Kristin Weingart, MS CCC-SLP
I am so happy that you found Communication Cottage, LLC. If you just stumbled across this page and you don’t know what a Speech-Language Pathologist is, you’ll learn a lot about it within my blog as I document my experiences and the resources that help me along the way.
The road to becoming an SLP is not easy AT ALL. The hours you put in to make sure that you show up for your education and you earn your degree. Not even taking into consideration the highly competitive nature of the programs and the females you’re surrounded by through it all! Let’s face it, when you’re waiting on your grad school acceptance letter, the last thing you want to hear is that Susie got accepted into all of the ones she has applied for and has an offer for a grad assistantship. Bite me right?!
So here’s the thing. YOU WILL MAKE IT. If you’re passionate about this profession and didn’t do well on an exam, YOU ARE NOT YOUR TEST SCORE. Your identity isn’t wrapped up in that and these are the truths I’m going to be sharing here. We need an outlet to bring to light the real hardships as well as the strategies for diagnosis, treatment, and resources that help.
My first SLP position was at a public day school where I had a caseload of 47 students ages 3-22 years old with complex communication needs. The majority of my students utilized Augmentative Alternative Communication (AAC) and THIS is my favorite area to treat! However, when you’re new to the field, trying to navigate carrying a caseload all by yourself for the first time, and learn AAC, was exhausting. No matter how much love I had for my students and the time I could spend with them, I always was thinking in the back of my mind about the progress reports that I needed to complete, the device that needed programming, and the funding report I needed to finalize
It was an experience that I am super grateful for now but when I got into the middle of my CF year I was always taking work home. I knew every time I said yes to prepping new themes at home, that I was saying no to the quality time with my family. I also noticed I could buy as many TPT resources as I wanted but they’d often sit in my google drive untouched or in a “to be laminated” pile.
In the middle of my clinical fellowship year, I realized how there is little to no prep time as an SLP and that many don’t understand your job is a lot more than just therapy. Although that is all you have time for during your work hours. In my CF, I felt frustrated that I had little time to collaborate with teachers and parents and to develop challenging and engaging materials, and I had just the minimum amount of time to pull something off of the shelf and to grab each child before we lost time in the session. Knowing this struggle, seeing that teachers have similar pain areas, and talking with families about not knowing where to start, I decided to take it upon myself and create The CommuniCrate. A monthly subscription box filled with language and literacy opportunities.
I now work as a Travel SLP meaning that I go state to state taking on contracts to fulfill needs in different areas of the United States. My husband and I are both from Illinois, but we set up a permanent residence with my in-laws in Colorado and then went to Oregon for our first placement, Texas for our second, and are now in South Carolina for the third placement. We are absolutely loving it here so far!
Behind the Scenes ...
Every resource is hand designed with your littles in mind.
So thankful to get to prepare these resources for you.
Here is a little peek at the effort that goes into our company every month.
No matter how the field of Speech-Language Pathology
has touched your life, I believe you’re here for a reason.
Thank you for spending time getting to know me.
I’d love to connect and get to know more about you.
Feel free to email me anytime! I love to hear about things that are going well as well as challenges, things you'd like more information about, product requests, blog post requests and MORE!
EMAIL: kristin@communicationcottage.com
Follow along on Instagram:
Communication Cottage
CommuniCrate
REMINDER:
Don't forget to sign up for the email newsletter.
This will get you access to freebies + special offers
and will keep you up to date on all of the theme releases
and exciting things in the works!