Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to ensure that opportunity areas develop plans to improve communication and language skills of children and young people over the age of five.

We know that poor speech, language and communication (SLC) skills can hold children back at school and limit their later life chances. This was identified as an issue in all 12 of the Opportunity Areas, which is why we have put plans in place to improve outcomes in the early years and across all the different phases and age ranges.

Particular projects that include or focus on children over the age of five include the following:

In Stoke-on-Trent, we are extending the successful “Stoke Speaks Out” initiative to 25 primary schools with lower than average numbers of children attaining a good level of development. This will provide targeted, specialist support for early language, communication and literacy.

In Derby, we are inviting schools in the most deprived areas to participate in ‘Talk Derby’, an ambitious SLC programme offering a package of support including developing an improvement plan against their particular needs providing training and development for ‘front-line practitioners’ in identifying and supporting SLC needs and training parents to introduce an early talkers programme.

In Blackpool, we are targeting nine secondary schools in a key stage 3 reading project. This will provide a series of interventions with the aim of increasing students’ reading fluency, enhancing their vocabulary and improving their comprehension.

In Fenland and East Cambridgeshire, we are funding five schools to run evidence-based research projects to improve language and communication skills in their pupils, with a particular focus on the most disadvantaged.

In West Somerset, three schools have taken part in a systematic synthetic phonics programme, “Read Write Inc”, delivered by Ruth Miskin training. We are now making plans for a more widespread synthetic phonics programme for the next academic year.

In Bradford, we have approved a project through our Strategic School Improvement Fund that will support 23 schools to improve outcomes at key stage 1.