Leadership

Preparing For Literacy: Improving Communication, Language And Literacy In The Early Years

This guidance report from the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) reviews the best available research to offer early years professionals practical “do’s and don’ts” to make sure all children start school with the foundations they need to read and write well.

The report considers how a wide range of different activities – like singing, storytelling and nursery rhymes – can help to develop children’s early reading. It offers seven recommendations designed to support early years professionals to improve the communication, language and early literacy skills of all their pupils – particularly those from disadvantaged homes. Previous analysis by the EEF found there was already a 4.3 month gap between poorer pupils and their classmates before school starts.

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      string(5491) "The social mobility strategy provides a focus on closing the education gap between rich and poor children. However, it will be a challenge for the Government to deliver a step change in social mobility in the face of on-going cuts to benefits and public services, and the projected dramatic rise in child poverty over the next five years. To be effective, this strategy must form part of a wider cross-Government commitment to a country that works for all children. Main Points:Identify and spread evidence-based home learning environment programmes that support early language development. Form a partnership with Public Health England to enable health visitors and early years practitioners to identify and support children’s early speech, language and communication needs. Provide £50 million funding to create more high-quality school-based nursery provision for disadvantaged children. Identify communities with low take-up of early education – particularly for disadvantaged children – and provide bespoke support to improve this. Develop and deliver a comprehensive offer of support to improve early language and literacy – especially for disadvantaged pupils. Spread best practice to where it is needed, including from high performing local authorities to underperforming areas. Improve the outcome goals in reception, with a particular focus on reducing burdens and strengthening literacy and numeracy in the early years. Identify and share best practice on what should be taught in reception year. Ensure the accountability regime gives full credit to what teachers and leaders achieve in challenging schools. Ensure that the consequences of accountability are about securing the right support at the right time, rather than simply imposing punitive sanctions or structural change. Introduce smarter incentives to train, attract and retain the best teachers in challenging areas. Provide £30 million in tailored support to schools with disadvantaged intakes that are facing significant recruitment and retention challenges. Provide an enhanced offer of early career support by strengthening qualified teacher status (QTS), and support clearer career pathways and improved professional development for all teachers. Transform the quality of professional development available in challenging areas, by investing over £115 million in evidence-based approaches. Prioritise the growth and coverage of high quality MATs and Teaching Schools in challenging areas. Provide £300 million of targeted, evidence-based school improvement support for underperforming schools across the country. Increase access to the most effective curriculum support in more challenging areas and schools.Extending the reach of the free school programme to benefit more areas of educational underperformance. Make sure our system can benefit from the full range of expertise from across the education sector. Prioritise work to understand the needs of the most vulnerable children and how best to improve their outcomes. Transform the quality of Alternative Provision (AP) and special provision. Ensure that disadvantaged pupils can access the core academic subjects that unlock opportunity. Spread evidence-based approaches to supporting disadvantaged pupils. Young people who currently choose a technical route face a fragmented and confusing system.Young people who have fallen behind their peers by age 16 then find it harder to catch up and have options shut off. Young people from less advantaged backgrounds are less likely to enter high quality higher education. Actions:Introduce the first T levels from 2020.Review higher technical education at level 4 and 5. Incentivise more employers to provide quality apprenticeships through the apprenticeship levy. Develop and increase the take-up of degree apprenticeships.Develop a further education improvement support structure. Invest in further education college leaders to raise standards. Establish new Institutes of Technology. Invest the resources and capacity needed to make further education colleges centres of excellence for maths and English. Introduce a new transition year, with English and maths as a key component, for 16-year-olds who are not ready for more advanced academic or technical study or employment. Ensure higher education providers spend their access and participation funding effectively, targeting low participation areas. Improve transparency of widening participation practices to encourage applications to the most selective higher education institutions. Ensure every young person has at least seven encounters with employers during their education. Improve the quality of careers advice in school.Improve the advice available outside of education to young people and adults, including those who need the most support. Provide an Essential Life Skills programme in targeted areas, alongside a national mentoring programme. Introduce a National Retraining Scheme.  Improve adult basic skill provision. Provide more flexible provision to develop advanced skills. WEB LINK Unlocking Talent, Fulfilling Potential KeywordsSocial mobility, talent, potential, SEND, vulnerable children, underperform, children in need, child poverty, best practice"
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Leadership

Unlocking Talent, Fulfilling Potential

3 Jan 2018

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      string(5854) "Aboard pilot projectand to support theroll out of All Aboard in these eight different settings. Training included an overviewof the background to and theoretical basis of All Aboard, organisational issues such asplanning and delivering the sessions and evaluation procedures.All Aboard was delivered for a total of twelve weeks in each of the settings, withthree one hour enhanced sessions being delivered each week. Six children from eachsetting were chosen to participate, although some nurseries chose to run All Aboardboth during both morning and afternoon sessions, thus involving up to 12 children. 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As All Aboard ran for two terms, good progresswould be shown by children making progress greater than or equal to 0.6 points.The results show that children in the All Aboard group made greater progressover a similar time period to the children in the control cohort. This suggests thatthere is a value-added element to implementing the All Aboard programme, and thatAll Aboard is successful in improving outcomes for vulnerable children.Graph 1Graph 1 indicates that All Aboard children made above expected levels of progress(0.6 points) in all areas. While most progress was made in the area of ProblemSolving, Reasoning and Numeracy, the difference between the All Aboard result andthe control group is relatively small (0.1 point). Similarly although progress in PSEis higher than the control group, this is also by only 0.1 point. The progress madein the area of ‘Communication, Language and Literacy’ is significantly higher thanthat of the control group, suggesting that All Aboard is a powerful intervention forsupporting children’s language development in the early years.http://www.education.gov.uk/childrenandyoungpeople/earlylearningandchildcare/delivery/education/a0068102/early-years-foundation-stage-eyfshttp://www.education.gov.uk/childrenandyoungpeople/earlylearningandchildcare/delivery/education/a0068102/early-years-foundation-stage-eyfshttp://www.education.gov.uk/childrenandyoungpeople/earlylearningandchildcare/delivery/education/a0068102/early-years-foundation-stage-eyfs94Vol 4.2School Leadership Todaywww.teachingtimes.comPrimaryFileLeadershipResourcesGraph 2Graph 2 shows that comparing the progress of the All Aboard Children with Englishas an additional language to that made by the children with English as an additionallanguage in the control group, All Aboard children made greater progress.In contrast, All Aboard children with English as their first language made lessprogress than the similar children from the control group. 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Leadership

Nipping the effects of disadvantage in the bud

30 Oct 2012

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      string(5309) "language after the reception year, the most effective schools made use of the available tools, such as the Cognitive Abilities Test (CAT), to track pupils’ progress in spoken language.9. Listening to children and young people: In line with the ethos of the Children and Families Act (2014), schools should involve children and young people with SLCN in discussions about their support. There are resources which schools can use to support consultation with children and young people with SLCN on the Bercow: Ten Years On website.10. Embedded in policy: School leaders advised us that having a whole school speech, language and communication policy did not necessarily guarantee positive change and could become a tick box exercise. Instead, speech, language and communication should be embedded in other policies, such as literacy, behaviour and wellbeing policies. In the report we specifically recommend that school leaders should ensure that the importance of spoken language is reflected in their school’s special educational needs (SEN) information report.Local good practiceThe Academies Enterprise Trust ran a pilot project across eight of its academies, building early identification into their regular data analysis and prioritising a whole school approach linked to their SEN strategy. They:Improved identification by looking at expected prevalence and ‘red flags’Used school data and language measures to track progressCarried out intervention in and out of the classroomProvided professional development for a more skilled and confident teaching staffCarried out training and level 3 qualifications for support staff, maximising impactIf you work in a school or other education setting, we encourage you to use this list as a starting point for a discussion about the way you currently support children and young people with SLCN, and any actions you could take to improve that support. Resources to support you are available: www.bercow10yearson.com/schools-and-colleges/ What next for Bercow: Ten Years On?The RCSLT and I CAN are continuing to work together to pursue the implementation of the recommendations within the report, and will publish an update on progress in March 2019. We hope you will join us in making a commitment to take action which will improve support for children and young people with SLCN. If you would like to see change happen at a national level, you may wish to sign the petition calling on the Government to implement the recommendations, which has been tabled on the Parliament website and will remain open until 26 September 2018: https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/215643 Caroline Wright is the Policy Adviser at the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists.References        Bryan K., Freer J. ,& Furlong C. (2007). Language and communication difficulties in juvenile offenders. International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 42(5): 505–520.        Department for Children, Schools and Families. (2008). The Bercow Report: A review of services for children and young people (0–19) with speech, language and communication needs. http://dera.ioe.ac.uk/8405/7/7771-dcsf-bercow_Redacted.pdf        Hollo, A,. Wehby, J.H., & Oliver R.M. (2014). Unidentified language deficits in children with emotional and behavioral disorders: A meta-analysis. Exceptional Children 80(2): 169–186.        Law, J., McBean, K. & Rush, R. (2011). Communication skills in a population of primary school‑aged children raised in an area of pronounced social disadvantage. International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 46(6): 657–664.        McCool S and Stevens IC. (2011). Identifying speech, language and communication needs among children and young people in residential care. International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 46(6): 665–674.        Norbury, C.F., Gooch, D., Wray, C., Baird, G., Charman, T., Simonoff, E., Vamvakas, A. & Pickles, A. (2016). The impact of nonverbal ability on prevalence and clinical presentation of language disorder: Evidence from a population study. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 57(11): 1247–1257.        Ripley, K. & Yuill, N. (2005). Patterns of language impairment and behaviour in boys excluded from school. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 75: 37–50.Further reading        Developmental language disorder: Suffering in Silence by Adi Bloom, TES, 2 February 2018: https://www.tes.com/news/suffering-silence-1        What Works database: https://www.thecommunicationtrust.org.uk/whatworks         Education Endowment Foundation: Oral language interventions https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/evidence-summaries/teaching-learning-toolkit/oral-language-interventions/        RCSLT guide to employing a speech and language therapist – what schools need to know: https://www.rcslt.org/speech_and_language_therapy/commissioning/employing_an_slt"
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Communicating for Life

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      string(4929) "ResourcePROMOTING SPEECH AND LANGUAGEOriginal DocumentPromoting Speech and Language – a themed study in fifteen Sure Start Local Programmes This DCSF research looks at speech and language learning support in Sure Start Local Programmes (SSLPs). It considers the extent to which new understanding of speech, language and pre-literacy are used in SSLPs and the role played by speech and language therapists (SLTs).KeywordsEarly years, language, literacy, communication, children’s centres.SummarySure Start Local Programmes (SSLPs) supported children under 4 and their families by integrating services. This study reviewed the policy and practice issues that arose relating to improving language development for children in SSLP areas. The researchers sought to identify good practice to foster the development of young children’s language skills. Such lessons for good practice might have application in Children’s Centres.Main Findings:· All programmes had employed a SaLT at some stage in their development. All SaLTs interviewed had been enthusiastic about implementing the newer concepts of prevention, by promoting language development directly with parents and through other staff.  Most continued with some one-to-one clinical work, particularly with children who had previously proved difficult to engage in any form of assessment or therapy.  However, the time commitment of SaLTs varied widely between programmes.  In several SSLPs their input had ended or was being substantially reduced.· Four of the programmes focused on developing communication in the newborn and in early infancy. Parents found this gave them useful insights.· Bookstart was widely used and was supported by staff groups including early years librarians and health visitors.· In other SSLPs, early years librarians and SLTs worked closely together. Many parents, including some of those who did not use libraries often, found the early years librarians’ advice and information useful.· A benefit of the SSLPs is the early identification of children with major problems in language and communication.· The programme managers’ backgrounds influenced the direction and focus of the programmes, as did factors specific to the area, such as interagency relationships.     Action· All early years programmes serving deprived areas should have agreements with SLT services, to makes sure that there is enough SLT input into staff training.· SLTs should train and support midwives, health visitors and early years staff so that they can show parents how infants communicate and respond.· Children’s centres should stress the importance of understanding language and literacy in their staff selection, programme planning, training and evaluation.Recommendations for children’s centres include:· All early years programmes serving deprived areas should have agreements with SLT services, to makes sure that there is enough SLT input into staff training.· SLTs should train and support midwives, health visitors and early years staff so that they can show parents how infants communicate and respond.· Bookstart is well established but more of its benefits would be realised if staff had more training and time to model the use of books with parents.· The early identification of children’s language difficulties and the promotion of language acquisition and pre-literacy skills should be part of any early years curriculum.· Children’s centres should stress the importance of understanding language and literacy in their staff selection, programme planning, training and evaluationNotes· One of the main aims of Sure Start is to make sure that when children start school they are ready to benefit from their education. Spoken communication and pre-literacy skills are essential for this.· Children in deprived areas are often at a disadvantage in this respect.· Research has lead to better understanding of how children acquire language and begin to understand concepts of literacy. This can benefit parents by giving them a better idea of how to support their child’s learning.· The quality and quantity of interaction between parent and child plays a big part in how children acquire language and literacy skills. Levels of interaction vary between social groups.     AuthorRaspal Chima, Questions PublishingDate CreatedSeptember 2007Enquiries to:rchima@qiis.co.uk (Authoring Unit)Month / YearPage 1 of 1©Birmingham City Council"
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Leadership

Promoting Speech and Language

6 Sep 2007