says
Janet Cooper
Faith Cross
Stoke Speaks Out
Stoke Speaks Out history..
• Stoke Speaks Out is a multi-agency City wide
programme aimed at tackling the huge deficits
identified in children’s language ability across
Stoke on Trent
• In 2001 local Surestart programmes provided
opportunities to explore the needs of local
populations
• The speech and language therapists involved in
Surestart in Stoke on Trent investigated
children’s language skills on entry to nursery
• The results were shocking…
Results of the initial study
• There was an average delay of 64%
across the nurseries tested
• In a few nurseries ALL children fell well
below expected norms
• The findings were supported by anecdotal
evidence from the nursery practitioners
and local health visitors and were reflected
in poor outcomes for children in school
Developing an idea
• The information was shared with a wide
range of strategic audiences including the
Director of children’s services, council
leaders and chief executive of the primary
care trust
• They all agreed that this was one of the
City’s priorities and that communication
should be everybody’s business
Stoke Speaks Out
• A project was developed jointly by a range of
key agencies
• The funding also came from joint sources
(initially Neighbourhood Renewal funds)
• The aim of the project was to embed a culture
and practice of supporting and developing early
communication skills at every level and to make
communication ‘everybody’s business!’
• This was branded Stoke Speaks Out
The project
• The project began as a core team hand picked
from a range of agencies and led by Janet
Cooper- a speech and language therapist
• The agencies ranged from Inclusion staff, SLTs,
clinical psychologists, teachers, early years staff,
bilingual support, midwife, play specialists
• The project also considered anyone within the
children’s workforce to be a member of the
extended team
The brief
• The brief was to embed core skills across
the children’s workforce through training
and mentoring and to create cultural and
strategic change
Turning a project into a programme
• The project developed a 5 tier training
framework- written multi-agency, delivered
multi-agency to a multi-agency audience
• The framework ensured that practitioners
all started with the same baseline
knowledge and encouraged the theory to
be put into practice
Activity
• 4150 practitioners trained between 2004-2010
• 20 toddler groups have been developed and
supported across the City to offer structured play
sessions
• All Children’s centre staff attend the training as
part of their induction and ongoing CPD
• 25 settings have achieved a ‘communication
friendly’ award
• All student midwives and student paediatric
nurses receive level 1 as part of their training
• The training framework has continued to
grow- agencies delivering related courses
develop these into level 3 modules
• These are now being linked to care
pathways for some agencies eg ASD
• ECAT is strategically aligned with SSO
• ECAT settings have been supported to
work towards the level 4 competencies (14
out of 33 have already achieved this)
• Additional courses written for ECAT have
been turned into level 3 ‘bitesize’ courses
to offer more widely
Outcomes
Speech and language measures
• 2005 City wide measures: 59% delay
• 2010 City wide measures: 39% delay
Foundation stage profile results:
2008 43% children achieved 78 points or more with 6+
points in PSED or CLL
2009 this rose to 51%
The National average is 52%
Level 4 settings are being recognised by Ofsted as
Outstanding settings
Engaging a wider audience
• Need identified to engage with the older
age range to break the cycle of poor
communication skills
• 11-19 training framework developed based
on the original model
• This encourages a wide multi-agency
group to identify their role and develop
layers of support
Special schools
• Outreach role of special schools linked
into SSO framework
• Special schools delivering level 3 modules
• All special schools have achieved level 4
or are working towards this
The future
Moving from an expert phase to an
empowering phase
1.Expert phase:
•Develop an evidence base of
local need
•Research the causes
•Identify ways of addressing this need
•Develop new ways of tackling the
issues
•Trial and perfect the methods
4. Empowering
phase
Sharing the expertise
beyond the City and
ensuring the ongoing
work is self-sustaining
Stoke Speaks
Out
3. Embedding
phase
Building in the
capacity and expertise
within agencies to
continue to support
and address the local
need
2. Enabling phase
Training and supporting the
infra-structure to develop
skills to support all areas
which affect communication
development
Linking ‘Hello’
• The campaign links perfectly with our aims
and vision
• Part of the Hello operations group to share
our expertise
Introducing Hello
• Team meeting to identify how to move forward
• Multi-agency meeting to introduce and gather
wider set of ideas and interest
• Briefings at a range of events
• Part of ECAT ELLP sessions
• Launch day involving all relevant partners
• Giving the tools, resources and enthusiasm for
people to be independent to get involved
Launch day!
SAYS…
• Feedback from the launch yesterday