Whilst most children and young people will develop their skills with ‘universal’ level good practice, some will benefit from further support. This doesn’t always mean a referral to specialist services however. There are many ways in which you can offer a ‘targeted’ level of support which may meet their needs.
Some things to consider…
- Are you/your team confident in identifying the type of support a child or young person may need?
- For Early Years settings – do you have a Language Lead/Communication Champion in place? Can they offer further support? Find more information about Language Leads
- Would parents/families benefit from help to support their child’s needs at home?
- Is there support available in the community? Consider Libraries, Blackpool Better Start, Lancashire Children and Family wellbeing service, Home Start
- Take a look at the local offer in Blackpool or Lancashire
- Would the child or young person benefit from a Targeted Learning Plan?
- Consider structured intervention programmes such as Talk Boost or NELI, or using activities from the Wellcomm Big Book of Ideas
- How will you monitor the impact of the support you have put in place?
- Consider how you can support in the classroom – take a look here for some idea
- Small group work around specific areas of need
- Pre teaching of key vocabulary – tools like word webs are really helpful
- Additional visual supports in place – signing, visual timetables, etc can provide extra support for those struggling with verbal information.
- Language programmes such as Colourful Semantics or Narrative therapy
- Lego Therapy
