Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment his Department has made of the level of (a) speaking and (b) understanding language ability of children starting secondary school in September 2021 compared to those who started secondary school in the years before the covid-19 outbreak.

The department does not have a current assessment of the number of children entering secondary school with speech and language difficulties or delay. We will have updated data on communication and language development later this year.

The department commissioned Renaissance Learning and the Education Policy Institute to collect data from a sample of schools to provide a baseline assessment of education lost and catch-up needs for year 3 to 9 pupils in schools in England and to monitor progress over the course of the 2020-21 academic year and the Autumn term 2021. The latest findings from this research, published 29 October 2021, include data from the 2020-21 summer term and a summary of all previous findings. Complete findings from the 2020-21 academic year can be found on GOV.UK: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/pupils-progress-in-the-2020-to-2021-academic-year-interim-report.

Latest evidence suggests that pupils are showing some degree of recovery in reading. By summer 2021, primary pupils were on average around 0.9 months behind in reading and secondary pupils were on average around 1.8 months behind compared to where they would otherwise have been in a typical year. This is an improvement since the second half of the spring term 2021, where primary pupils were 2.3 months behind, and secondary pupils were around 2.6 months behind.

That is why the department is investing nearly £5 billion on measures to support further recovery such as the National Tutoring Programme, teacher development, and the recovery premium to support teachers to implement evidence-based interventions to address education gaps. This is in addition to a strong core funding settlement which will see core schools funding rise by £4.7 billion by financial year 2024/25 compared to existing plans.

The department is investing in early years education recovery to address concerns around lost education. Improving training for early years practitioners is one of the key levers for driving up quality in early education providers, and language development is key to this. That is why we are investing £180 million of recovery support in the early years sector.

This includes £153 million for evidence-based professional development for early years practitioners, including through new programmes focusing on key areas such as speech and language development for the youngest children. It also includes up to £10 million for a second phase of the Early Years Professional Development Programme in academic year 2021/22, targeted to support early years staff to work with disadvantaged children. It also includes up to £17 million for the Nuffield Early Language Intervention (NELI). NELI is a proven programme aimed at the reception aged children needing extra support with their speech and language development and is proven to help children make around three months of additional progress. Two thirds of primary schools have signed up, the majority of these being schools with the highest levels of disadvantage, reaching an estimated 90,000 children.

As part of the department’s recovery strategy, we will also be significantly increasing the numbers of qualified level 3 special educational needs coordinators, to support better early identification and support of special educational needs and disabilities.