Which approach is right for you?

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 THE CAKE (1-3 hours)

This is the foundation of all services and includes all children, young people, their families and the professionals that work with them. 

My universal role is with parents, carers and professionals, in two different ways that are equally important:

1. Strengthen - to give information and advice to families and professionals, based on a secure foundation of reliable information of approaches or resources that could help.

2. Prevent - to check for gaps or common misunderstandings so that families and professionals have confidence in their reasoning and decision making together.

I offer information and advice which enables parents, carers and professionals to identify and take positive action with speech, language and communication needs as soon as they notice them, to understand why their communication is key and how small changes can make a big difference to learning and behaviour.

I also offer training sessions on my JIGSAW profiling tool, as well as the foundations speech, language and communication, and how it fits into a wider developmental context, e.g. with attention, verbal reasoning, social interaction and behaviour.

THE ICING (2-4 hours)

This builds on the universal foundation. It adds to the understanding and skills parents, carers and professionals already have, building on what they already know and do well in their day-to-day communication and interaction.

I offer small group sessions for professionals or parent carers educating at home, in specific areas:

1. Interpretation of a JIGSAW profile (1h) to see how the different areas relate and map out the strengths, differences and needs, then moving to next steps. This would be for an ALNCo, or their deputy, or with parent carers in home education.

2. Verbal reasoning training (2.5h) how and why to informally assess and make sense of the results, to understand the links between reasoning and regulation to add to universal good practice, and to plan intervention if needed. This would be a small group session for professionals or for parent carers in home education.

3. Language, Communication and Behaviour training (4h) This session covers how language development is linked to social, emotional and behaviour difficulties. It explores language and communication development within the JIGSAW model, and how evidence is key to identifying strengths, differences, and needs, to then agree decisions about next steps with confidence. There is also an introduction to two different ways to adapt adult communication, which fit with an inclusive environment whether whole class, small group or with individual learners. This would be a small group session for school staff or for parent carers in home education.

THE TOPPING (6- 8 hours)

This builds on the universal foundation and targeted training and/or intervention already in place. My role is to complete a Specialist Speech and Language Therapy (Specialist SLT) assessment with the child/young person, face to face, in a quiet room at school or at home if they are home educated. The decision to assess would be based on my review of a completed JIGSAW profile and the identified strengths, differences and needs. At that point, a specialist assessment may be one of the identified needs, because more detailed information would guide next steps, to add to what’s already available from universal school-based assessment or screening.

The assessment takes 6-7h in total, the steps are:

1. Review or create a JIGSAW profile to understand the strengths, differences and needs already identified. This is a 1h meeting with staff that know the learner best, parent carers can attend or send information in advance depending on what they’d prefer;

2.Agree next steps – this may be a follow up meeting to allow staff/parent carers to fill any gaps in the JIGSAW, deciding that Specialist SLT assessment is not the main need based on the current situation, arranging the assessment;

3. The assessment takes 2-3h: one-to-one session/s in a familiar setting, to complete standardised language assessments and structured observations of receptive and expressive language, social communication, task approach and motivation, executive function skills of attention, impulse control, flexible thinking, planning and organisation;

4. My report (2h) will detail the JIGSAW, the strengths, differences and needs across the range of areas and a clear summary with recommended next steps;

5. If I recommend using specific questionnaires to help make decisions about next steps, they would be discussed separately.