The most important resource to support children’s developing communication and language skills are the adults around them (you and their parents/carers). It is important to develop positive interaction techniques within your staff teams and support parents or carers with this too. This video about scaffolding may be of interest.

It is vital that all leaders and managers are clear about the intentional strategies that their setting uses to ensure interactions are high quality and consistent across all team members. The Education Endowment Foundation’s Preparing for Literacy guidance report has various sections which may be of interest and the National Literacy Trust produced a report called Language unlocks reading which sets out an approach for structured, targeted and explicit language learning. Our Top Ten Tips for Talking and these top tips from Speech and Language UK may also be of interest to support you with this. The Hanen Centre in Canada have developed the OWL approach to communicating: Observe, Wait and Listen.