On our Instagram, we are highlighting our amazing therapists that work with Speak Speech and make it what it is. As we have been sending out interview questions and getting amazing responses back, I realized that we needed to highlight Lupita Rodriguez in a special way.

Lupita has helped to strengthen our clinic into what it is today! She sees a full caseload of kiddos in the Daisy Kids Care clinic, as well as keeping up on the home health side with notes and other operational tasks. Our therapists provide such thoughtful responses.

Here’s Lupita:

I actually became a speech therapist without ever really knowing about the profession. I was going to school for nursing and met a classmate in my sign language class who invited me to go to Texas A&M University – Kingsville because she didn’t want to go alone. Little did I know that, that same day I would be signing my lease and enrolling for their speech therapy program in Kingsville lol! I actually fell in love with the profession when reading more about it and meeting people who had taken speech therapy or knew of people talking speech therapy.

I’ve got so much good advice from SLP’s, SLPA’s, OT’s, COTA’s, PT’s, PTA’s since I began my career, that it’s hard to choose just one. One of the best pieces of advice I’ve been given related to working as a SLP-Assistant is to remember that any progress is good progress. We have to remember that every child learns differently and at a different pace. And that is OKAY! Every now and then I look at my kiddos and wonder to myself… Am I doing the best I can for my kiddo? Am I doing enough? I don’t feel like we are advancing. An old supervisor told me, “when you feel like you haven’t helped this child in any way or feel like you are stuck, go back to their first therapy visit and read your notes”. Every time I’ve done this, I can see the progress they have made with me and at the same time, it reminds me of techniques that I may have forgotten about that I can either try to use with them again or that may work with a kiddo who I feel may benefit from that technique.

Some advice I’d give to anyone wanting to join our amazing team is don’t be afraid to ask questions. We sometimes feel like we don’t want to sound like we don’t know what we’re doing or are embarrassed that we ask the same question over and over, but everyone is so amazing and is more than willing to help. Also know that Rachelle will always have your back during rough times. Rachelle is such an incredible blessing to me. My old agency had unfortunately just closed down a few years ago. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do, being a single mom. I was blessed that Valerie, an occupational therapist I used to work with, helped me find Rachelle. Rachelle gave me a caseload to work with while all of my kiddos transferred services so that I could continue providing for myself and my son. She has been a wonderful supervisor and friend to me. She is always willing to help in any way that she can. We also have so many resources that can help in your sessions, monthly meetings, and best of all you are able to work the schedule you want without being micromanaged.

If I weren’t such a great speech therapist; I’d probably be trying to continue to pursue a career as a nurse.

If you would have asked me when I first started it would have been articulation. Two years ago it would have been language, but my favorite area of speech therapy to work in today is social skills and pragmatics. I love to learn the different ways that different children learn, how they socialize with peers, and their different personalities once they open up to you. My favorite thing to hear from my kids is “I have a new friend” after working so hard to crawl into their world and help give them the confidence to talk to other kids and sometimes even their own families. It’s really a great feeling to know you were a part of the reason they are expressing themselves and talking to people.

definitely the barn and animals. You are able to use it for prepositions, identifying, describing objects, articulation, quantitative concepts. My favorite thing to do when playing with the barn is articulation though. My kids and I will name those animals depending on which phoneme we are working on. If we are working on D, S, T, L, we will name the animals “Didi, Sam, Tom, Larry”. You would be impressed at the imagination some of these kiddos have. My favorite activity is definitely anything from teachers pay teachers and boom cards. There are so many activities and ideas you can take from those 2 websites.

The amount of support that some of these families provide for their children is unbelievable! Some of these parents will bring their kids to therapy every day if they have to, ride buses/taxis to get to therapy, advocate for their kids to educate people about their diagnoses, and find summer camps to try and keep them on a schedule during the summer also.

that you have to learn how to manage your time from day 1. Figure out what works for you. Buy yourself a planner and keep your schedule organized. Try to schedule your kiddos at the same time you see them every week. These kids need consistency and keeping them on a routine will work so much better for you, your kiddo, and their family. If you get into the habit of learning about your families, learning how to manage your time depending on the family you are working with, you will have better control of your time. Every minute counts!

the ability to hear people from across the room. The fact that I worked at a hospital when I was younger may be the reason for that. When you have someone talking to you in a low voice from across the nurse’s station, your ears get trained to hear far distances.

the ability to hear people from across the room. The fact that I worked at a hospital when I was younger may be the reason for that. When you have someone talking to you in a low voice from across the nurse’s station, your ears get trained to hear far distances.

1. Search and find books.
2. My iPad, you never know if you’ll get a last-minute visit in. If I forget my super duper fun decks I have them all downloaded onto my iPad.
3. My trinkets! I have purchased so many! I highly recommend y’all visit Etsy for some if you don’t already have some. You can alphabetize them, put them into categories and sort them by colors. I put mine in a jar with straws so the kids have to dig into the jar. They do come in different sizes. I buy the really small ones and just keep an eye on the littles. I make sure I’m right next to them while using these.

Here at Speak Speech, we love Lupita and her heart for the people she works with! SLPs, SLPAs, and Kids! A big thanks to Lupita for taking time out of her busy schedule to answer these Q’s for me. 🙂

If you’d like to learn more about being an SLP or SLPA, this series of Team Interviews will be the one to keep up on! Anyone qualified or that is interested in being an SLP or SLPA, view our job opportunities or submit resume to Speak Speech Therapy (info@speakspeechtherapy.com).