Tracie Dowling is an Ofsted registered childminder and mentor who has over 30 years of experience within the early year sector.
Tracie took up the opportunity to take part in the Enhancing Communication Support SLT ‘Hanen Teacher Talk’ programme through the Liverpool City Region and Beyond Early Years Stronger Practice Hub.
What is the Communication Support SLT ‘Hanen Teacher Talk’ Programme?
https://communicate-slt.org.uk/about-us/
The Programme is an evidence-based programme that uses researched-based strategies to help children develop language and communication skills. The programme is designed to be inclusive and caters to a wide range of early years practitioners, children, and families.
https://hanen.org/workshops/teacher-talk
This specific training has been aimed for childminders to offer them high quality training with one-to one coaching, to enhance the support they provide for all children’s speech, language, and communication development.
Tracie started the course in September 2024 with an initial home visit introducing her to Ellie-Mae her designated one-to-one coach. Ellie-Mae has supported Tracie throughout the course involving, visits, Teams’ meetings, evening group training, filming sessions and access to peer support through a WhatsApp group.
‘Initially I felt nervous to take part in the programme especially with the filming, but as soon as I met Ellie-Mae and Alex Sharp the Lead trainer from Communicate I felt confident and excited to have the opportunity to take part in the course.
The Course outline.
‘At the first training session I met the other 11 childminders participating in the training. As childminders we want to ensure we provide our minded children with the best opportunities to enhance their communication and language skills and I was thrilled to be chosen to take part’.
Throughout the training programme the childminders had to record insights, thoughts, and experiences to ensure the strategies learned had a positive impact on both the childminders practice and supported the children within the setting.
The childminders had to complete a daily delivery log which had been adapted to include the strategies they learned in the training sessions. These logs were used to support the research outcomes coved by the training.
The first workshop focus was ‘follow the child’s lead’ and ‘give reason to communicate and wait’. This session covered conversational styles, teacher roles, stages of development, observation wait and listen (OWL) and face to face interactions.
The childminders had to put together an action plan using the information covered in the workshop and used this to create a short 5-7minute video. Within the video the children and childminder needed to participate in an activity focusing on speech and language and ensured both the children and childminder could be seen and the ‘talk’ needed to be heard throughout. Once recorded the film needed to be uploaded to a secure folder for the one- to-one coach to access, then have a reflective session via zoom.
‘For my first film I chose a little boy aged 29months who is nonverbal, he needs extra support and thought this would be the perfect opportunity to provide 1-1 learning. I set up a pumpkin exploration and painting activity, I chose this activity as he loves Halloween and enjoys creative play. I provided him with toys and equipment to enable him to explore and create to encourage a rich language and communication environment.
I was extremely nervous about filming the activity, but when I received the positive feedback from Ellie-Mae this assured me that I had provided the child with an activity to enhance his communication and language outcomes.
The second workshop focused on ‘following the child’s lead’ by imitating, interpreting, commenting, and joining in with their play.’
The last face to face workshop focused on keeping your interactions going back and forth, taking turns, and using a plan called SSCAN which as five important steps:
- Small groups are best.
- Set up appropriate activity.
- Carefully observe each child.
- Adapt your response to each child’s needs.
Now keep it going.
At the the end of the session the childminders needed to write up their second action plan ready for the last filming session.
‘For my second film, I chose two children aged 30 months, who love water play. I provided them with artic animals, water, ice, igloos, Inuit figures and magnifying glasses to use for exploration. They ended up taking over the activity and adapting it themselves by filling a jug with the ice until it overfilled. They used rich descriptive language such as cold, wet, slippery, frozen, warm, and fluffy. I added new language such as transparent, Igloo, Inuit, Moose, solid, temperature and artic. It was evident the children had understood and learnt the new language by repeating the words within their extended play later in the day.
The feedback was very positive, and I was assured the language and communication styles we had covered where evident within the recording.’
How has the Hanen Programme benefited the children in your setting?
‘The children who I focused the filming around, have increased their participation within group activities and have made significant progress in their language skills.
The little boy who was nonverbal has now started saying a few words such as ‘dad, more, numbers 1-5 and up’ The parents are over the moon and have said it has improved the whole family’s sense of well-being’ As a practitioner I have found that the programme has encouraged the children’s family to integrate the strategies I have shared into everyday activities at home. This has given them confidence in their role as an essential part of their child’s learning’.
What impact has the Hanen Programme had on you?
‘The Hanen ‘Teacher Talk’ training has equipped me with knowledge around key interaction and language building strategies that I will use to nurture the best possible language, social and literacy skills of all children in my care. The training has personally given me the reassurance, confidence and confirmed I have been on the right track, ensuring the children I mind have the best possible start to life and thrive to be amazing communicators.
Tracie Dowling
Other Reading to supplement my knowledge:
https://www.hanen.org/programs/teacher-talk
https://www.hanen.org/programs/learning-language-and-loving-it
https://child-development-training.education.gov.uk/about/module-4
https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/early-years/evidence-store/communication-and-language
https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/early-years/evidence-store/early-literacy
https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/early-years/high-quality-interactions