I love to use short videos in speech therapy sessions to spark discussion and increase engagement. Often these videos are wordless or have minimal dialogue, which allows the students to make inferences, predictions, and use descriptive language.

Before we get to the list. I want to familiarize you with three helpful resources to bring these videos to the next level.

Safe Youtube

If you are worried about inappropriate advertisements popping up or the video ending and automatically playing something inappropriate next, paste the YouTube link into safeyoutube.net and it will generate a safe version of the video hosted off of YouTube, so you do not have to worry about students seeing advertisements or content that you have not approved.

Edpuzzle

Edpuzzle allows you to add strategic pauses in videos with built in question prompts. You can also trim videos to remove content inappropriate or irrelevant to your students. I have included an example I made below. You can sign up for a free account to make twenty of your own videos, but you also get unlimited access to tons of videos made by other educators.

Any Video/Article Visual Organizers for Describing and Critical Thinking

No time to prep? I feel ya! I have this no-print visual organizer Boom Card Deck bookmarked on my iPad for quick, engaging, language rich sessions. It includes visual organizers for describing using attributes, describing using key info, compare/contrast, sorting important vs. unimportant details, story retell, summarizing fiction stories, summarizing non-fiction stories, and inferencing.

Check it out here.

List of Short Videos for Speech Therapy

This is a growing list of animated shorts available on YouTube. I have tried to organize the videos by theme for easy planning. The title of the video is a direct link to the video. These links are subject to change, please preview content before sharing it with your students. It is your responsibility to ensure appropriateness of the content for your students.

---

---

Birthday

Preheated: A boy decides to make a birthday cake for his eccentric scientist father, but accidentally spills one of his dad’s experiments and ends up with super hot hands! Use this video to target predicting, sequencing, inferencing, describing, and summarizing.

---

Fall

Automne: This animated reimagines the changing of the seasons by creating seasonal characters, who paint their season on to a scale model of the Earth when it is their turn. Great for working on comparing and describing the different seasons.

Geri’s Game Pixar Short: Geri is enjoying a competitive game of chess in the park…against himself. Great for inferencing, describing, and identifying emotions.

Autumn Leaves: Cute, super short film about a little boy enjoying the leaves in the fall! Great for sparking discussion about fall and making simple predictions!

Autumn Squirrel: Silly video about a squirrel trying to keep the Autumn chill out of his tree house. Great for discussing problem solving and cause/effect.

Back to School

Clocky: Cute story of a little alarm clock getting ready to ring for the first time. Great for perspective taking, describing, and problem solving.

Afternoon Class: A boy fights the urge to fall asleep during a boring afternoon class. The video features excellent imagery for using figurative language! Also great for perspective taking and cause/effect.

Acceptance & Friendship

Alike: This is a beautiful animated short with the message that it is okay to be different from others! Great for working on describing, cause/effect, perspective taking, summarizing, and predicting!

Invisible Animated Short: Two chameleons are lonely at a school dance. One chameleon wants to ask the other to dance, but he is too nervous and every time he tries something goes wrong. Great for working on summarizing narrative events, perspective taking, identifying emotions, inferencing, and problem solving.

Snack Attack: This video is awesome for working on many different social skills! The older lady in this story has the wrong perspective and she completely over reacts! Awesome for working on perspective taking, prediction, describing, cause/effect, personal space, summarizing!

Perseverance

Hair Love: This is a beautiful, heart-warming story about perseverance! Great for working on describing, predicting, perspective taking, and problem solving.

One Small Step: Luna Chu wants to be an astronaut more than anything! Follow along on her journey from childhood to the moon! Great for perspective taking, predicting, describing.

Content Warning: Luna’s father passes away during the story. She comes home to find his can left on the floor and the lights off in the house. Then, the animator shows her at his grave and destroying her bedroom in grief. The loss of her father renews her desire to work hard to become an astronaut.

Scarlett: Scarlett is a young girl with an amputated leg and a lot of perseverance! Great for working on perspective taking, summarizing, and describing!

Pip: Pip is ready to become a guide dog for the visually impaired, but the training is much harder than expected. Nevertheless, Pip perseveres and becomes a true hero. Perfect for targeting describing, compare/contrast, summarizing, and problem solving.

Halloween

Lucas the Spider Animated Shorts : Lucas is an adorable Spider and everything is new and exciting to him!

Simon’s Cat in Spooky Tales: Simon’s Cat videos are terrific for inferencing and summarizing!

Thanksgiving

Simon’s Sister’s Dog in Fed Up : This one will get your student’s laughing as this poor hungry dog gets himself into a predicament. Great for inferencing and summarizing. Target figurative language with the title as well.

Simon’s Cat in Festive Feast & Other Cat Capers:

Mr. Indifferent: Great for discussing empathy, cause-effect, character development, and summarizing.

Coin Operated: This one is very silly. Target describing, problem solving, cause/effect, and summarizing using this video.

Kid President’s 25 Reasons to Be Thankful: This video is a helpful example for students as they try to brainstorm their own gratitude list.

Salt: This is my favorite Thanksgiving video. It is perfect for targeting cause/effect, sequencing, describing, perspective taking, summarizing, & predicting.

---

Winter

Under the Winter Sun: Two snowman have a fun snow day until the sun begins to rise. Great for predicting, describing, cause/effect, and summarizing.

Hey Deer: Ever wonder what it would be like to live inside of a snowglobe? This short answers that question. Great for predicting, inferencing, and summarizing.

Holiday

The Present: A young amputee receives a puppy with three legs from his mom. This video shows the boy going from displaced frustration and anger toward the dog to care and compassion. It is a good conversation starter regarding empathy and perspective taking. USe this video to target summarizing, describing, and inferencing.

Downtown: Cute animated short about a town that has lost all of its color and a little house that brings the spirit of christmas. Use to describe, compare/contrast, predict, infer, and summarize.

A Shorter Letter: Cute video that helps kids understand you do not always get the toys you want for Christmas. Good for sparking discussions about describing, compare/contrast, and summarizing.

Baking

Here’s the Plan: This video is definitely for a more mature student group. It references divorce and includes a scene where one of the character accidentally gets a bloody nose. This video is good for discussing cause-effect, compare/contrast, and inferencing.

Preheated: A boy decides to make a birthday cake for his eccentric scientist father, but accidentally spills one of his dad’s experiments and ends up with super hot hands! Use this video to target predicting, sequencing, inferencing, describing, and summarizing.

Salt: This is my favorite Thanksgiving video. It is perfect for targeting cause/effect, sequencing, describing, perspective taking, summarizing, & predicting.

---

Spring

Petals Animated Short: This is the story of two young humanized animals with different levels of respect for the environment. Highlights the impact people can have on the environment. Great for inferencing, making predictions, identifying cause & effect, compare/contrast, describing, and summarizing.

Sweet Cocoon Animated Short: A very chubby caterpillar cannot fit into his cocoon. A few of his buddies help him out. Great for working on summarizing narrative events, identifying cause & effect, problem solving, and inferencing.

The Spark & The Time Shop: These Chik-fil-a commercials are adorable! They help children see the true meaning of christmas and are great for inferencing, predicting, and summarizing. Time shop includes some funny figurative language examples.

The Gift: A boy asks Santa for an elf and the elf is afraid of being someone’s toy. This little video is fun and festive, and great for targeting describing, compare/contrast, perspective taking, and summarizing.

---

Summer

Watermelon a Cautionary Tale: A boy imagines what if you really do turn into a watermelon when you eat the watermelon seeds. Great for discussing figures of speech (i.e., do you really become a watermelon? No. You may just get a stomach ache.)

Content Warning: Some of the imagery of becoming a watermelon may be scary for some students.

Beach/ Ocean

Piper Pixar Animated Short: Adorable animation of a baby sandpiper adventuring out of his nest to get his own food. Great for describing, summarizing, and problem solving.

Trouble in Paradise: This crab does not know what a coconut is and he wants it far away from his home! Great for inferencing and describing.

Bottle Animated Short: Cute wordless story of a sandman and a snowman who communicate by sending things back and forth in a bottle over the ocean. Great for working on describing and compare/contrast.

The Legend of the Crab Phare: I love this sweet video. The Legendary Crab Phare likes to collect ships as they pass by. As he gets older it is harder for him to move, so he becomes sedentary causing him to appear as an island in the middle of the ocean. Eventually, a society forms on top of him until one day he molts and begins again. So many inferencing opportunities. Great for working on describing, inferencing, and summarizing.

Taking the Plunge Animated Short: Cute video about a nervous guy, who accidentally drops his engagement ring into the ocean just before he took the plunge to propose causing him to actually take the plunge to find the ring. Great for working on non-literal language, inferencing, describing, summarizing, and problem solving.

Camping

Roughin’ It Mickey Mouse Short: Mickey, Goofy, and Donald go camping, but they have very different ideas of what roughing it means. Great for working on compare/contrast, describing, identifying cause/effect, and summarizing.

Content Warning: Mickey references being in nature’s bosom in the first ten seconds. I personally just start the video after to avoid teaching this particular vocabulary word. Also, Mickey is attacked by forest animals very time, so may view the tussle as violent.

Zoo Animals

Rollin’ Wild Animated Short: What if jungle animals were like blown up balloons? Very entertaining. Great for working on predicting, identifying cause & effect and problem solving.

Catch it! Animated Short: The meerkat’s sacred fruit is stolen by a vulture! How will the meerkat’s get it back? Great for working on inferencing, predicting, problem solving, and summarizing.

We Love Animals Animated Short: A trip to the zoo shown from the perspective of the animals inside their small enclosures. Very sad and will spark big discussions about animal care. Great for working on inferencing and summarizing.

Safari, So Good Mickey Mouse Short: Mickey and Minnie are left behind by their tour bus in the wild, but they make the most of enjoying the plains and the animals. Great for working on summarizing, inferencing, describing, understanding indirect language, and identifying cause & effect.

Thanks for reading!