Screen and assess

Public Health England (PHE) and the Department for Education’s (DfE) Best Start in Speech, Language and Communication Programme aims to improve the rate of early identification of need in the early years and increase the number of children who are ready for school by the age of 5.

Click here to open the ELIM Handbook

All children in England are offered a 2 to 2½ year review completed by the health visitor as part of their universal service. The ELIM and intervention should be integrated into this review with all children to enhance identification of need.

It is anticipated that steps 1 and 2 are carried out primarily by the health visitor.

The handbook outlines the 3 steps of the Early Language Identification Measure and Intervention programme.

• The first step (Assessment carried out by the health visiting team) involves a simple measure for identifying which children might have early Speech Language and Communication needs as part of their 2 to 2½ year review. Based on the outcomes of this first step, those children where there is no current need can be offered general signposting to support ongoing language development. Where a need is identified they can be offered step 2 and 3 of the identification and intervention programme.
• The second step (Conversation) gives guidance on how to discuss and explore the identified needs and observations of the child’s language with the parent/carer. This may then lead to signposting to specific support and consideration of options.
• These can be explored fully in the third step (Intervention) which offers a framework for comprehensive engagement with families to work in partnership on agreed goals and interventions tailored to the family. Underpinning steps 2 and 3 is a Review of Progress. For each child where a need has been identified and intervention has been agreed through shared decision making between the parent/carer and practitioner, a review process should be carried out whereby interventions or goals set are reviewed with the parent/carer using existing systems within the service concerned.

Step 3 (Offering tailored support) could be offered by those working most closely with the child and their parent/carer (health visitor, speech and language therapist, early years practitioner) individually or in combination.

If the child is 2 to 2½ years old and in an early years setting and the early years practitioner identifies that they have concerns about the child’s language, a decision on the best way forward to assess the child’s SLCN should be agreed between the health visitor and the early years practitioner (EYP), with the parent/carer which may include the EYP completing step 1 of the ELIM and Intervention if they have received the appropriate SLCN training and ELIM & Intervention Training.

For teachers and practitioners working in Bradford local authority schools. the Launchpad for Literacy is an approach to literacy readiness for all children within the Early Years. In the Early Years and beyond, it also gives practitioners and leaders a tool to clarify what children CAN do, identify developmental skill gaps and set next steps, enabling you to:

• incrementally close gaps in relation to vulnerable groups.
• build skills to work towards group listening, participation and learning, supporting older children who find this problematic.
• target specific language and vocabulary skills involved in a 'Love of Reading' and pave the way for reading comprehension, inference and building knowledge.
• bridge the gap between spoken language and literacy by focussing on incremental sequences of skills.
• improve Phonic and longer-term literacy outcomes for reading and writing.
• avoid using 'blanket' approaches to literacy readiness and speech & language by embedding informed interventions into targeted practice and Quality First Teaching.
• implement 'progressive support' by setting appropriate next steps for children with more specific needs or where progress has plateaued, ensuring progression for all.
• avoid cycles of repeating what a child cannot do during interventions in order to facilitate progress.
• make more informed decisions about interventions based on diagnostic assessments, making communication with Outside Agencies more specific and two-way.
• focus on the language and social communication skills involved in PSED and appropriate behaviour.

Launchpad for Literacy also affirms and supports current good practice and pedagogy, allowing you to make more specific decisions about what you do and why, based on the skills children have now and the skills they need.

To find out more, visit the Launchpad for Literacy website.