Best Practice

Speech, language and communication needs – how does your school measure up?

Inclusion SLCN
Effective support for children with speech, language and communication needs is essential, but how does your school measure up? Ten years on from the Bercow Review, Mary Hartshorne looks at the situation today and gives primary schools a checklist for best practice

Every year, excellent practice in supporting children with speech, language and communication needs (SLCN) are celebrated at the Shine a Light awards ceremony. This year’s primary school winner was Pendle Primary Academy in Lancashire.

Listening to them describing how they put talk at the heart of every aspect of their school, you sense how they have prioritised children’s spoken language. They are serious enough about it to have invested in their own speech and language therapist – not just for those pupils who have SLCN, but also for staff training and whole school approaches.

As a result, the school is now above the national average in reading and prides itself on creating confident young communicators.

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