All the research tells us our students are arriving at school with low oral language skills. The oral language children have when they start school directly impacts on their ability to think and to learn. Alison Burge presented findings from the "Welcome to school project" in Tamaki schools showing 53% of New Entrants assessed had significant concerns in Communication.
All students who enter the school environment need to learn about a variety of conventions and routines of talking and listening in a context that is unfamiliar to most of them. Students’ oral language improves through practice, that is, when students talk regularly for different purposes and with different partners. (Ministry of Education. (2009). Learning Through Talk: Oral Language in Years 1 to 3. Wellington)
At Sommerville we extremely fortunate to employ our own Speech language therapists who work directly with students and provide on going Professional development to our staff.
Francesca Bierens SLT has shared her Verbal language development Summary for how language is developed and the progress
Published: In 2015 by Speechmark Publishing Ltd, London, UK,
I have attached Oral language resources from Francesca that are worth a read.
Oral language development and abilities have significant impact on our students ability to access the curriculum in all areas.
Hi Donna, this is very informative and helpful to have on file. Thanks for sharing :)
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