Running a DLD Together National Group

DLD Together, a joint initiative between NAPLIC and AFASIC has been running since 2019 and has trained more than 150 professionals so far. I was delighted to be one of those professionals trained in 2021. I’ve always had an interest in Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) and have worked as a generalist speech and language therapist (SLT) for more than 20 years in England then Scotland and now the Isle of Man. I became a RADLD ambassador in 2020 and wanted to find more ways to raise awareness of DLD in communities. Helping families to advocate for their children through increasing their knowledge is something I feel passionate about so the DLD Together groups seemed an ideal way to support families, who I hoped would then raise awareness through family members and in schools.

As part of a commitment to the training and because I was interested in working with families across the UK who do not have access to this training, I decided to volunteer to run one of the national groups. Initially I wrote to Claire Hoyle, who works at AFASIC. As well as co-ordinating the groups, which involves pairing SLTs and teachers together and grouping families whose children are of similar ages, Claire attends the 7th and final group session of the course and gives her perspective on being a parent of a child with DLD, something which parents find invaluable.

I was paired with Kate Starr who is an advisory teacher for a Local Authority service for Speech, Language & Communication Needs (SLCN) and Cognition & Learning needs. Talking about the course, Kate says: “Within my team I am part of the SLCN service development group and very passionate about improving outcomes for children with SLCN across Birmingham. I also have a 9 year old child with DLD, so I understand how important it is for families to have the right information about DLD so that they can support their child or young person and advocate for them.

I was delighted when I heard about the DLD Together programme and signed up for the training. Having been a part of delivering a couple of courses in Birmingham I had experienced how useful it can be to families first-hand. When Afasic asked for volunteers for the National programme I was keen to help because I want to help support those with DLD and their families. It is a privilege and a joy to be able to support parents and carers to better understand DLD and empower them with knowledge and strategies of how to support and advocate for their child.

The course is wonderful because in bringing families together, not only do they receive excellent information from the course content, but also from each other. Each family has knowledge, experience and a perspective that professionals cannot capture on their own. It is a fantastic course that I would highly recommend to any family with a child or young person with DLD and I hope to be involved with supporting many groups in the years to come. It is incredibly rewarding to be a part of changing the visibility and understanding in society of DLD.

This particular group has been absolutely wonderful, their openness in sharing their experiences and strategies with each other has been great. Everyone learns so much from each other and helps families feel less alone in their journeys.

I have learned that most families want to gain more understanding of DLD and how to help their child. They also want to hear about the experiences of other families, how to navigate the school system and how to help family members understand about DLD. Families report a lack of knowledge of DLD in schools and amongst other professionals. They want to be able to support their children and to help others understand about their child and what the impacts are for the child or young person with DLD.

The families are from different areas of the UK but are united in a passion to understand and support their child and are willing to openly and honestly share information about this. For some families the training has finally helped them to find answers to the many questions they had about their child. One parent has reported that she is finding it powerful to share Lily Farrington’s Amazing Developmental Language Disorder You Tube video, which we show in session 2 of the DLD Together course. Another parent has chatted to someone whose child has also been diagnosed with DLD in her LA and was so happy to find someone else nearby, who has a child with DLD.

In one group session one parent said that she hadn’t thought about focussing on phonological awareness and early phonics to support literacy before going on this course. The parents are great at sharing resources such as Widgit symbols and Now and Next boards and share information about how they have supported their children in building their self-esteem and resilience through focussing on strengths and interests. It’s lovely to hear about whole school approaches such as the use of the Zones of Regulation throughout one school, due to the fact that it was successful with one child with DLD. The confidence of each family grows weekly, the more they learn. For one parent in particular everything has ‘clicked into place.’ She said, ‘Of all the many courses I have attended this one has grabbed my attention. It is 100% relevant for me and very helpful. It has been the best course that I have been on and it has been a tool to push the education authority to make a referral to Speech and Language Therapy for my child because I have given them everything I have learned about DLD.’

From my own perspective it has been brilliant to run the group, to work with Kate and to learn about families, who are so committed to finding out about DLD. None of them have had an easy journey. One of the children in the group is not diagnosed because professionals are finding it a challenge to work through the presenting difficulties and to decide that this is the right diagnosis. The insights of these families and the support they offer each other, when they have to struggle themselves, is remarkable. I can finish this course knowing that those families will be doing everything they can to raise awareness of DLD within their families, their schools and in the wider world.

Lesley Cherriman Speech and Language Therapist, Manx Care Naplic committee member

Links between vocabulary and comprehension and word reading

In the fields of education and speech and language therapy it is widely known that vocabulary is important for developing reading comprehension1. The idea that vocabulary also influences word reading and phonemic awareness (orally breaking words into individual phonemes) is less recognised. This may be due to models of literacy including the Simple View of Reading2 which depict word decoding and comprehension as separate skills, with decoding considered as a prerequisite for comprehending text.

Whilst research confirms that decoding generally leads to higher reading comprehension3 , conventional models do not necessarily display the interplay between the strands, in particular the contribution of oral language (including vocabulary) to decoding. Given the considerable evidence available, researchers have called for a more integrated approach to decoding and oral language4-6 and a forthcoming special issue in the Journal of Child Experimental Psychology has been devoted to this theme.

To understand the influence of oral vocabulary on word reading outcomes, it is important to differentiate between two aspects of vocabulary. Vocabulary size relates to the number of known words, whereas vocabulary depth reflects how well a word’s meaning is understood. The amount of vocabulary that a child knows predicts their level of phonemic awareness and word reading, as depicted by the dotted arrows in the diagram below. Depending on the age groups and assessment measures used, studies indicate that vocabulary contributes between 4-15% of a child's phonemic awareness outcomes and 611% of their decoding skill7-10 .

Vocabulary

Phonemic awareness

Decoding

The lexical restructuring hypothesis11 provides a possible explanation. It suggests that whole word forms are stored initially, but as more vocabulary is acquired the sound structure of stored words begins to overlap, e.g. bat/bad, prompting words to be stored in an increasingly distinct and segmental way that supports word reading. A range of research evidence supports the effect of lexical restructuring12; 13

Vocabulary continues to be a stable predictor of phonemic awareness and decoding until around age 8 when phonological skills typically reach maturity9; 10. Over the course of Key Stage Two, vocabulary exerts progressively less influence on decoding, but its role in reading comprehension increases10. After this point, oral vocabulary continues to support irregular exception word reading14; 15, which cannot be read purely through phonic decoding and require access to the child’s understanding of the word’s meaning. In the example below, the child does not arrive at the meaning of the word ‘yacht’ through sounding out the word. Instead, after several attempts the pronunciation is linked to an item in the lexicon (word store).

In addition to studies describing vocabulary’s ability to predict levels of phonemic awareness and word reading, there is emerging research to show that vocabulary instruction may also be able to directly impact these skills, in addition to the expected vocabulary gains. One promising approach, drawn from the field of speech and language therapy16 , uses a combined focus on the sound structure and the meaning of new words. The combined sound-meaning approach has been shown to be effective for pupils with language impairment even in Key Stage Three17; 18. Evidence also indicates this to be an effective and inclusive classroom method in Key Stage One for improving vocabulary19; 20. In addition, several studies have found that the combined vocabulary approach also leads to phonemic awareness gains in this age group19,21. It is thought that improvements may be linked to higher lexical quality resulting from the multimodal emphasis on sound, meaning and print, seemingly supporting word learning, retention and retrieval22

The interconnected nature of vocabulary and word-level reading suggests that instruction should be carried out in a more integrated way to allow dual opportunities for vocabulary and phonemic learning, particularly in younger pupils and those who struggle with language and literacy. Such opportunities arise throughout the school day, for example, staff can discuss the meaning of words in a phonics lesson or tap out the sounds and syllables for new subject vocabulary.

Want to know more?

If you are interested in developing your knowledge, understanding and skills in language and literacy development to support your work or future career, take a look at the ‘Language and Communication Impairment in Children’ (LACIC) course at Sheffield University. There are a range of post graduate distance learning qualifications to choose from, including the Post Graduate Certificate (one year); Post Graduate Diploma (2 years) and MSc programmes (2 or 3 year options), all based on part-time online study supported by tutors and occasional study days.

The course would be relevant if you are a teacher, early years lead, SENCo, literacy coordinator, Advisory Teacher, Educational Psychologist, Speech and Language Therapist or other professional with a specific interest in supporting children’s language and literacy development. Previous students report that they feel more confident in supporting children with communication needs and that they have been able to cascade the learning to their schools and settings, thus improving outcomes for all. Students also say that the course enhanced their personal and professional development, creating new career opportunities.

Please visit the website for further details:

The university offered 100+ scholarships worth £10,000 each for home fee-paying students in 2023.

Rose Brooks NAPLIC member LACIC course tutor - University of Sheffield

(for references please see the end of the newsletter)

Kamini Gadhok retires as CEO of the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists

After 22 years at the helm of the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists (RCSLT) as Chief Executive (CEO), Kamini Gadhok bid her farewells at a retirement event held at the Tanner Warehouse in Bermondsey, London on 22nd March 2023. Ten of the 12 chairs she had worked with were able to attend, and she embraced each of those present in turn as their tributes to her hard work were made. Particular note was paid to her capacity for hard work and networking, commitment to causes close to her heart, her resilience and her human touch. One notable past chair able to be present was Dr Pamela Enderby. She was the lead claimant in a landmark legal case back in 1986, which successfully fought for equal pay for female speech and language therapists.

Introduced by the current chair, Sean Pert, Kamini thanked everyone who attended, the staff for their hard work and her husband for his support. She described that, of her three sisters, she had not been the academic one, and had only been noted by her mother for her ‘practicality’. Having decided that speech and language therapy would be her career at the age of 16, she surprised everyone by studying for A-levels. She said that she had never had any particular ambition to achieve what she had done, but that her motive had just been to improve the lives of those around her.

It was acknowledged that Kamini had been active in promoting equality and diversity in the college, and has done much in her career to raise the profile of women of colour, particularly of Asian descent, in the profession, and had been an exemplary role model herself.

The current president of the RCSLT, Nick Hewer, (perhaps better known for his role as consultant to Sir Alan Sugar on The Apprentice, and the compere on ITV’s Countdown) also paid tribute to Kamini’s energy and commitment inviting the audience to supply words to describe her. His was ‘miraculous’. (Mine is ‘dynamic’.) It was quipped that Kamini was being ‘re-tyred’ rather than ‘retired’ as she intends to continue to be ‘on the road’ in a voluntary capacity, continuing her work as chair on Covid Alliance UK which is a national coalition of organisations and groups providing support and advocacy around Covid-related issues in the UK.

Kamini is to be succeeded by Steve Jamieson. He joins from the Royal College of Podiatrists, where he was CEO/General Secretary. He has considerable experience in managing professional bodies in the healthcare sector. He was originally a nurse and has held the post of Deputy Director of Nursing at the Royal College of Nursing and CEO of the Hospice of St Francis in Berkhamsted. He is also a trustee of Dementia UK. The RCSLT website quotes Steve’s statement: “I am absolutely thrilled and honoured to be joining RCSLT. This is an incredible organisation and profession. I'm passionate about representing RCSLT members and will do everything in my power to make sure the voices of speech and language therapists are heard loudly and clearly.”