Pre-School & School Screening Services
We provide whole group early intervention Pre-School and School screening services for provision of communication solutions.
4 year old Kinder to Grade 1 Screening
Kindergarten to Grade 1 Screening is a highly valuable tool for preparing children to learn and develop well at school for the best social and academic participation. These screeners involve our Senior Speech Pathologist screening all childrens’ speech, language and early literacy skills in a Kinder, Prep or Grade 1 class.
The Screening involves:
- Screening each child’s individual speech sounds, ability to follow instructions, expressive language, and foundational skills for reading and writing (i.e. phonological awareness).
- Individual analysis of each child’s skills.
- A summary sent to parents and teachers for each child with all results and ongoing teaching/ therapy recommendations to assist with their development.
- Feedback session for teachers and parents requiring any further information and/ or advice.
- Giving resources to families to practice any discussed areas that might require support.
- Feedback and mentoring session with teachers or teaching aides to assist with lesson planning, to ensure the screening results aid in the ongoing development of each child within the classroom.
Ongoing Group Therapy
Ongoing Group Speech Therapy is available for children who have been identified as requiring additional support.
This includes:
- A block of weekly group speech sessions for 4-6 students held at school.
- Specific speech, language and/ or literacy skills to support the students who have been identified in the screening as requiring additional support.
- Providing weekly home/ school practise to ensure the skills that are learnt are carried over to the classroom.
- Encouragement for Teachers and/ or integration aides to observe to learn how to best support each child’s learning needs.
- Re-testing for the students at the end of the therapy block, to help ensure improvement for all students who engaged in group sessions.
- Giving teachers and parents a report outlining each child’s individual results and specific learning needs.
- Comparing pre and post therapy results to ensure positive change has been made.
Value participating schools and families can receive:
- Early detection of speech, language or literacy difficulties for all children.
- Specialised support to assist children to develop speech, language or literacy skills so they can thrive and learn positively at school from the start.
- The results from 2015, showed all students who participated in the phonological awareness group therapy sessions went from below average to above average on the standardised assessment.
- Accurate and reliable data available for teachers to plan lessons, form learning groups and plan classes in upcoming years.
- Schools are given the opportunity to provide students with speech, language and communication disorders with individualised, specialised support to meet their learning needs.
- The program is run by our Senior Speech Pathologist, thus the schools are not burdened with organisational difficulties.
- The program is run in conjunction with parents, teachers and well-being officers to ensure the student’s program is tailored to meet the child’s most critical needs.
- Professional development opportunities are also available for the teachers and integration aides to observe and learn about specialised support for students with communication difficulties.
To find out more about running these programs at your school, please email [email protected].
Frequently asked questions
Is there a minimum amount of children you screen in a cohort?
We recommend screening children within entire age or grade groups. This allows us to compare strengths and weaknesses both individually and as a group, as well as providing group support. Please do enquire with us in the cases of a few children as it can be considered or a different approach might be best utilised for screening and assessment.
How do you inform parents?
Depending on the organisation we support, we always obtain consent pre screening to speak to both teachers and parents. Once we identify students who require further communication or information, we communicate with the parents following another check in with educators or teachers. This can be done via email or a scheduled phone call. Guidance and resources to assist can be discussed at this point. The reports for the entire cohort will be provided to the Kinder and/ or School after summarising results.
Can we contact you to engage with services following the screening process if support is required?
Yes, we would be very happy to advise or engage with you should any support services be required that we can provide. This can be discussed at any time post screening.
Please get in touch
We would love for you to get in touch to help determine the next steps. Please kindly fill out and submit this contact form.