comprehensive resource for teaching what questions, I have created a set of what questions flashcards that you can purchase. The flashcards featured in this section are from that resource.
First, teach the skill using explicit instruction or focused implicit instruction.
Explicit Instruction-
Explicit instruction means teaching the skill directly. If the student is old enough, consider starting with explicit instruction when teaching a student how to answer what questions. This is how I start each session. There is research in the area of grammar intervention that suggests combining explicit instruction with implicit instruction is more efficient than just implicit instruction alone. (Calder, S.D., Claessen, M., Ebbels, S. & Leitao, S., 2020)
Directly teach your students that when they hear the word what in a question it refers to an object, action, or description.
Focused Implicit Instruction-
How do you teach children that aren’t ready for explicit instruction? For my students who cannot learn via explicit instruction, usually, because they are too young, I use focused implicit instruction (a term I coined). Focused implicit instruction involves focusing the child’s attention on several trials of a target skill, with minimal environmental distractions.
For example, I might use simple flashcards that require only a point to answer a question. Every flashcard repeats the same target WH question word, as well as the same grammatical structure.
Then, practice the skill.
There isn’t much research that I’ve come across in regards to a hierarchy for how to teach what questions. The following is based on my clinical experience and what I’ve found to be effective in teaching what questions for speech therapy intervention. Although this learning ladder provides a general hierarchy, you should always consider the student’s language profile when planning intervention.
Here is the scope and sequence of my flashcard resource for PreK students.
Here is the scope and sequence of my flashcard resource for school-age students.
If the student is old enough, I use flashcards between turns of an open-ended game. The game motivates students to participate in a flashcard activity that would otherwise be a nonpreferred task.
If the student is not old enough to participate in games, I might use flashcards during play activities. I’ve also had success with answering questions and then acting out the answers. For example, if the question is What is the girl doing? and the answer is sleeping, I would have the child act out the action of sleeping.
1. Basic What Questions
Start with basic what questions. (These WH question examples are from sets 1 and 2 of my what questions flashcards resource.) If your student can already answer basic what questions, move on to intermediate what questions.
Example: What is this? What is she doing?
Prerequisite Skill: The student must be able to verbally identify objects and actions.
This task can also be easily addressed by looking through a picture book and pointing to pictures of objects and actions while asking What’s that? or What is happening?
2. Intermediate What Questions
Next, address what questions that focus on functions. (These WH question examples are from sets 3-6 of the what questions flashcards resource.)
Example: What do you do with a pencil? or What do you write with?
Prerequisite Skills: The student must be able to understand associations between objects and their functions.
First, I start by using flashcards with picture choices. Before moving on to the next set of cards, I might use these cards again but not show the picture choices unless the child cannot answer the questions. This provides a nice scaffold before moving on to flashcards without picture choices.
3. Advanced What Questions
Finally, I work on advanced what questions. I only use these flashcards with my elementary-age students. This type of what question is the most difficult because it requires the student to use more memory and processing than the other types of what questions. (These WH question examples are from sets 7 and 8 of my what questions flashcards resource.)
Example: What is a pig like?
Prerequisite skills: The student must understand the qualities associated with objects.
First, I start with flashcards that have a picture of the object and choices of descriptors.
Then, I move on to flashcards with picture choices.
Step 5. Complete your post-intervention data collection.
When your session data suggests that the student has learned how to answer what questions, update the original baseline assessment. This provides you with data to report at the IEP meeting and/or on the progress report. If the student has met his or her goal, move on to the next skill.
What is the ultimate goal for working on what questions?
It is important to note that during this process of teaching what questions for speech therapy, it’s essential to incorporate what questions into conversational and read-aloud activities. This is the overarching goal of working on questions- to be able to participate in a conversation and answer questions for academic tasks.
If you are unsure of what your student’s accuracy is with answering WH and WHAT questions, get a free baseline tool . This will help you determine where you should start with intervention.
Wondering where you can get the WH question examples featured in this post? Get your own set of what question flashcards to complement your therapy at my Teachers Pay Teachers store.
Other Related Posts:
4 Things To Consider Before Writing Speech Therapy WH Question Goals
5 Steps for Effectively Teaching Who Questions for Speech Therapy
Resources:
Calder, S.D., Claessen, M., Ebbels, S., & Leitão, S. (2020). Explicit grammar intervention in young school-aged children with developmental language disorder: An efficacy study using single-case experimental design. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools. https://doi.org/10.1044/2019_LSHSS-19-00060
Calder, S. D., Claessen, M., Ebbels, S., & Leitão, S. (2020). The efficacy of an explicit intervention approach to improve past tense marking for early school-age children with developmental language disorder. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research. https://doi.org/10.1044/2020_JSLHR-20-00132
Ebbels, S., & Owen Van Horne, A. (2020). Grammatical concepts of English: Suggested order of intervention. The Informed SLP. https://www.theinformedslp.com/review/the-grammar-guide-you-never-knew-you-always-wanted
Gaertner et al., (2008) Focused Attention in Toddlers: Measurement, Stability, and Relations to Negative Emotion and Parenting. Journal of Infant Child Development. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2607062/pdf/nihms-81608.pdf
Lanza, J. R. & Flahive, L. K. (2012) Guide to Communication Milestones. LinguiSystems. (https://www.carolinatherapeutics.com/wp-content/uploads/milestones-guide.pdf)
