#SpeakUpSalford

Staff
& Professionals

Speech is difficult to understand

 

What to do ✔

If you are unsure what a child is saying you can:

Ask questions to help narrow down the topic. Keep the questions short and specific, for example:

“Inside school or at home?”

“With mum or with dad?”

“Were you on holiday?”

“Yesterday or today?”

“Were you driving or walking?”

These make it easier to understand what the child is trying to say rather than broad questions such as “Where did you go?”

 

Check you have understood, by repeating back the words you think you have heard.

For example:

“So, you went to Spain?”

 

Ask the child to slow down. Slowing down your own rate of speech will encourage them to do the same, and will help to make it easier for you to understand them.

 

Show interest in what they are saying. Keep your face and voice lively and let the child know you are interested in what they have to say. This will encourage them to explain. Try to keep normal eye contact and posture.

 

Encourage the child to use normal cues to supplement their speech (your child may not do this automatically and may need frequent and gentle prompting). Some examples of this are:

  • Pointing
  • Gesturing/signing
  • Facial expressions
  • Drawing/writing
  • Say what the first sound of the word is
 

Take time to tune in. Spend some time getting used to the child’s speech in situations where you might be able to predict what he is going to say e.g. sharing a book together. This will help to build the child’s confidence.

 

A home/school book where parents can write down family and pet names and what they did at the weekend, as this will give you some clues as to likely topics of conversation

 

Try and work out what sounds the child says instead of the correct sound (what sounds they substitute) – this will help you understand the child. For example:

‘ k ’ always said as ‘ t ’, so coat toat

‘d’ always said as ‘g’, so dad gag

 

 

What to avoid ✘

Making the child repeat the words after you and never say ‘say it properly’.

 

Asking the child to repeat what they have said more than once, as this will be frustrating and embarrassing for them.

 

 

 

Ask your Speech and Language Therapist for more information.

NEWS/ EVENTS

Examples of What We Offer

Early Years

Our Early Years team follow the Greater Manchester Early Years Delivery Model (EYDM). They work in close partnership with health, local authority and social care colleagues to support early identification of speech, language and communication needs to ensure the right support at the right time for children, parents/ carers and settings.

School and Post 16

We work within with settings to identify and support communication needs. This could through training staff, modelling and coaching, whole class/ small group input and 1:1 interventions. There is a wide virtual training offer available for Salford schools. Please speak to the school/ college Link Speech and Language Therapist if you have any questions. 

 

 Enhanced Services

The Enhanced Speech and Language Therapy (SALT) Service allows settings to buy-in additional support. This is bespoke to each setting and might involve universal, targeted and specialist input and training. For further information, please contact  salttraining@nca.nhs.uk

 

I would also like to say that I am very impressed with the work Speech and Language Therapist is doing in school as well as the professional way she deals with my parents and her helpful advise to my staff. I believe credit where credit is due.

School staff

I have found working with the speech therapist very beneficial. She helps me to set achievable goals for the children by coming into the nursery and interacting with the children and getting to know them. She talks to us on a regular basis and updates us on what targets she would like the children to achieve next. She teaches us new strategies to use with the children which we find really useful, we try to incorporate this into everyday activities. Parent’s often comment on how much they appreciate the advice from our therapist. They also comment on how much progress their children have made since visiting her. We don’t know what we would do without her!

Anneka Williamson, Children’s Centre Practitioner

My child absolutely LOVES coming to see you, you are so good with him. We are extremely grateful for all of your care and support. He is counting down the days until we can come again.

Parent

I just wanted to send a quick email to say thank you for the training you delivered for us this afternoon, it was so useful and informative. It was great to have further training that was bespoke to Early Years and built on what we had done in the whole school training. We're excited to start implementing it for our children.

Early Years Teacher

EPs and SALT frequently work together during Multi agency meetings to clarify individual concerns and strengths. We develop joint objectives, that are regularly reviewed and evaluated to improve outcomes for children and young people. Parents and teachers comment that this work is effective and helps to increase their understanding and knowledge. Jointly we increase schools capacity, through conversations and training, to meet the needs of their pupils.

Joanne Snee- Educational Psychologist

I am new to the role and I have found all members of the team extremely helpful and have gone out of their way to support me.

School SENCo

This is great and I am so appreciative of your support. We have nothing but fantastic things to say about the Salford SALT team and the support that you have given to both of our children.

Parent