Radio 4 held a discussion today about a report from the government’s poverty ‘tsar’ Frank Field – that some children turn up for their first day of school not knowing
their own name.
You can listen to the discussion on the Radio 4 web site
Mr Field stated that more indicators need to be in place by the time a child is old enough to begin school, such as: the child being dry the child knowing their own name
the child knowing that pencils are for colouring and not stabbing
He stated that currently some children’s communication levels are so reduced that the above indicators are not being met, despite the child being of school-age.
The programme spoke to Neil Wilson, a Head Teacher in South Manchester who recognises the importance of the successful acquisition of communication skills by school age. He stated that it’s a real issue – that children who have not developed their communication between ages 0 – 3 just haven’t been talked to. He went on to say that primary school teachers do a lot of work on speech, language and communication and this is an incredibly important part of the learning process.
The programme queried whether Mr Wilson was talking only about children from a non-English speaking population, and that the issue was simply around having a different language at home. However he confirmed that within his federation the population was 97% white and therefore that the issue was around language, full stop.
The Children’s Champion, Jean Gross, elaborated on this later in the programme. She stated that there were two reasons for speech and language difficulties in nursery and school-age children:
- Biologically based impairment – that some children’s brains are just not wired for language as well as other children’s. She stated that 1.2 million children in this country have this difficulty
- A more socially or environmentally determined impairment – she used an example where she had been able to talk to her grandson for 10 minutes simply about a slug, and recognised that not all families had the luxury of putting time aside to be able to do this every day with different generations of their family.
She went on to say that parents will want to do the best by their child but they often simply don’t know how, and that many parents don’t know that they can talk to their child before they can talk back.
She also quoted some statistics:
A 58% rise over the last 5 years in children with speech and language difficulties as their primary Special Education Need (SEN).
Yet a foundation age study showed a slight improvement in under 5s children who have poor early speech and language skills are much more likely to be unemployed as adults , 65% of young offenders have speech, language and communication needs.
Speech and language difficulties are linked to behaviour difficulties and literacy difficulties
She also stated that in 2004 Stoke on Trent conducted a survey that showed 64% of their 3 year olds had severe communication difficulties. When speech and language therapy was utilised effectively this figure came down to 39%, demonstrating the benefit of speech and language therapy and strategies used by parents and educational settings.
She concluded that children need to be ‘picked up’ or have speech and language intervention early, before age 5, but that age 18 months is the time when children’s brains are most receptive to language development, and that this is when health and education professionals should be involved.
If you think your child may benefit from support with their communication skills, Integrated Treatment Services could be of help. Contact us.
Sarah Bennington July 2011
Written on behalf of Integrated Treatment Services. Integrated Treatment Services is a private Speech and Language Therapy service based in Leicestershire and the East Midlands. It specialises in providing highly-skilled Speech and Language Therapists, but also associates with other therapeutic professionals, including Occupational Therapists, Physiotherapists, Psychologists and Arts Therapists Therapists.
