News
Post-Covid Early Talk Boost Project in the Royal Borough of Greenwich (RBG)
December 2021
We are delighted to have been commissioned to manage and deliver this ambitious project aimed at boosting the language and communication skills of 3–4-year-olds across a whole London Borough. It is aimed at children who, during the pandemic, have missed out on much of the high-quality language and communication support that pre-school and nursery settings normally provide. We hope a greater number of children will start reception from September 2022 with the essential speaking and listening skills they need in order to learn and to interact with peers.
We will be working in collaboration with:
- RBG Inclusion, Learning and Achievement Division and Early Years Setting staff
- Greenwich Children’s Integrated Therapies, Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust Speech & Language Therapy (SaLT) team
- Therapy Links UK CIC
- I CAN Charity
We plan to co-design and deliver sustainable training and intervention using the ICAN Early Talk Boost programme. As part of the project, a number of RBG setting staff will become licensed ICAN Early Talk Boost tutors who can continue to develop language & communication support in the Borough over time. We hope to involve SaLT students from London Universities and to measure and report on the impact of the project.
Talking Outcomes is changing direction
May 2021
After 10 years providing a service to schools and families we are now shifting our focus to school services and supporting the next generations of SaLTs. All our current arrangements with families will be honoured, and those on our waiting list will be seen in due course, however, we will not be taking on any new children from May 2021 unless they are seen via a service commissioned by a school.
New guidance launched
September 2020
The new NAHT (National Association of Headteachers) and RCSLT (Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists) guidance for education settings on commissioning speech and language therapy is now finalised and can be found here.
Jan Baerselman was the lead author on this document, which will be invaluable for educational settings interested in commissioning support for children with speech, language and communication difficulties.
The Value Talking pilot project is successful and will be offered to local schools
March 2020
We explored whether a student-delivered speech & language therapy service could help tackle unmet speech, language and communication (SLC) need in schools.
A trial student-delivered service was provided to two mainstream schools. The aims were to tackle placement shortages for speech and language therapy students and address reported unmet SLC need. Evaluation & cost analysis suggested that the service was effective, relatively low cost, valued by service users and provided an excellent placement for final year SLT students.
Read more about the project here or watch the 20 minute webinar.
Talking Outcomes wins ‘Giving Voice’ award
December 2019
Jan Baerselman, along with two parents of children with speech difficulties, Lynnette Webster and Theresa Mayman, won an award for her work raising awareness of the needs of children with speech, language and communication difficulties.
BBC TV interview re importance of language & communication for young children
June 2019
Jan Baerselman, our director, was invited onto the Victoria Derbyshire BBC2 show to talk about underfunding of Speech and Language Therapy on 13th June.
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