Please steal it, modify it for your child, and let me know what type of response you get. I noticed that the initial “Hey” is the hardest piece for our kids. This story came out of the many wonderful interactions I have with the children who struggle with initiating conversation and/or play with peers. I’d love to see pictures for this story. If you find yourself so inclined, please email me any drawings you and your child dream up after reading (spectrumshareconsulting@gmail.com).

Don’t let “Hey” get in the way of Play

There once was a girl named Mattie who had a frog caught in her throat. The Frog wasn’t always in her throat. Only some of the time. Strange Frog.
He would jump right into her mouth every time Mattie thought about talking to a new friend. How was she supposed to say “Hey” with a big old frog in her throat?

She needed to find a way to GET THIS FROG OUT!

First, she thought “Maybe I’ll carry around a net full of flies…frogs love flies…he won’t be able to resist. When it’s time to say ‘Hey’ to a new friend, I’ll just release the flies from the net and Voila, the frog will jump right out”. Perfect!
At once, the girl hurried to the pet store. “A net full of extra delicious frog flies please”, she said to the pet store owner. Later that day, net in hand, Mattie bravely walked over to her new neighbor’s house. Eve was the neighbor girl’s name. She rang Eve’s doorbell and as she began to hear footsteps approaching, she released the flies. Within seconds, the flies flew straight up into the blue sky and were gone. Mattie was left standing at the doorstep, scared and stiff, eye’s wide open, with that strange frog stuck in her throat. Eve smiled and said “Hey” but no words would come out of Mattie’s mouth. She stood there for a moment, as Eve looked straight at her. Mattie turned and ran home, embarrassed and disappointed that her plan didn’t work.

Thankfully, she was a brave girl and wasn’t ready to give up yet. She really wanted to be Eve’s friend. The next day, she thought to herself, “What about a Lily pad? That won’t fly away and frogs love Lily pads”. She grabbed her mud boots and went trudging through the stinky, squishy neighborhood swamp. Within minutes, she found a big green Lilly pad sitting in the middle of the pond with a frog on it. “Oh yeah…this is going to work”, she thought. She swept the frog off and put the Lilly pad inside her boot. When she got home, she nicely asked her mother to call Eve to come and play.

When the doorbell rang, the frog appeared in her throat as expected. Mattie took a deep breath in and quickly threw down the lily Pad as the door opened. The frog jumped out at the sight of the big green lily pad, and to her surprise her voice produced a quiet “Hey”. Mattie felt Incredible, Wonderful, Great!
Eve said “Hey” back and the girls ran upstairs to play.

Mattie couldn’t believe it, her plan worked. Now she had a trick to get that strange frog out of her throat and a new friend to play with. Finally she could say “Hey”, just three little letters, when she wanted to play.

As for the frog, he’s still around…with all these summer mosquitos, it doesn’t hurt to have a pet frog (Picture Mattie sleeping in her bed with the frog sitting on the edge snatching up mosquitos).

UPDATE to Post (10/2013):
This picture was the creation of a young girl following the reading of the story above. We created what the world looked like for “Mattie” – making the story come to life. It was great!