Ahoy, Matey!
Are you looking for a fun theme for your summer speech therapy sessions or Talk Like a Pirate day? From treasure hunts to interactive books and hands-on games, a pirate theme creates opportunities to practice imaginative play, articulation, language, and social skills.
Whether you’re planning a full pirate week or just want a quick seasonal activity for Talk Like a Pirate Day, these pirate-themed speech therapy ideas will make learning feel like an adventure!
Pirate Themed Activities
We all know that when our students are engaged and having fun, opportunities for practice will increase! I have listed some fun activities below to consider:
Treasure hunt – Hide coins/gems with cards around the room. Practice prepositions, commenting, and carrier phrases (“I see…” and “I found….”). Pair with these Pirate Treasure Articulation pages for targeted speech sound practice.
Sensory Bin – Hide stimulus cards in a bin filled with rice, beans, pebbles, or sand. For fun, include hidden gold coins, gems, and toy jewelry. Practice vocabulary, commenting and carrier phrases (“I see…” and “I found….”).
Pirate Obstacle Course – Walk the plank, toss “cannonball” bean bags, crawl through a cave, dig for treasure, and sail away on a rocking “pirate ship”. this activity is a great choice for co-treat sessions with an OT. It is perfect for practicing following directions, sequencing, and prepositions. *Learn more about the benefit of movement activities HERE!
Captain Says – This game is played like Simon Says while practicing receptive language skills and following directions.
Make a spyglass telescope – Your students could decorate a paper towel tube or several toilet paper rolls to make their own telescopes! Then, go on an adventure searching for stimulus cards or gold coins. Practice following directions, making requests, commenting, and expanding utterances (“I see a …..”).
Cooperative activity – Build a pirate ship out of recycled materials (cardboard tubes, boxes, paper, straws, etc). Perfect for social skills groups, a cooperative project can be an excellent way to promote teamwork and communication. When kids build things together, they are learning to communicate, collaborate, negotiate, and coordinate their efforts. Practice giving and receiving directions, sharing ideas, and working towards a common goal. *Learn more about cooperative activities HERE!
Scavenger Hunt with a map – Make a treasure map for older students and leave clues along the way. This is a fun way to practice following multi-step directions, reading comprehension, problem solving, and cooperation!
Pirate Books
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- Ahoy, Pirate Pete by Nick Sharrat (AKA Pirate Pete): This book is a gem! During this interactive book, the reader chooses the adventure as he manipulates “pop in the slot” story pieces. Practice prepositions, vocabulary, answering questions, sequencing, and story retell.
- How I Became a Pirate by Melinda Long : Jeremy joins a pirate crew and learns pirate life isn’t all treasure and fun. Target sequencing/retell, compare/contrast, predicting, perspective taking
- Pirate Boy by Eve Bunting: Great for answering WH questions, sequencing, and inferencing.
- The Pirate Who Couldn’t Say Arrr! By Angie Neal : This book is ideal for practicing the /r/ sound and other articulation skills. The book is out of print and pretty expensive, but I also found this animated story video with a similar storyline! The Pirate Who Couldn’t Say Arrr!
- There Was an Old Pirate Who Swallowed a Fish by Jennifer Ward: Your students who love the “Old Lady Who Swallowed a ….” books will love this book with a pirate theme twist! Practice recall, sequencing, expanding sentences, and answering questions.
Commercially Available Resources
*This section contains Amazon Affiliate links*
- Pirate Sand Play Set – Hide treasures in sand (mini objects, cards, gold coins) or act out a pirate adventure together.
- Learning Resources Surprise Pirate Treasure chests – Practice core words such as help, in, more, and open. Target vocabulary and expanding utterances with the carrier phrases, “I see…” or “I found…”. You can also hide other mini objects in the treasure chests to target specific speech sounds
- Talking Parrot – This parrot repeats what you say. It is a fun way to motivate your students to practice saying “rrr”, other speech sounds, or vocabulary words.
- Pop-up Pirate – This is a classic game in just about every speech therapist’s game stash. Pair the game with any stimulus cards and practice targeted speech/language skills as you play the game.
Pinwheel Speech Resources
Printable Resources from Pinwheel Speech:
- Pirate Wheel Craft (see picture above): Features articulation wheels to practice K, G, F, V, S, Z, SH, CH, TH, L, & R (including vocalic R and blends), syllable shapes (CV, CVC, CVCV), multisyllabic words, and vocabulary!
- Pirate Hat Articulation Craft (see picture below): Includes articulation practice for M, N, P, B, T, D, K, G, F, V, S, Z, SH, CH, J, TH, L, R, vocalic R, and blends!
- Pirate Treasure Articulation Activity (see picture below): Students can use dot markers, magnetic chips, gold coins, gems, game pieces, stickers, or mini erasers to cover each picture as they practice their target words. Hide gold coins around the room or in a sensory bin for added engagement!
- Pirate Treasure Hunt Boom Cards Game: Students will help the pirates hunt for treasure as they practice their speech words. Includes practice for M, N, P, B, T, D, K, G, F, V, S, Z, SH, CH, TH, L, R, and blends.
- Pirate Articulation Memory Games: These digital pirate memory games are a fun way to build articulation, attention, and memory skills.
- Feed the Parrot R and R Blends: This interactive resource features a Boom Card activity AND a printable activity to practice prevocalic R, vocalic R, and R blends.
- Fill the Treasure chest Boom Cards articulation activity: Help the pirates collect coins and gems as you practice articulation skills!
- Journey to Pirate Island: This digital activity allows students to create their own story! Students choose what happens by dragging words to the line and the pictures onto each scene to create a story. Once you have finished, you can have them go back to the first page and retell the story that they created!
Free Pirate Activity
Finally, to thank you for stopping by pinwheelspeech.com, I have included a free sample pirate treasure vocabulary activity below. Students could use dot markers (bingo daubers), magnetic chips, gold coins, gems, or even game pieces to cover each picture. Hide gold coins and gems around the room or in a sensory bin for added fun! Enjoy!
