District: California
Role: SLP (High School)
Students Served: 42–50
Free Pilot: District-wide, ~60 SLPs

Background

Cait has worked in the California school district for nine years and currently serves as a speech-language pathologist at a comprehensive high school. Her caseload spans honors/AP students to students in self-contained programs that have intellectual disabilities and autism. Cait has been using Everyday Speech for eight years, since the district-wide rollout.

Related resources: See our full list of social skills lessons.

Challenges

Before Everyday Speech, Cait’s toolkit was a patchwork of worksheets, flashcards, and piecemeal programs. Cait was used to cobbling together different materials without the consistency needed to help students build real-life skills. She relied on the Social Language Development Test (SLDT) flashcards, some Michelle Garcia Winner materials, and lessons from UCLA’s PEERS program. These were static, hard-copy resources that lacked flexibility and real-world relevance. Later, as digital options appeared, she experimented with Boom Cards and Ultimate SLP, but those tools were either too limited in scope or inconsistent in quality.

“Boom Cards are basically electronic interactive flashcards… but they are user-made. So a random person like me makes them… I don’t use it for any of my social skills students because I haven’t found anything on it that I enjoy.”

She found that without a structured, evidence-based progression, her students memorized patterns quickly, preventing true generalization of social skills.

Solution

Once the district brought in Everyday Speech, Cait got access to her first structured, digital platform for social communication skills. It became her go-to for introducing new topics and establishing a shared foundation before branching into real-world examples.

“That was the first digital platform we were given… before then, it was definitely more of using whatever worksheets we could print off. I liked that it was low effort on my end to pull something up and just go with it.”

She now uses Everyday Speech primarily with her students in self-contained programs and her most impacted students, introducing concepts like sarcasm, disguised thoughts, and online safety. That includes 1:1 sessions, small groups (2-3 students), as well as whole class lessons weekly (8 students).

Results

Time savings

Instead of spending hours creating or searching for materials, Cait can log in, scan the curriculum, and quickly pull what she needs. Everyday Speech also gives her flexibility to switch gears mid-session if a lesson isn’t working.

“I can spend one or two minutes quickly going through the curriculum list to find what I need versus having to sit there and actually create something myself.”

Organized and structured lessons

Everyday Speech gave Cait a structured way to introduce complex social communication skills. The built-in sequence of videos, worksheets, and games helps her pinpoint where a student is struggling and build from there.

“It’s just nice… having the content organized in a logical way. You have the intro video, the related worksheets, and another step-up video with a related worksheet. When you’re trying to figure out a student’s baseline and skill breakdown, it helps that there’s scaffolding that’s already built in.”

Engagement from students with significant needs

For Cait’s students with intellectual disabilities and autism, Everyday Speech strikes the right balance of accessibility and concreteness. Short, well-structured videos hold their attention and give her peace of mind that the content is appropriate.

“For my students with intellectual disabilities, I do like that… it’s laid out in a way that’s easy for them to understand. And it’s very concrete. I like that the videos are short, and I like that I don’t need to pre-screen the videos.”

Everyday Speech helps SLPs like Cait focus on helping students make meaningful progress in social skills without burning out from endless prep and piecemeal resources. Want to see how it can support your team? Learn more about our Free Pilot Program.