Talk about Talk Secondary - giving young people the skills they need for work

1. Talk about Talk Secondary - giving young people the skills they need for work Practitioner Training 2018

2. What is Talk about Talk Secondary? A group intervention Prepares students to co-deliver workshops Talk for Work Profile Completed before and after the intervention to track progress Phase 1: Communication skills – what are they? (Lessons 1 - 4) Student Handbook and individual targets to record and track learning Phase 2: Preparing for the Practice Workshop (Lessons 5 - 8) Course review and applying learning beyond school Phase 3: Preparing for the Employers’ Workshop (Lessons 9 - 12)

3. Evaluating Talk about Talk Secondary • A range of measures enabled us to triangulate the data to ensure outcomes were met using rigorous and robust methods • Staff self report measure of confidence (adapted from the Speech, Language and Communication Framework) • Young person’s own rating of skills • Staff rating of young persons’ skills • Talk for Work Profile • Interviews with staff, students and employers • Small comparison study

4. Evaluation key findings • Students’ communication skills made significant improvement; especially ‘checking when confused’, ‘changing their style of talking’ and ‘listening’ • Students became more aware of their communication skills, and of how important they are for work • School staff felt more confident in supporting young people’s communication

5. Today’s training Session 1: SLC and SLCN at secondary Session 2: Running Talk about Talk Secondary Talk about Talk Secondary Practitioner training Session 3: Tracking student progress Session 4: Planning ahead

6. Learning outcomes • To have an awareness of speech, language and communication (SLC), including later language development • To have awareness of how communication difficulties (SLCN) can present at secondary age • To understand how to run the Talk about Talk Secondary course, including selection of students and use of the Talk for Work Profile • To understand your role in supporting students to co-deliver Talk about Talk workshops

7. Why language and communication remains important at secondary • Enables thoughts to go from my head to yours • Enables you to check out your understanding • Underpins literacy development, complex reasoning, relationships, successful life outcomes • Continues to develop throughout the teenage years and beyond • Lots of young people have poor language skills

8. Why language and communication remains important at secondary • Enables thoughts to go from my head to yours • Enables you to check out your understanding • Underpins literacy development, complex reasoning, relationships, successful life outcomes • Continues to develop throughout the teenage years and beyond • Lots of young people have poor language skills

9. I never said she stole my purse How does the meaning change when different words are emphasised?

10. The scale of the problem

11. To develop good language skills a child needs both .... A positive environment providing lots of good quality talk and interaction with the child A genetic make-up enabling language to develop

12. The communication chain (psycho-linguistic model) Processing skills Talking skills (expressive skills) Listening skills (receptive skills)

13. Communication chain

14. Communication chain

15. Communication chain

16. Communication chain Less severe difficulties with various parts of the communication chain

17. Communication chain

18. Case studies exercise

19. Rashid: Teacher’s report In school, teachers are worried about Rashid as he approaches GCSEs. He’s a quiet lad and not very confident– he’s always been a bit of a loner except for the few kids he plays computer games with. Rashid is not focusing in class – he often seems to be in a daze when the teachers are explaining important information, he’s doesn’t want to answer questions and usually gets them wrong by forgetting words he’s already been taught. This happens most in his science classes. In Key Stage 3, Rashid kept up quite well with his peers. His book work was neat and usually completed. He did well at practical work and experiments. But during Year 10 and now in Year 11 he’s become really passive and just waits to be told what to do first, and then reminded about the next step, and so on. Once he gets started, Rashid will usually keep going but even then he’s really disorganised so never finishes work in the tight deadlines teachers have to set to cover the syllabus. Rashid’s writing is really vague – lots of ‘things’ and ‘stuff’ – so often he could be talking about anything instead of a science report.

20. Evan: Teacher’s report Evan’s recently been in trouble for little things and this is distracting him from focusing on his GCSEs. He’s usually in trouble because he does something before he’s thought about how it’ll work out, and he’s rubbish at lying so he gets the blame. Sometimes Evan just shrugs when a teacher asks him a question in class, and then when he’s persuaded to explain what he thinks he gets into a confusing ramble and you often end up wondering ‘what was all that about?’ It’s like he doesn’t understand the work he’s been doing but I know, watching him in practical sessions, that he does. His literacy skills are a worry and he’s had some extra help with this, but it hasn’t made as much difference as hoped. Before GCSEs, Evan worked hard at all his subjects but now he only seems to be making an effort in Food Technology because he’s decided to become a chef. He’s got lots of natural talent, but even there teachers report problems: his last project that he’s really proud of was all over the place; really confusing. The written report was full of spelling mistakes, simple steps were in the wrong order and sentences rambled on for ever. It’s certainly not up to the standard needed for exam success.

21. Paul: Teacher’s report Paul has had problems during the work experience arranged for him at a garden centre and nursery. His home background is very disadvantaged and quite chaotic but the stability of school’s been good for him. One of the difficulties Paul has is working in a small group or team. He either becomes really aggressive very quickly or messes around. He won’t accept anyone challenging what he thinks is best. When his class peers are having a discussion about the topic Paul starts to get angry, putting people down for using ‘big’ words and teachers have to step in before it gets out of hand. Working on his own is normally OK, even though what he produces is pretty basic. Around school, Paul hangs out with a bunch of lower ability students, one of whom Paul calls his ‘butler’. On work experience, problems happened because he said the bosses were treating him badly and ordering him around. And he almost got into a fight with an employee over something that was really just meant to be a joke. When they asked him to work in their shop, they got a couple of complaints from customers about Paul being rude, even though he genuinely didn’t seem to know what he’d done wrong.

22. Amber: Teacher’s report Amber’s always been a talented student who’s worked hard in all her subjects. She’s predicted to get high grades in Science, Maths, Languages, but also in Music, Computing and others too. Amber’s quite shy and has avoided all the distractions of boys and fashion, etc that her peers get caught up with. She speaks quite formally in a voice that lacks much intonation and wears her hair long in a way that reminds me of curtains she can hide behind. She sticks with one or two girlfriends who are also interested in horses. So the school thought a work placement in the office of nearby stables would be perfect. Amber was given a job inputting customer data into the old-fashioned software that the office had been using for ever. Amber thought it would be helpful to update them to a more modern system and quietly went ahead doing the necessary work. The office manager thought Amber was taking a long time doing the work she asked for but let her get on with it. When Amber proudly announced what she’d done, the manager was really angry. She had no idea how to use the new system and when Amber explained to her how it worked, her instructions baffled the older woman. Amber was really surprised by the reaction and refused to return to the office.

23. Receptive difficulties • Problems with: • Understanding • Conversations • Memory • Word learning • Being organised • Expressive difficulties • Problems with: • Explaining • Conversations • Using the right words • Poor language • Problems with: • Understanding • Big words • Language register • Interacting with others • Can often catch up with good support and practice • ASD • Problems with : • Focusing attention • Understanding • Non Verbal Communication (NVC) • Language register • Interacting with others • Relying on rules and systems But each young person is different and their difficulties are often hidden

24. SLC in teenage years • Later language development is centred on: • Word learning and retrieval  • Figurative language  • Comprehension, verbal reasoning  • Sentence structure and narrative  • Social use of language, conversation • Meta-linguistic skills

25. SLC in teenage years • Later language development is centred on: • Word learning and retrieval  • Figurative language  • Comprehension, verbal reasoning  • Sentence structure and narrative  • Social use of language, conversation • Meta-linguistic skills

26. Behind the behaviour Badly behaved Doing this gets me removed from a difficult situation I can’t understand any of this, so I’ll just play with my phone Not paying attention De-motivated Every time I try to do this it all goes wrong and I feel stupid

27. Behind the behaviour Aggressive He thinks I’m stupid and now he’s laughing at me I’m not sure what that question was about so I’ll guess it’s this Odd response I can’t put the words together to explain, and it’s taking me ages Stupid

28. Communication difficulties terminology • Developmental language disorder (DLD) – difficulty with speech, language and/or communication not arising from any other area of SEN • Language disorder (LD) associated with x – difficulty with speech, language and/or communication arising from another area of SEN

29. ‘Features of SENDs’ and ‘Who’s Talking’ exercises In pairs, decide which information refers to each of these special educational needs: • Highfunctioning autism / Asperger syndrome (AS)  • Attention deficit / hyperactivity disorder (AD / HD)  • Dyslexia or specific learning difficulty (SpLD) • Moderate learning difficulties (MLD)   • Developmental language disorder (DLD)

30. Indicators of SLCN • Consider their social interaction • Look at their written language • Check how they follow a series of instructions • Consider how they retell a ‘story’ • How do they generate vocabulary?

31. Indicators of SLCN – story re-tell Dr Pamela Snow (2001)

32. Indicators of SLCN – • generating vocabulary • get into pairs • one of the pair will generate as many items from a given category as they can within a minute • the other will note down the items said • speakers, your category is.... • listeners, what did you notice?

33. Today’s training Session 1: SLC and SLCN at secondary Session 2: Running Talk about Talk Secondary Talk about Talk Secondary Practitioner training Session 3: Tracking student progress Session 4: Planning ahead

34. Principles of the programme • Enable independent communicators • Break skills down • Practise and prompt • Develop reflection skills • Individual goal setting is important • Teach group skills

35. Overview of Talk about Talk Secondary Phase 1: Communication skills – what are they? (Lessons 1 - 4) Phase 2: Preparing for the Practice Workshop (Lessons 5 - 8) Delivering the Practice Workshop in school Phase 3: Preparing for the Employers’ Workshop (Lessons 9 - 12) Delivering the Employers’ Workshop Reviewing learning 35

36. Which skills do employers want most? 36

37. Which skills do employers want most? Rank the communication skills like this ... Least important Most important Be prepared to say why you decided on this ranking 37

38. Presenting the communication chain Practice and employers’ workshop 38 38

39. Introducing the ‘communication chain’ … … which we think is more like a chain reaction • Each ‘domino’ has to do its bit so that all the following ones can work too – and all in a split second!

40. Communication chain • The first stage is noticing that someone is speaking to you

41. Communication chain Next you look at the other person and listen to what they are saying ....

42. Communication chain • Then you have to hear the words … • … understand what they mean • … and put them together to make sentences that make sense

43. Communication chain • Then you look at the other person’s expression and body language …

44. Communication chain • … put all that together to understand what has been said.

45. Communication chain • Then you need to reply … • So, you get an idea about what to say …

46. Communication chain • ... decide what’s appropriate depending on who you’re talking to • and where you are...

47. Communication chain • … find the right words in your memory • … put them together to make sentences

48. Communication chain • … choose the right expression and body language

49. Communication chain • … programme your speech muscles • … and speak!

50. Communication chain • Check out the other person’s expression, and you’ve got it! • Then you have to keep the conversation going! • But many young people have difficulties with different parts of this chain reaction