#ThursdayTherapyTune (s)- Songs for #Speech: Current Hits for Singing the ABCs Part I

Sometimes we need to go a little outside of the box to encourage speech. Music therapists use singing as a main intervention to work on speech, as do many speech therapists. There are always the traditional songs like the “Old MacDonald” or singing along to Barney’s “Raindrop” song, but what if you are working with someone whose musical preferences are more mainstream? One may think this presents a dilemma, but actually current music uses a lot of repeated vocalizations and is quite repetitive in nature. There are many songs for working on vowel sounds such as “Oh” or “Ooo”, and you don’t have to listen to the radio very long to hear the word “baby” 100 times. But what about the other sounds? In this 2 part blog post, I am sharing with you a hit song for each letter of the alphabet ranging from the 80s to today. Most of these I am actually currently using right now to help my clients with speech! Hope you enjoy and feel free to add some of your favorites in the comments below to keep the ideas flowing!

A- Hey Soul Sister- Train (2009) (long A sound)

B-  Bye Bye Bye- N’SYNC (2000)

C- I Want Candy- The StrangeLoves (1965), Bow Wow Wow (1982), Aaron Carter (2000)

D- Beautiful- Christina Aguilera (2002)

E- Pompeii- Bastille (2013)

F- Girl on Fire- Alecia Keys (2012)

G- When I’m Gone- Anna Kendrick (2013)

H- Ho Hey- The Lumineers (2012)

I- I Love You Like a Love Song- Selena Gomez  (2011)

J- Jump- Kriss Kross (1992)

K- Kiss Me- Sixpence None the Richer (1997)

L- La La La- Naughty Boy ft. Sam Smith (2013)

M- I Like to Move It- Reel to Reel (1993), Sacha Baron Cohen (2005)

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So there you have it! The first 13! Check out next Thursday’s post for the other half of the Hits for the ABCs 🙂