Speech Link Multimedia Ltd contributes evidence to the Oracy Report released on Wednesday 28th April 2021 by the Oracy All Party Parliamentary Group.
Recently, The Oracy APPG published their final Inquiry Report which highlights the significant impact of the pandemic on the already marked spoken ‘language gap’ between disadvantaged students and their peers. SL Multimedia (the trading name of Speech Link Multimedia Ltd) was pleased to be asked to submit evidence to the Group from our standardised data, confirming the prevalence of the language gap for 4-5 year olds.
As Emma Hardy MP writes in The House (https://www.politicshome.com/thehouse/article/speaking-skills-must-be-at-the-heart-of-education-catchup-in-schools)
Speaking skills must be at the heart of education catch-up in schools
The impact of Covid-19 school closures on children’s spoken language skills paints a stark picture, with the already persistent language gap between disadvantaged students and their peers …
“The report presents its case in great detail and its recommendations include:
- investing in a teachers’ professional development at every stage;
- equipping and empowering teachers and schools to provide sustained, and comprehensive, high-quality oracy education;
- including oracy as part of funded policy initiatives such as opportunity areas and English hubs;
- ensuring that oracy is part of any recovery or ‘catch up’ investment;
- and the return of an oral language component as a part of the grading at GCSE level.”
Here at Speech Link Multimedia Ltd, we are pleased to help fulfill all these recommendations. Our aim to provide everything a school needs to support children with SLCN:
- The Link CPD – an SLCN training package for teachers and TAs
- regular webinar SLCN training hosted by our specialist SaLT team
- focussing on support and interventions to ‘connect’ and ‘reconnect’ with schools, children and young people, parents and specialist teams
- assessment and support packages for children aged 4-14, as children and young people have SLCN beyond Early Years
- improving the level of appropriate referrals and working with local speech and language therapy services.
If you are interested in our data, please email the Speech & Language Link Help Desk at helpdesk@speechlink.co.uk.