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MAGAZINE • March 2010 • ISSN 1336-0799 • www.BATOD.org.uk

British Association of Teachers of the Deaf

Quality standards

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From your editor There is a range of qualitystandards which affect Teachersof the Deaf in their professionallife. Sometimes they may beregarded as rather burdensome,representing yet more paperwork,but it is clear from these articles

that they can have a significant and positive influenceon practice. There is also a related article on theimplementation and positive effect of the EarlySupport Monitoring Protocol. Furthermore, not allquality standards are imposed from outside. Teachersof the Deaf, and indeed BATOD itself, have beeninvolved in a number of quality standards initiatives –most recently when, as Lindsey Rousseau explainsin her article, the NDCS decided to fine-tune thegeneric support and outreach services standards tomake them more specifically applicable to servicesfor deaf children. Many services and colleagues wereinvolved in drawing up these standards, as well asrepresentatives of BATOD and the RNID, underliningthe value of collaborative working which is now sucha strong part of current practice. We would be verykeen to receive your response to these standards.

As many readers will know, the Christmas and NewYear period brought the very sad news of the deathof three members: Peter Preston, Andrew Broughtonand Eirwen Carpenter. Obituaries for thesecolleagues will be on the BATOD website. You canread them by following The Association >> AboutBATOD >> News of Members >> Obituariessubmitted by colleagues.

Forthcoming topicsMay Conference edition:

Communicating clearly together –with the RCSLT

September Aetiology, diagnosis andsupporting parents

November Post-16 issuesJanuary 2011 TAs and support workersMarch 2011 Literacy and maths

Please let me know if you would like to contribute an article – or suggest one – for any forthcomingeditions of the Magazine.

Magazine editor

Quality standardsIntroducing QS 4

Making quality standards work 5

A bone anchored hearing aids update 7

Developing audiology standards 8

Up to the standards 10

More answers than questions 12

Good practice for FM 13

Assessing the impact 14

General featuresSounding positive 18

An Essex study 20

Morpheme trials 24

Time well spent 26

Access to phonics and literacy 28

A new perspective 30

The Chatterbox Challenge 32

Conference content 34

Time for rhymes 35

Keeping in touch 36

Graphically illustrated advantages 38

Research summary 40

RegularsReviews 49

ICT news 50

This and that 53

Abbreviations and acronyms 54

Calendar – meetings and training 56

Association businessFlying high 2

Representing you – Deaf Educational

Support Forum 42

Representing you – NDCS and HMI 44

What went on at NEC on 5 December 2009 46

Change of address notification form 47

The Ofqual Equality Bill 48

BATOD was there representing you… 48

Subscription rates 2009/10 55

Officers of Nations and Regions inside back cover

Cover pictureAlfie Dawkins with a teacher at Beam Primary School,Essex. Courtesy of NDCS.

Need to contact BATODabout other matters?

Talk to National Secretary Paul Simpson

email: [email protected]

answerphone/fax 0845 6435181

Contents

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49

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For information on advertising rates see www.BATOD.org.uk

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Did the 16th President of BATOD achieve herstrapline intention to keep BATOD ‘flying high’?Obviously in the course of the past two years

it hasn’t especially been ‘The President’ who haspersonally raised the profile of BATOD – many people,in particular Paul Simpson, our National Secretary, haveattended meetings and taken part in developmentalwork that has enhanced materials and circumstances forTeachers of the Deaf. Apart from Paul, who is our onlypaid employee, all the work has been voluntary andcarried out with amazing enthusiasm and willingness bycolleagues, mostly in full-time occupations, who havesqueezed the extra time from their busy schedules.

The effect has been amazing – BATOD is well regardedat the highest levels of government, with regularcommunications from the DCSF and other bodies,including the invitation to become involved with thefunding of additional training places to provide moreToDs. Our network has provided evidence, someanecdotal, about numbers and profile of ToDs, and whatis happening across the UK in services and provisionsto support deaf children and young people.

Annually, alongside the teaching unions, BATODsubmits comments on pay and conditions to the SchoolTeachers’ Review Body. The unions read our submissionand sometimes pick up and support what we are sayingwith regard to ‘unattached’ teachers. For several yearsBATOD has been mentioned in the final STRB reportthanks to the contributions of Ted Moore. Peter Prestontook on the role of BATOD Consultant and he wasinvited to attend and submit oral evidence to STRB on BATOD’s behalf. It is important to continue to raisethe position of ToDs as their circumstance when notemployed in a school setting is often misunderstood.The structure of teachers’ pay in England is a challengeto ToDs who take on responsibilities but do not appearto be entitled to additional allowances.

Peter Preston died just before Christmas 2009. TheBATOD National Executive Council is sad to lose such a valuable member, and colleagues in BATOD and throughout the profession extend their deepestcondolences to his families and friends.

Since September 2009 Peter’s advice, especially onissues of pay and conditions, has been particularlyappreciated by the Association’s officers and the NECas he took on the role of BATOD Consultant. Hiscomments and advice were always studied and fair.

Peter’s firm, forceful and clear enumeration of the pointswhich he made in BATOD’s submission to the STRBdemonstrated his commitment to the role that he feltBATOD should play at this level.

Peter was fervent in his desire to promote themaintenance of quality provision for deaf pupils and hebelieved there should be choice and clear specialist ToDmanagement. Throughout his career there has been arelentless climate of change which has threatened thisgoal. Along with members of NEC, Peter believed thatBATOD has an essential role to play in the ongoing fightto maintain an appropriate continuum of provision fordeaf pupils and the status of the mandatory qualificationfor ToDs.

Supporting our members as they attempt to quantifytheir role and its ‘value’, the NEC has produced anupdated list of some of the areas that are covered byToDs in their everyday work. Other documents havebeen produced to help BATOD members become awareof the range of information required to provide andsupport effective services. Currently NEC is researchingthe models of service provision.

I was especially pleased that Oticon sponsored theupdating and subsequent publication on the website of all the audiology refresher sheets and supportivearticles. These will form the basis of further developmentof the audiology section of the website. There havebeen other materials that I have been involved withpersonally, such as the ‘Can he hear?’ leaflet formainstream teachers, that have widened the scope of BATOD materials and resources.

Keeping all members up to date and aware of what isgoing on and what is being said on their behalf in arange of meetings was part of my mission at the start ofmy presidency. I reminded everyone then that we havethe website for fast communication which relies on anactive membership checking for changes, especially inthe members only area; the Association Magazine whicharrives at approximately two-monthly intervals burstingwith practical information about focus topics as well asreports, reviews and notices; the Journal Deafness andEducation International with research information andresults that could affect the way we work and provideupdated knowledge for practitioners. Reaching a rangeof professionals there is also the ToD email forum wherequestions are responded to by a range of colleaguesand if necessary information can be passed on quickly.

A s s o c i a t i o n b u s i n e s s

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Flying highIn her final editorial as BATOD President, Ann Underwood

reviews the progress made over her two-year tenure and paystribute to the hard work and commitment of BATOD membersand officers

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To this end BATOD also contributes to the effectiveHOSS forum which allows heads of services to sharemanagement information. The information is therewaiting to be read and utilised.

BATOD has also held its head high abroad as a leadingmember of FEAPDA (our Secretary Paul Simpson isPresident). Collaboration has extended beyond the UKthrough our involvement, as a member of FEAPDA, in a successful European Leonardo da Vinci project ablydeveloped by Andrew Broughton from Telford andWrekin. This project aims to develop pan-Europeancompetencies for Teachers of the Deaf and we hopethat BATOD members will get involved in this. Andrewdied on New Year’s Day and we hope that a successfuloutcome of the project will be a fitting memorial to hiscommitment to and perseverance in the cause of deafeducation.

Even within the gloomy forecast of approximately onethird of the ToD workforce retiring before 2012 and areduction in numbers of BATOD members in spite ofmuch effort put into a membership drive, it is quiteexciting that we have seen BATOD North gatherstrength and recover from a spell in the doldrums, andthe revival of BATOD South West. Wanda Garner hasbeen instrumental in encouraging ToDs in the area tomeet together to benefit from an interesting trainingprogramme. Karen Taylor and Liz Reed-Beadle haveresponded to the local demands of BATOD members in

the eastern region – their key problem with networkingis distances for ‘real’ meetings. From this an eighthBATOD region – BATOD East – has been born.

The annual report, which you received with yourJanuary Magazine, once again outlines the tremendousamount of work carried out on your behalf while you‘get on with the day job’. As everyone has busy livesand changing lifestyles, voluntary organisations arefinding it a challenge to locate people who are willing to give time to their management and work. Everyonewho has given time to BATOD has found it valuable –knowing what is going on, getting information as fast as it appears, and being able to influence activities and consultation responses. The benefit, especially incareer development (and CV writing!) is for everyone –the ‘ordinary’ ToD as well as the lead professional – soplease consider standing for election to the NEC whenthe opportunity comes along in September.

In my opinion, but then I suppose I am biased, wehave continued to keep the Association in the forefrontof activities, leading professionals in deaf education,supporting the BATOD membership, promotingexcellence in deaf education and ensuring that BATOD is flying high.


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The publication of the DCSF Quality standards forspecial educational needs (SEN) support andoutreach services in September 2008 was an

important milestone in bringing together aspirationalstandards for all services working with children andyoung people with SEN.

These standards build on and replace earlierdocuments published by DCSF (or DfES) and otherorganisations. Since their publication they haveattracted interest and good professional debate, withsupport and outreach services working together toshare developments and benchmark service deliveryacross local boundaries.

The publication of the National Deaf Children’s Society(NDCS) Specialist teaching and support services fordeaf children and young people, in September 2009,offers services for deaf children more specific guidancewhich can be applied across the full range of servicesfor deaf children and young people in early yearssettings and in mainstream, special school and otherprovision. The NDCS QS were adapted from the DCSFstandards and do not attempt to replace them.

Inevitably there have been some questions asked about the status of the various publications of qualitystandards. With the focus of this BATOD Magazine, this seems to be the right place to look at the rationaleunderpinning the publications, and how they fit in withthe agenda of 2010 and the role of services in helping toimprove outcomes for deaf children and young people.

In 2002 a working party for the DfES published qualitystandards for VI services. These were a really usefulstart for specialist ‘low incidence’ services to developmore robustly in line with recognised standards. TheDfES made clear that it would not be working on othersensory impaired QS and so, in 2004, based on the VIQS, MSI QS were developed through Sense, and SIQS through the SERSEN partnership.

In 2005 the attention of schools and services was beingincreasingly drawn to the gap in attainment of pupilswith SEN, compared with the achievement of otherpupils, and Ofsted undertook a report and consultationon the impact of support and outreach services. One ofthe recommendations from that report was to producequality standards, which would not be minimumstandards, but which would be challenging and noteasily achieved.

Alongside the consideration of QS in England therewere other publications of standards for those workingwith deaf children. In 2005 the National Assembly forWales produced Quality Standards for Children andYoung People with Sensory Impairment (Circular34/2005), while in Scotland QS for SI services hadbeen developed in 1999. The Department of Health inEngland also produced guidance entitled TransformingServices for Children with Hearing Difficulty and theirFamilies in 2008.

Specialist teaching services have a crucial role in helping to improveoutcomes for deaf children andyoung people

In order to fulfil its commitment to produce QS forsupport and outreach services, in 2007 the DCSFasked the south east regional partnership facilitators to develop generic standards with it. The process wasgreatly helped by a steering group which includedmembers of Ofsted, SEN advisers, the DCSF SpecialEducational Needs and Disabilities division and anational reference group which included manyrepresentatives from services and schools for thedeaf. The published QS are not perfect but they arebroadly applicable across all services and offer a leadto improved outcomes for children and young peoplewithin the five ECM outcomes. They recognise thedevelopment of traded and commissioned services,have been mentioned in Parliament (June 2009) and,most importantly, are used as a tool by Ofsted.

The answer to that question about status is that, forDCSF, these quality standards have replaced allprevious versions.

So, how did the NDCS QS come about and whatpurpose do they serve? The NDCS believes that deafchildren and young people have the right to participateequally in education and to achieve their potentialacross the full range of educational and lifeopportunities. It recognises that specialist teachingservices have a crucial role in helping to improveoutcomes for deaf children and young people. Thefurther development of the generic DCSF qualitystandards as a specific tool for deaf services was seenas a way to support local services and presented thewelcome opportunity for some joint working acrossNDCS, RNID and BATOD in their development.

Q u a l i t y s t a n d a r d s

Introducing QS Lindsay Rousseau provides some background to the quality standards

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In special education, services have had access to a range of quality standards intended to supportcontinuous improvement. The challenge has been to

make the best use of those which will serve to providetangible rather than theoretical improved outcomes for children and families. Services which support theeducation of deaf children have been presented with standards on a huge range of subjects, fromassessment to transition and from FM management tocochlear implants. Using standards to best effect is achallenge for any service and the following is an outlineof the way inclusion services in general and the hearingand vision support services in particular used the lateststandards in Dorset, Bournemouth and Poole.

The Quality standards for special educational needs(SEN) support and outreach services (DCSF, 2008)were devised to assist local authorities in determiningappropriate resources, to illustrate standards of goodpractice, to support monitoring and evaluation and toguide the development of provision and support. Thiswas the first comprehensive recognition of the need to review outcomes/management strategy for supportand outreach services. By making a direct link with theEvery Child Matters (ECM) agenda, the aim was toensure that children and young people (CYP) wereproperly supported to meet these outcomes.

The extension of these standards, commissioned andsupported by NDCS, RNID and BATOD, led to thepublication of the Quality standards for specialistteaching and support services for deaf children and

young people (NDCS/RNID, 2009). These standardswere developed specifically for use by specialistservices for deaf CYP and drafted so that they could be applied across the UK.

Using the standardsBecause these two sets of quality standards relatedirectly to the current approach towards commissioningand provision, they can provide an excellent startingpoint for service development and planning. Foreducation support services, service development planshave often been brought together on a rather ad hocbasis, with an eclectic mix of activities built on thestrengths of a particular team, a view on ‘what we might do next’ and a reactive approach to the latestgovernment initiatives. The links with plans above andbelow have sometimes been tenuous at best.

The new quality standards for deaf CYP relate veryeffectively to the themes which are challenging mostlocal authorities. They fit well with the drive forcontinuous improvement and recognise the primaryimportance of outcomes when measuring the valuespecialist services should add in their routine supportwork. By providing descriptors for each standard underthe established headings of inadequate, satisfactory,good and outstanding, services can make judgementson their own effectiveness using terminology which iswidely understood.

The standards can be a useful starting point to identifygaps in service provision, areas for improvement and


Making qualitystandards work Martin Smith considers the role of quality standards in improving educational

outcomes for children with sensory impairments

Using the same process for writing, with a steering andnational reference group, the HI QS were developedand published in a timely fashion. They are designed tobe used across specialist services to assist in servicedelivery.

The answer to that question about status again? TheNDCS guidance sits alongside the DCSF QS, illustratesthe specialist element for deaf children, and does notreplace the generic document. The NDCS interest inthe use of the QS is ongoing and we are currentlyconsidering whether some specialist case studies wouldbe helpful.

How best to make use of the QS is a further questionfor services to grapple with. The QS are designed to

assist with planning, developing and delivering effectiveservices for deaf children and young people and thatmust be achieved best within the context of wider localauthority plans and through sharing good practice.

The DCSF Quality standards for special educationalneeds (SEN) support and outreach services can bedownloaded from www.teachernet.gov.uk/ The NDCSQuality standards for specialist teaching and supportservices for deaf children and young people documentis available from www.ndcs.org.uk and can bedownloaded from the BATOD and NatSIP websites,www.BATOD.org.uk and www.natsip.org.uk/

Lindsey Rousseau is the facilitator for the NationalSensory Impairment Partnership.

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effective ways of addressing service performance. InDorset, the first stage in developing this type of reviewwas undertaken at a joint planning day for the seniormanagers of all of the inclusion services (SEN, EthnicMinority Achievement, Traveller Education, SENSupport Service, Educational Psychology, BehaviourSupport, Hearing and Vision Support). Staff had beenprovided with the corporate plan for the council, theChildren and Young People’s Plan and copies of theQuality standards for SEN support and outreachservices. Copies of the quality standards for deaf CYPwere also available and these were found to haverelevance across many disciplines. The aims were to:• ensure that all services aspire to the same high

standards exemplified in the quality standards for deafCYP

• support service planning• share good practice• identify gaps in provision• assist in determining appropriate resources and

arrangements• develop consistency across services• support monitoring and evaluation• make links with and support local plans and

developments• produce draft service development plans of a high

standard, with core activities based on clear evidenceof need and rigorous audit.

Each team was provided with pre-printed A1 sheetswith the 16 quality standards pasted in column 1.Column 2 provided scope for discussion on whereservice staff could identify gaps in provision. Column 3 allowed teams to develop ways of meeting theperceived shortfall in provision and priorities for actionto produce improved outcomes. Column 4 used the self-evaluation headings from inadequate tooutstanding to enable services to judge their presentperformance. In this way, each service completed theday with a draft working document based on audit ofneed, recognition of priorities and clarity of purpose.

Follow-up work focused on refining the planning work,making specific the actions arising and clarifyingresponsibilities with timeframes. Similar joint planning may become an annual event, with greaterunderstanding of parallel service roles and the needs of children from vulnerable groups. Year on year, theexpectation is that the performance of the services will show demonstrable improvement via the self-evaluation process.

Keeping up the standardsSome services are wedded to their particular methodsof doing things, often perfected over years but withoutany reflection on their value or purpose. According toPeter Drucker (The Effective Executive, ButterworthHeinemann, 1967), ‘There is nothing as useless asdoing effectively that which should not be done at all.’We must take care in support work that we do not fall

into the trap of being superficially effective but missingthe core principles which will bring about change andimprovement.

The new quality standards can assist in embeddingthese principles into service delivery and planning. Theyare wide ranging and appropriately challenging. Whenused effectively, they can bring about the requiredchanges in service delivery which have a positiveimpact on the lives of children and families.

In addition to service planning, the standards should beavailable in the performance management of specialistsupport staff, alongside the service development planand the job description, to identify where individuals canmake a contribution to the wider service remit throughappropriate targets. Links can easily be made acrossLA planning, and staff can (perhaps for the first time)understand their individual role in corporate objectives.There are strong links with inspection for services. For example, the NHSP Quality Assurance makesreference to the need for a culture of continuousimprovement. The fact that a service has madeeffective use of the quality standards will provide good evidence that this is in place.

Finally, when local authorities are commissioningservices, they need to be assured that those beingdelivered are of high quality and meet the needs of theclient group. There are more competitors in servicedelivery now than at any time in the past. Althoughservices for hearing-impaired children have enjoyed theprivileged position of being the only providers in thepast, experience from other central support servicessuggests that this may not last. Only those serviceswith a focus on outcomes, a recognition of quality and aculture of continuous improvement are likely to surviveand the latest quality standards provide the kind ofevidence base for such measurement in an increasinglycompetitive marketplace.

Planning and development processes based on qualitystandards are only useful if they are monitored andevaluated over time. By making transparent links withother plans, reviewing these in line with service andindividual objectives, the quality of delivery to childrenand the outcomes they achieve can be expected toimprove significantly. In the field of sensory impairment,specialist teachers have consistently reflected on theirpractice, and the availability of comprehensive qualitystandards has helped to support the drive for betteroutcomes. If services are not yet using them, it might be timely to review the need to do so and to plan some in-depth self-review.

Martin Smith is Head of Specialist Teaching and Advicewithin Dorset’s Inclusion Services. He has managementresponsibility for the central teaching services includingHearing and Vision Support, which operates across thethree authorities of Dorset, Bournemouth and Poole.


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NDCS has recently updated the Qualitystandards in bone anchored hearing aids for children and young people, which was

originally published in 2003. The guidelines havebeen written in conjunction with professionalsworking in the clinical field and they aim to ensurethat deaf children and young people who canbenefit from specialised bone anchored hearingaids receive the most appropriate service and long-term support to meet their individual needs.

Quality standards in bone anchored hearing aids forchildren and young people is for professionals withan interest in providing services to deaf children,young people and their families, and commissionersof services. It provides a framework for audit withrealistic and attainable standards for a boneanchored hearing aid service and should be usedalongside national and country specific standards(where available) written for newborn hearingscreening and audiology services in the UK.

The first bone anchored hearing aid devices wereintroduced to the UK more than 20 years ago andhave been found to be an effective method of aidingsome groups of children, such as those with chronicinfection of the middle or outer ears, congenitalabnormality of the ears or severe–profoundunilateral deafness. There are now more than40,000 people worldwide using bone anchoredhearing aids. As more of these devices andsystems are entering the market, NDCS hasdecided to drop the acronym ‘BAHA’ which may beconfused with the term used by one manufacturerfor its product.

Providing children with a bone anchored hearing aidrequires a dedicated multi-disciplinary team whosemembers understand the complex needs of eachchild and the impact any intervention will have. The paediatric team must be able to assess theindividual needs of the child, be fully conversantwith specialised bone anchored hearing aidequipment and capable of providing long-termhabilitative support to the child and family, untiltransfer to an adult service. Essentially, the boneanchored hearing aid service must work closelywith the child and parents and involve them in every step of the procedure. The impact of such

equipment will mean lifelong care and commitmentby the NHS.

The new quality standards document identifies good practice guidance and standards that willenable providers of health, education and socialservices, as well as the voluntary sector, to deliverappropriate and effective support, from referral for a bone anchored hearing aid to transfer to an adultservice.

The document covers: different types of hearingaids for conductive hearing loss; supportingchildren, young people and their families; the role of local services; the bone anchored hearing aidservice; bone anchored hearing aid equipment;referral and selection procedures; the assessmentprocess and outcome of the assessment; surgery;ongoing evaluation and care; transfer of care; andservice evaluation and audit.

NDCS has also updated the booklet for familiesentitled Bone anchored hearing aids: Information for parents and families. This covers what a boneanchored hearing aid is; how it could help; theadvantages and disadvantages of bone anchoredhearing aids; the bone anchored hearing aidservice; referral; assessment; surgery; fitting of thesound processor; follow-up; transferring care toanother service; evaluating the service; servicestandards.

Both booklets can be ordered free of charge from theNDCS Freephone Helpline at [email protected] 0808 800 8880 (voice and text).

Angela Deckett is the Education, Health and SocialCare Projects Officer at the NDCS.

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A bone anchored hearingaids update Angela Deckett has news of the latest quality standards from the NDCS

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When NDCS published its first sets of QualityStandards in Paediatric Audiology in 1994and 1996, the key target was the detection

of 80% of bilateral congenital hearing impairment in excess of 50dBHL within the first year of life and40% by the age of six months. All the black andwhite photos were of children using body-wornhearing aids. How things have changed! In the last15 years the world of paediatric audiology has seensome of the most exciting political, professional andtechnological developments in its history.

The last published update of our Quality Standardsin Paediatric Audiology was in 2000. The contentsincluded interim arrangements while UniversalNeonatal Hearing Screening (UNHS) was pilotedthroughout England, and were due to be reviewedin light of the outcome of this. Newborn hearingscreening has since been implemented in all fourcountries across the UK. During this time we’vealso seen the introduction of digital hearing aidsand the modernisation of audiology services as well as changes in the education and training ofaudiology professionals.

NDCS undertook a major update of its qualitystandards during 2005–6. This was supported bykey members of the Modernising Children’s HearingAid Services (MCHAS) team and other interestedprofessionals. However, it became clear that therewere significant overlap and duplication with newstandards written and published by professionalgroups, such as those of the newborn hearingscreening programmes and MCHAS. Theseprofessional guidelines and standards reflected thebeliefs of the NDCS and referred to earlier qualitystandards documents produced by us. We decidednot to republish our own general audiologystandards and instead focus our efforts on workingwith the various groups to ensure that the voice ofthe family was always heard.

Each NHSP service and its associated audiology,medical, education and social care service is visitedevery 18 months and reviewed against the NHSPquality standards (http://hearing.screening.nhs.uk/cms.php?folder=1064). So those readers working inearly years education in England will already have

had their service reviewed twice since the qualityassurance programme started in 2006. The reportsgenerated from these visits have been importantdrivers in service improvement and developments,and in accessing funding for further training forearly years specialists. However, mindful thatquality standards should apply to all children and young people right through to transition to adult services, NDCS continues to support thedevelopment of quality standards for audiologyservices.

The QRT uses a five-point scalethat services are rated against

NDCS was invited to join a multi-disciplinaryworking group chaired by Martin Evans, withmembers from England, Scotland and Wales,working on a new quality standards document andaccompanying Quality Rating Tool (QRT) utilisingthe Quality Improvement Scotland methodology.The QRT uses a five-point scale that services arerated against, so that 1 would be ‘no elements of the quality statement criteria met’, and 5 wouldbe ‘fully compliant with good to best practice asindicated by the quality statement criteria’. TheAudiology Services Advisory Group (ASAG) inScotland has since taken forward and developedthis work, undertaken a pilot audit of paediatricservices against the standards and then publishedthe final document in April 2009 (Quality Standardsfor Paediatric Audiology Services, NHS Scotland,2009). There are nine standards with supportingrationale and criteria for compliance in: accessingthe service; assessment; developing an audiologyindividual management plan; implementing anaudiology individual management plan; outcomes;professional competence; information provision and communication with children and families;multi-agency working; and service effectiveness and improvement. NDCS remains a partner in the2009 audit programme, which consists of self- andpeer-assessment.

At the time of writing, NDCS Cymru’s CountryDirector Jayne Dulson is chairing a multi-disciplinarygroup looking at implementation of these quality

Developing audiologystandards Vicki Kirwin reviews the current situation regarding quality standards for

paediatric audiology services

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standards and QRT in Wales. Public consultationended on 31 January this year and we wait to hearthe next steps.

NDCS will continue to support andpromote the development andproduction of quality standardsfor paediatric audiology services

Meanwhile the Department of Health in Englandhas adopted the global rating scale model known as the Audiology Quality Enhancement Tool (QET)(http://audiology.globalratingscale.com). This is a web-based self-audit tool that uses yes/noresponses. Level D services meet the basicrequirements only, while level A is generallyconsidered aspirational (few services currently meetthis). The QET is fully live for adult services and sofar two rounds of results have been completed on avoluntary basis. The QET is based on five ‘qualitydomains’ covering clinical quality, technology,workforce and training, systems and performance,and patient experience. So, for example, within thepatient experience domain the standards measureprovision of information, communication, support

from patient and volunteer groups, quality of theenvironment, capturing service user feedback and promoting equality and diversity within the department. In the future it is likely thatcommissioners will use the results whenconsidering which services they will purchase for their local population so there is some incentivefor services to complete this. Although about 70% of the QET is applicable to paediatric services,unfortunately the paediatric module is not yet liveas development work continues, particularly aroundaccreditation and alignment between the QET and aQRT.

In all four countries NDCS will continue to supportand promote the development and production ofquality standards for paediatric audiology services,and lobby for a programme of audits against those standards. We will also continue to publishstandards that focus on specialty areas such asbone anchored hearing aids, cochlear implants andtransition. There is more on this work elsewhere inthis Magazine and in future issues.

Vicki Kirwin is the Development Manager(Audiology & Health) at the NDCS.


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Each year approximately 700 children are born inEngland with a bilateral permanent childhoodhearing impairment. The NHS Newborn Hearing

Screening Programme’s (NHSP) major aim is to identifyall children born with moderate to profound permanentbilateral deafness within four to five weeks of birth toensure the provision of high quality and appropriateassessment and support for deaf children and theirfamilies.

The NHSP Peer Review Quality Assurance (QA)Programme lies at the heart of the leadership givenby the Programme Centre to local newborn hearingscreening programme sites. Its team of over 40consultants, representing disciplines across the widerchildhood hearing care pathway, can, through theirexternal review of practice, provide a vital link for expertinformation exchange by:• recognising and sharing best practice• highlighting areas of professional development and

training• providing consistent judgements across all strategic

health authority regions against agreed qualitystandards.

The QA Framework (QAF) aims to ensure that minimumstandards are met and exceeded by improving theperformance of all aspects across the care pathway. The role of the QA team is to determine whether:• commissioned services meet the needs of deaf

children and families• governance structures and strategic partnerships are

in place• the entire care pathway is delivered in line with quality

standards and family-friendly practice• there is a quality improvement culture in place.

The team ascertains this information through the reviewof self-rating information, discussions with staff, visits toclinic settings, discussion with commissioners and publichealth bodies and through feedback from parents.

At the end of each visit, good practice is acknowledgedand recommendations for improvement are put forwardby the team. These are then documented formallythrough a written report. Services are required to submitaction plans addressing the issues raised in the QA visitwithin two months of the report being finalised. Whereappropriate, local action taken to improve quality isreviewed by the Programme Centre and good practice,emerging trends and risks to the programme areanalysed and fed back into the ongoing delivery of theprogramme nationally.

Results from the firstround of peer reviewvisits show that thissystem is an effectiveand supportivemechanism for drivingquality improvement.Analysis provides aninsight into the commonshortfalls in serviceprovision nationally and identifies candidate services forchampioning good practice. For the Programme Centreit gives a national picture of skills gaps, commissioningshortfalls and the need for policy development and, indoing so, provides an opportunity to target support andpolicy development in an efficient, cost-effective manner.

AudiologyAlmost half of the recommendations for audiology werearound early assessment, establishing the nature anddegree of the hearing loss, and the programming ofhearing aids. In response to this the Programme Centrehas developed a number of training courses to addressthese issues.

The audiology QA consultants have raised awareness ofa number of issues during discussion and feedback fromtheir visits. They are able to offer suggestions for audittopics, refer audiologists to the relevant protocols,discuss the benefits of networking and share goodpractice ideas. Consequently, the MCHAS website wasredesigned to highlight and develop the Champions’Zone, and a Good Practice Zone has been introduced.

Over one in ten of the recommendations from the firstround of visits were related to family-friendly practice inaudiology, particularly around the recurring themes of:• disclosure and sharing the news• better facilities, including waiting areas• providing families with written information that details

local contacts and whom to contact if they have anyquestions before their next appointment.

The timing and accuracy of diagnosis have improved in a number of sites where they have responded torecommendations to improve the range of tests usedand have put in place more peer reviews of auditorybrainstem response (ABR) traces. The timing ofconfirmation to parents has been raised at a number ofsites, also covering how and when early interventionservices are informed and involved.



Up to the standards The NHSP quality assurance team works to ensure that early intervention services are meeting

minimum standards. Mary Kean and Tim Silvester explain the review process

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Discussions and decisions about the fitting of hearingaids are expected to be multi-agency, with ToDsinvolved. Where partnership working is established withfamilies and other agencies, parents were happier andexpressed their satisfaction with the services theyreceived. There are several examples of good practicein collaborative and flexible working around hearing aid fitting, including the timing, location and follow-upappointments and producing improved outcomes fordeaf babies, young children and their families.

Ear mould provision was commented on by parents bothwith regard to provision and turn-around times. The QA process has highlighted the need for impressions to be taken more widely and within different contexts,including at home and at parent support group meetings,and for the ear moulds to be dispatched swiftly.

There is an expectation that there will be formal linkswith education services with regard to the exchange ofinformation, and ToDs attending hearing aid reviewswhen needed.

Early intervention/HI servicesThe central role of early intervention practitioners, fromthe point of diagnosis, is pivotal to the support deliveredto deaf children and their families and is generallyagreed to lead to better outcomes for deaf children. As part of the QA process practitioners from educationservices undertake a peer review visit to support qualityimprovement in early intervention services. The eightquality standards which performance is rated againstrelate specifically to the:quality of the experience for thefamily and baby/child post-identification, the range ofearly support services offered and the impact of theintervention and support provided.

The initial responses to confirmation and timing ofcontact with parents and ability to respond in QAtimescale with current staff are covered by QS 20. Theoffer of early contact is important, but it does not haveto be a ToD to meet the necessary standard. Mostservices do prioritise early diagnosis and provide goodToD support in these early stages, but many havereported that there is a knock-on effect to the rest ofthe service with correspondingly less support availablefor school-age children.

One of the distinctive aspects of the QS and associatedQA process is that it is multi-agency. While manyservices have long had established links with otheragencies, there is now a real expectation of formalpartnership working and information sharing. QS 22 and 26 look specifically at this aspect. There have beenmany discussions on what is possible and desirableabout the co-ordination of support and the role of keyworker/main professional contact. While there areseveral models in different LAs and services, theintention is that there should be some co-ordination,especially when seen from the parents’ perspective.

The QAF expects services to have staff members withexperience and training in the 0–2 age range to reflectthe specific nature of working with families with babiesdiagnosed at a very young age. Currently, we do stillhave to make a recommendation if this is not the case;however, possession of this formal qualification has notyet been an indicator of the overall quality of supportgiven to these families.

We would expect to see within services, staff with up-to-date knowledge and competencies, relating toearly support, in communication, the support andmanagement of early amplification and informed choice.

The QA visits have also facilitated discussions andrecommendations around information sharing,partnership working to access resources such as parentsupport groups and deaf role models, networking toshare resources, training, good practice and successionplanning. There is clearly a need to establish andimprove the involvement of the social care servicesavailable to deaf children and their families and forclarification of the role, level and type of involvement and support the social care team can offer.

CHSWGs Given the multi-agency nature of the QA process, therole of Children’s Hearing Services Working Groups(CHSWGs) is seen as one vital way of ensuring that allcontributing agencies share information and co-ordinatetheir support for parents. It is hoped that they will take an increasingly strategic role to achieve this. This wasembodied in one site’s Terms of Reference which stated:‘The CHSWG is a formal group which is allowed tomake decisions on behalf of the services representedand direct the strategic developments of services offeredto deaf children.’

In conclusion Early intervention education services overall haveperformed very well against the standards with noservice rated as poor, a small number satisfactory, butwith the vast majority rated as above average, and alsosome considered exceptional. This reflects the traditionthat services have of working in a multi-agency way withfamilies with young children and the priority that theyhave accorded this vital area of their work.

The second cycle reports will be published on the NHSPwebsite to ensure transparency of the QA programmeand share information regarding the quality of servicesdelivered. The quality standards that have been agreedand made more robust in June 2008 will now beassessed to ensure that the weighting in each areaproduces a fairer reflection of the overall performance of a service.

Mary Kean and Tim Silvester are education consultantsfor the NHSP Quality Assurance Programme(http://hearing.screening.nhs.uk).


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In between the mountains of paperwork theWandsworth Hearing-impaired Service Early YearsTeam completed the first quality assurance (QA)

questionnaire in record time. I confess many of theanswers were extremely brief. It was only in hindsightwhen we heard stories of hours spent filling in thequestionnaire and evidence being presented insuitcases large enough to grace Heathrow check-inthat we realised that somehow we had missed anopportunity. Our feedback was positive but there wasno doubt that we had not managed to communicatethe essence of how and why we support children andfamilies following newborn hearing screening. Thesecond time round we grabbed the opportunity the QA visit could provide to collate and streamline ourevidence. We left the trolley bags at home andmanaged to pack an extensive amount into one leverarch file.

In between QA visits we had restructured the serviceand appointed an Early Years Phase Co-ordinator –Gill Tapson. In Wandsworth we are fortunate that theperipatetic service and hearing-impaired units are partof the same team. This enables us to deploy staffflexibly across different teams as numbers on roll shiftand profiles of children change over time. A key aspectof Gill’s brief was to streamline systems so that wecould demonstrate equity of service. We wanted toensure that among the Teachers of the Deaf deliveringearly years support there would be consistency in theapproaches used and information provided. In fact, theprocess ended up clarifying and reducing paperworkoverall.

So, back to the second QA visit. The first thing we did was to go through the questionnaire and agree ajudgement. This was one of the quickest elements ofthe process but it also made us question the amountof evidence we would have to back up a judgement.We then started to collate an evidence file. On thecontents page we typed a section for each standardand then bullet-pointed the source of evidence foreach. Some standards had approximately 20 sourcesof evidence, others less. We included minutes ofmeetings, service improvement plan tracking sheetsand policies, among other sources. This was the first step of the process and was important in revealing areas where we were stronger on impactmeasurement than others. As an example, over theyears we have organised a number of events for theextended family but only comparatively recently, over

the last two years, have we started to gather evidenceshowing the impact on the family and child ofattending such events.

Following the contents page we then used dividers toseparate each standard, putting actual examples ofevidence within each section. Some of the key types of evidence we found were the minutes of meetingswhich not only demonstrated inter-agency working butalso recorded when action had been taken – or not!

Gill Tapson designed two systems to streamline ourwork and these became powerful sources of evidencein the QA process. One was the home visit curriculumwhich is shared between families and professionals. Itrecords the information sources and discussions whichoccur during home visits. This linked with WandsworthCouncil’s Children and Young People’s Plan whichincluded a target to ensure consistency in its homevisiting sources. Using the curriculum, professionalscan record discussions that have taken place and alsofamilies can use the plan to have some autonomy in terms of the order of information or discussionswhich take place. We felt that putting information insequential order would not work for families, as inpractice each family’s priority is different.

We also had the advantage in Wandsworth of beingable to produce a significant amount of evidence ofhow we as a service collaborate with the cochlearimplant programme. This is mainly due to the fact that our service was commissioned by St George’sHospital to provide the Teacher of the Deaf input on the programme. As a result we have developedcomprehensive protocols, information sharing networksand joint planning mechanisms. It is not without itschallenges but overall it works well and provides analternative model for cochlear implant programmes.

Finally, we found that presenting evidence in this way,through one file, made the QA interview so mucheasier than before when we were scrabbling to finddifferent bits of paper in a box. When we had our QAvisit, five sites were involved and so this approach wasparticularly useful.

While we presented a paper version of our evidencethe future is no doubt electronic. From suitcases tomemory stick – that’s a thought!

Deborah Rix is Head of Service in Wandsworth.

More answers than questions When the NHSP quality assurance team visits, it is worth being well prepared and having

an efficient system for gathering and presenting evidence, as Deborah Rix discovered

in Wandsworth

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The UK Children’s FM Working Group was formedin 2004 by a group of like-minded individuals keento promote the use of personal FM systems. The

NDCS, strongly involved in the group, was asked to survey the criteria used by local authorities todetermine candidacy for the provision of systems. Mostrespondents stated that they did not have a policy. Thisprompted debate and the notion that some guidancefor users and managers of this technology would bebeneficial. What form should this take?

The earlier publication of the NDCS Quality Standardsin Paediatric Audiology (2000) recognised theextensive use made of FM systems and included aquality standard focused on collaborative workingbetween paediatric audiology and education services‘to ensure provision of equipment and effective use bythe child and the transmitter user’.

The Modernisation of Children’s Hearing Aid Servicesbetween 2000 and 2005 highlighted the need for closerprofessional links between audiology and educationservices. Alongside the introduction of new hearing aid technology, new fitting procedures and workingpractices were introduced. Guidelines were written to cover these procedures, among them the FMadvantage procedures for setting up personal FMsystems with digital signal processing hearing aids.These soon became accepted by the profession asstandard quality practice.

The speed of advancement in technology, such as the introduction of ear level receivers, the rise in thenumber of children undergoing cochlear implantationand at an earlier age, and the introduction of newbornhearing screening were all factors highlighting the needfor more information and support in relation to FM.Systems had been in services and schools for over 20years, with varying approaches to selection and use.

Technology and practices had moved on fast butdebate and policy were not always present prior toimplementation, revealing a postcode lottery andinconsistencies within services. As a means ofaddressing equal opportunities and to promote optimaluse, the decision to produce some further guidanceseemed timely. This was the easy part. Since thegroup comprises manufacturers and professionals fromeducation, health and the voluntary sector there waswidespread agreement about content. As for ‘quality‘,the debate raged over how high to set the bar. Thequality standards needed to be aspirational but also

achievable and a catalyst for greater understandingand optimal use. It was this that shaped Part 2, theGood Practice Guide on CD to support users and helpthem achieve the selected 13 quality standards set out in the hard copy publication. It was felt that thematerial in the guide would shift with the dynamics oftechnology and as a more temporary resource the CDwould prove to be an easier and cheaper production.

A framework was agreed and chapters written.However, the constraining of a document produced by a committee of passionate enthusiasts into anaccessible working document for end users neededconsiderable attention. A small editorial team focusedon reducing the content and was grateful for helpfulcomments from John Bamford. Colleagues weresupportive in providing real photos of FM systems in daily use and attempts were made to ensure faircoverage of the different systems available frommanufacturers. The content of the CD was supplied by many. The FM Working Group remains very gratefulto those professionals who were willing to share theireveryday practice as well as to manufacturers andtechnicians for their information and comments;grateful thanks also to the NDCS for financing theproduction and printing. The launch coincided with thePaediatric Conference at Mary Hare School in July2008.

Dissemination since has been through the NDCSwebsite www.ndcs.org.uk (where the content isdownloadable following registration), at conferencesand at training events. The NDCS financed a secondrun following a high early demand. The FM WorkingGroup is keen to hear feedback about the content anduse of the document. In some locations it has causedconsternation and has certainly aroused debate andreflection on practice. Has it achieved its aims? Wewould be pleased to hear about your concerns,frustrations or positive changes in practice.

In an update of the Good Practice Guide we hope toinclude more examples – so if you have a policy, aproforma or any ideas about use of personal FMsystems we should like to hear from you.

The FM Working Group now has a website – pleasetake time to sign up: www.fmworkinggroup.org.uk/

Joyce Sewell-Rutter is an educational consultant with the Ewing Foundation and a member of the UK Children’s FM Working Group.

Good practice for FM Joyce Sewell-Rutter reveals the thinking behind the quality standards for the use

of personal FM systems

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As the Sensory Consortium Service (SCS) inBerkshire we work across six unitary authoritiesin both a teaching and advisory capacity with

children and families who have an identified hearingloss. All our Teachers of the Deaf work across the agerange of 0–19 years and everyone in the team hashad training in using the Early Support MonitoringProtocol (ESMP) with families and throughout theEarly Years Foundation Stage (EYFS). Severalmembers of staff are also trainers for delivering Early Support training.

The introduction of universal newborn hearingscreening has resulted in a shift in the age of thechildren we are now supporting, with some as youngas three or four weeks old. Early intervention, betteramplification and the introduction of quality standardsand national guidelines have meant that services arerequired to respond to the challenge of providingbetter outcomes for deaf children. The MonitoringProtocol and Early Years Foundation Stage have beentwo tools which have had a significant and positiveimpact on the way in which we work.

For the majority it is a useful tool forparents to monitor the developmentof their deaf child

In the SCS the Monitoring Protocol is introduced to all the families the Teacher of the Deaf is supportingfollowing diagnosis of a hearing loss. For the majorityit is a useful tool for parents to monitor the developmentof their deaf child especially in the areas of listeningand communication. For a small number it representsthe blue box under the stairs, in a cupboard or on the shelf gathering dust, and it is only taken out onrequest. However, as it becomes more embedded inour everyday practice I am confident that the numberof families using it will only increase.

So how is the Protocol used with the families wesupport? In our service all families are introduced tothe Early Support materials, usually on the first visit.The educational audiologist or on-duty teacher arrivesarmed with an A–Z, the SCS Parent Pack and a bluebox, or at least some of the contents of the blue box.Over the next couple of months the materials areexplored in more depth and the different strandsdiscussed and used. Parents are encouraged to fill inthe Protocol ring binder on a regular basis – every six

or eight weeks – and this is then looked at on aregular home visit with the Teacher of the Deaf or on a joint visit with the speech and language therapist,audiologist or the sensory team social care worker.Our joint observations help to document an accuratepicture of where the children are functioning acrossdifferent areas of their development and this in turnhelps us identify the next steps for the children.

Ownership of the file is always with the family and thishas been a challenge as we have had to rethink ourideas that record keeping fulfils our role responsibilitiesand belongs to us rather than the family!

As one parent says, ‘I wasn’t really keen on filling inthe file but my visiting teacher was always trying to get me to do it! I really didn’t think my little boy wasmaking much progress with his language but when I started to fill it in I was so pleased and surprisedabout what he was doing. It really encouraged me tothink about his development and now my mum and I fill it in together and then show it to his teacher.’

In practical terms the information from the ESMPinforms our planning on a half-termly basis. Trackingof progress is then possible and successes can becelebrated and concerns raised. As well as using theprofiles we have also devised our own tracking datasheets which enable staff to see at a glance where thechild is across the different areas of development. Wenow have evidence of the impact of our interventionsand a record of progress in a language which isconsistent and therefore meaningful to both parentsand professionals across the country, especially if achild has moved from another area.

The Monitoring Protocol has also been used in ourpre-school Chatty Monkeys Groups so that parentshave an opportunity to discuss how they use thematerials and family plans and what works for them.The children are encouraged to include their ownhandprints and photos to personalise their folders as a way of increasing family ownership of the materials.The materials are also shared at our workshops forfamilies with newly diagnosed children and weincorporate the Protocol into our specific workshopson listening and communication and how to promotethis area of development with your child.

Family plans are also used as part of the programmewith all our regular teaching caseload families (A


Assessing the impactJane Peters shares her service’s view of working with the Monitoring

Protocol and the Early Years Foundation Stage


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category) and in some cases with the children whomwe only monitor (B and C categories). The plan isfilled in with parents and with other professionals whoare involved in working directly with the child so thatthere is only one set of targets or next steps. Thisway the family does not feel overwhelmed with thenumber of targets and is not faced with potentiallyconflicting ones – there are no longer Teacher of theDeaf targets, speech and language therapy targets,physiotherapy targets and so it goes on. This has had a positive affect on the way in which we work,bringing professionals together and helping to breakdown boundaries so that they are no longer workingin isolation and can concentrate on only what theythink the child needs within their professional remit.This has helped to support the family more effectivelyand therefore the child holistically. The family planhas helped all of us to focus on the families’ priorities.The voice of the family is now at the very centre ofsupport, which in turn has had a positive impact onthe resilience of the family.

The voice of the family is now atthe very centre of support

As the parent of a profoundly deaf child says, ‘I hadlots of appointments with different people. We agreedat a family plan meeting that the speech therapist and social worker would try to visit only on the sameday and time when the Teacher of the Deaf visits.This really helped because I didn’t have to keepgoing over the same things and to go to lots ofappointments, and everyone seemed to know whatthey were doing and what I said I would do!’

As a team we continue to discuss a number ofchallenges. As part of our policies and procedures we aim for all our A category children to use theMonitoring Protocol. If parents do not want to takeownership, the ToD continues to use the material torecord progress and this is still shared with familiesthrough reports and discussion.

For new members of staff who are either returning toteaching or starting off in their careers as Teachers of the Deaf the Monitoring Protocol has been aninvaluable tool which provides a framework forunderstanding a child’s development and in particularthe amount of detail in the listening and communicationsections which are broken down into smaller steps. I wish I had had this tool when I first starting workingwith babies and young children. Staff generally feelmuch more confident working with the very youngchildren and babies and their families.

The Early Years Foundation StageSo has the EYFS had the same impact? This is amuch newer government initiative and is therefore not

quite as embedded as the Monitoring Protocol intothe service paperwork or practice. Getting to gripswith all the material is a challenge in itself.

The EYFS principles as outlined below are asrelevant for the children we work with as they are forhearing children. • A unique child – every child is a competent learner

from birth who can be resilient, capable, confidentand self-assured.

• Positive relationships – children learn to be strongand independent from a base of loving and securerelationships with parents and/or a key person.

• Enabling environments – the environment plays akey role in supporting and extending children’sdevelopment and learning.

• Learning and development – children develop andlearn in different ways and at different rates and allareas of learning and development are equallyimportant and interconnected.

These principles underpin the way in which we wantto work with families, the children and the settings inwhich they are placed and in many ways the impactof the EYFS has been to make our job easier, as all those working with the children are sharing a common language and way of working. Thefrustration for us may be that despite the guidancethere remain different interpretations of the samematerials across settings!

SCS staff have used the EYFS to highlight thespecific needs of the deaf child and to incorporatespecific advice relating to the child’s hearingdifficulties into the framework.

The emphasis on observation in the EYFS hasprovided an opportunity for all those who work with orlook after our deaf children to use observation to seehow the children function, and to understand theirinterests and the way they learn. These observationsare then used to identify learning priorities and planrelevant and motivating learning experiences for theindividual child, so that there is a route to planningwhich takes into account the individual needs of achild with a hearing loss.

Within our service all staff are more confident in theuse of the Monitoring Protocol to track progress andto use this as a tool to plan with the family the nextsteps for their child. This is also reflected in our pupilrecords and general paperwork. The impact of theEYFS will become clearer with time. I am sure we willalso revise and produce some new paperwork to goalong with it.

Jane Peters is the Service Development Co-ordinator with the Sensory Consortium Service in Berkshire.


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NDCS believes that goodacoustics in the schoolclassroom are vital for all

children, but especially for the 45,000 deaf children in the UK. Manydeaf children tell us that personalamplification and Soundfield systemscan help them a great deal to listenand learn. However, educationalaudiologists and deaf childrenthemselves tell us that these systemsare not a ‘substitute’ for bad acousticsand, in many cases, by amplifying theexcess noise in a classroom, thesesystems can worsen the effect ofpoor acoustics for a deaf child.

Good acoustics are also vital for teachers. As many BATODmembers will know, teachers aredisproportionately more likely toexperience voice problems comparedto other professionals.

Do schools sound good? Government regulations state that acoustics in schoolclassrooms should be appropriate to their intendeduse. Compliance can be achieved by meeting thestandards set out in the government guidancedocument Building Bulletin 93 (known as BB93),which applies to all new school buildings constructedsince 2003 in England and Wales.

However, until recently, school buildings were notrequired to be tested to check that their acousticscomply – BB93 currently simply ‘recommends’ it. Ineffect, BB93 just requires local authorities to makesure that the acoustics look good on paper, ratherthan actually sound good in the classroom.

Over the past few years, many teachers haveapproached NDCS with concerns about acoustics in brand new school buildings, particularly in largeopen-plan spaces. For example, a state-of-the-artschool with a unit in Kent, which opened in 2008, was later found to be non-compliant with BB93, even though this was built into the original designspecification. Concerns about poor acoustics werealso raised with a brand new school in south London,also with a unit, and it was found that the unit hadnever even been tested.

When NDCS surveyed all local authorities where anew secondary school had been built in recent years,we found that only 21% of local authorities couldconfirm that their schools had acoustics which metthe Government’s standards set out in BB93. The resteither had failed to meet the standards or did notknow because they had not carried out any testing.

Taking action In the face of these mounting concerns, NDCSdecided to launch the Sounds good? campaign, with the central aim of a new mandatory requirement for all new schools to be tested for their acousticsbefore they open. With the Government spendingover £7 billion last year on new school buildings,there was a real need to act quickly.

F e a t u r e

Sounding positiveFollowing a recent NDCS campaign, it seems likely that all schools will be

required to improve their acoustics and comply with modern standards, as

Ian Noon reports


‘It was really hard, you couldn’t really understandwhat the teacher was trying to explain… You feelreally left out and you feel like you’re sitting in acorner in a lonely classroom... so it hurts yourfeelings a little bit.’Rebecca, from Sweyne Park School in Essex, onthe school acoustics before refurbishment.

Boody Hassan with David Howarth MP at the Houses of Parliament in June 2009during the NDCS Sounds good? campaign

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It’s a campaign that successfully got theGovernment’s attention – 45 MPs came to aparliamentary event in June last year to listen to deaf children talk about their own experiences ofpoor acoustics. In addition, nearly 90 MPs signed apetition in Parliament supporting the call for actionand nearly 20 organisations, including BATOD,endorsed the campaign.

We also commissioned independent researchinvolving Sweyne Park School in Essex, which had gone beyond the acoustic standards set out inBB93 in some rooms. This found that good acousticscould be achieved at minimal extra cost and had asignificant impact on children’s learning.

Ministerial statementThe campaign made a breakthrough in October lastyear when the Government announced a package ofmeasures to improve acoustics in new schools. Thiswill include a new requirement for secondary schoolsbuilt under Building Schools for the Future to be testedfor their acoustics before they open. In addition, localauthorities will not be able to get funding for future

schools unless they can prove compliance in recentlybuilt schools. This will apply to the vast majority ofnew schools due to open in coming years.

The DCSF will also produce guidance on how toachieve high quality acoustics. Over the longer term, itwill consult on further changes to BB93 with a view tointroducing a firm new legal requirement for all newschools to be tested for their acoustics.

This was a very positive step forward after months ofsustained campaigning by NDCS and our supporters.We will continue to monitor implementation of thepackage, keeping a close eye out to make sure thatthe scandal of new school buildings opening withpoor acoustics comes to a close.

For more information about the Sounds good?campaign and the October announcement, email [email protected] or visitwww.ndcs.org.uk/soundsgood/

Ian Noon is the Policy and Campaigns Officer at the NDCS.

F e a t u r e

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There has been a lot of interest in the experimentalwork on acoustics that has been carried out inEssex. It has featured in online discussions,

conferences, newspapers and professional magazinesin not only the UK but also Europe and the USA.

In recent years, a number of parents of deaf childrenasked for out-of-county places for their children, poorclassroom acoustics being one of the issues raised at special educational needs and disability tribunals.Essex County Council sought to address the issue of classroom acoustics and £150,000 was initiallyallocated to do this. Following a meeting of educationofficers and teachers (mainstream and specialist) it was decided to take a considered, evidence-basedapproach to the classroom refurbishment process.While the building regulations refer to Building Bulletin93, regarding acoustics there is a degree of confusionas to which of the three standards that appear in thepublication should be applied in order to create anenvironment that is appropriate for the inclusion of deafpupils in mainstream secondary schools.

The research considered the three published standardsin classroom acoustic design and sought to explore theimpact of these on the occupied classroom:• BB93 regular secondary school classroom

performance standard (less than 0.8Tmidfrequency)• BB93 classrooms specifically for use by deaf pupils

(less than 0.4Tmidfrequency)• BATOD (less than 0.4T 125–4000Hz)

(BB93 Sections 1 and 6)

Studies that have examined the effects of reverberationtime in controlled conditions suggest that the lower thereverberation time the better the speech perception.This does not help guide the design of mainstreamschools where there has to be a balance between whatis achievable and what is desirable. There have beenvery few peer-reviewed experimental studies using realclassrooms that provide helpful guidance. A number ofreports, however, have been published in New Zealandwhich give some direction. In a survey carried out with122 teachers to identify good and poor classrooms foruse in further work the authors found that reverberationtimes of 0.6 seconds were considered ‘poor’ byteachers and 0.4 seconds as ‘good’. A purely acousticalapproach based on the self-masking of typical runningspeech would suggest a reverberation time of between0.3 seconds and 0.4 seconds for deaf children.

It was therefore hoped that by conducting a controlledexperiment in occupied classrooms (‘real’ school

situations), it would be possible to assess the impacton the teaching and learning environment andconsequently guide the design of new and refurbishedclassrooms in inclusive secondary schools.

Starting point for acoustical designThe acoustic environment is an often overlookedvariable in classroom design. The NDCS campaignSounds good? has recently highlighted this issue with examples of schools that have failed to ensureadequate acoustic environments. Acoustic design inschool, however, does have legislative weight: ‘Eachroom or other space in a school building shall bedesigned and constructed in such a way that it has the acoustic conditions and the insulation againstdisturbance by noise appropriate to its intended use.’Requirement E4 from Part E of Schedule 1 to TheBuilding Regulations 2000 (as amended) (BuildingBulletin 93 p3).

There have been many studies from around the worldshowing an association between higher noise levels in schools with lower academic performance andincreased stress in both teachers and children. It is also well established that reverberation has adetrimental effect on speech recognition and is apredictable cause of high noise levels. BB93 addressesunoccupied noise levels and reverberation time, asboth are features that can be addressed in the designof a new school or school refurbishment. They aredesign targets and relate to the ‘physical acoustics’ of a space.

The way that a classroom functions when occupiedmight be called ‘functional acoustics’ and cannot bespecified in the physical design as it relates to theoccupants and the activity taking place. These arematters beyond the direct control of a buildingcontractor. That there is a link between physical andfunctional acoustics is clear, but the precise nature ofthat link has yet to be described.

One key measure of the appropriateness of anenvironment is the signal-to-noise level as experiencedby the children. Signal is defined as ‘whatever isimportant’ and noise is ‘everything else’. In general thegreater the signal-to-noise level the greater the chanceof being able to hear and listen effectively. There is a clear relationship between signal-to-noise level and speech recognition in children which has beendemonstrated repeatedly in the literature since theseminal work of Finitzo-Hieber and Tillman (‘Roomacoustics effects on monosyllabic word discrimination


F e a t u r e

An Essex studyDavid Canning presents an interim report on his research into classroom

acoustics in Essex

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ability for normal and hearing-impaired children’,Journal of Speech and Hearing Research 1978, 21(3),p440–58).

There are now many automated ways of assessing theimpact of signal-to-noise on hearing in children, and inthe Essex study we chose to develop an automatedaudiovisual speech-in-noise test called the PaediatricAudioVisual Speech in Noise Test (PAVT) incollaboration with Advanced Bionics.

BB93 identifies the following communication activitiesin classes, each of which can be characterised by thesignal-to-noise level:• listening to the teacher when he/she is facing away

from the listener• listening when the class is engaged in activities• listening to the teacher while he/she is moving

around the classroom• listening when other children are answering

questions• listening when other adults are talking within the

same room• listening to peers when working in groups• listening in situations with competing background

noise from multimedia equipment.

BB93 goes on to state that ‘a teacher should manageteaching in such a way as to ameliorate the challengesfaced by a student with hearing difficulties. However,the better the acoustic conditions, the less challengingwill be the situations described above.’

The acoustic challenge is to create an environmentthat allows a signal-to-noise level to prevail that isappropriate for each deaf child in each communicationactivity. The required signal-to-noise level is likely to bedifferent from one deaf child to the next and the PAVTwas used to explore the range required.

Study designThe decision by Essex County Council and the co-operation of one large resourced secondary school created the opportunity to undertake a counter-balanced experiment that changed just onevariable – the amount of acoustic absorbency in theroom. Four similar classrooms from one faculty areawere chosen and refurbished to be visually similar. The materials used to alter the total absorbencywithin the room were also visually similar althoughthey had very different acoustic properties. At varioustimes over two academic terms, the rooms had theacoustic treatments changed. This occurred at theweekends so that teachers would not notice a visualchange in the room. Only the school LearningEnvironment Leader was aware of the precise room treatment, and everyone else, including staffcollecting data, was blind to the precise condition.One of the four rooms acted as a control, with the

other three rooms variously being treated to one ofthe desired acoustic standards.

A number of measures were obtained, including acomplete range of acoustic parameters of empty andoccupied classrooms. Interviews and questionnaireswere also used along with expert listening panels andspeech discrimination tests. This has generated aconsiderable quantity of data that is currently beinganalysed. Where data requires coding it is being doneblind to the condition.

Interim findingsIn total 400 children were involved, including 25hearing-impaired children; nine teachers were alsoinvolved directly in the research and more than 120lessons were studied. Data relating to the physicalsound levels in working classrooms has been the firstaspect of the study to be analysed and is reported herebriefly.

Sound levels and reverberation timeThe impact of adding absorbency into a classroom on the working environment is complicated. Addingabsorbency can have an impact on the class inunexpected ways. It has been observed to changedramatically both teacher and student behaviours. Ifthis is the case it is likely that this will be observed inthe physical acoustic data of occupied classrooms.

Figure 1: Graph showing the statistical measure LA90 (soundlevel that is exceeded for 90% of the time) against reverberationtime. Dashed lines indicate 95% confidence intervals

The statistical measure of sound LA90 is often used to represent the background noise level. In Figure 1the LA90 of each of the 120 lessons recorded has been plotted against the reverberation times of the classrooms. It should be noted that there is adistribution of reverberation times because predictingthe actual reverberation time of an unoccupiedclassroom prior to refurbishment was not a certainactivity. What can be seen from the data is that there is a very clear relationship between reverberation time

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and LA90. The longer the reverberation time the greaterthe level of sound in the room. This is consistent withthe findings of David McKenzie during the Herriot Wattstudy in the late 1990s of 70 primary classrooms whichshowed reductions following sound treatment in theorder of 7–9dBA in occupied working classroomsalthough only small reductions in unoccupiedclassrooms.

Perhaps a measure that might be more meaningful to teachers is the proportion of time that classesexceed 65dBA. This is a level that many would findcomfortable and sustainable in a working classroom.Figure 2 shows the proportion of the class timeexceeding 65dBA for all classes observed plottedagainst reverberation time. It can be seen that there is a relationship between reverberation time andproportion of time that classrooms exceed 65dBA.

Figure 2: Graph showing the proportion of time during whichclasses exceeded 65dBA plotted against reverberation time.Dashed lines indicate 95% confidence intervals

Clearly both figures require detailed exploration andinterpretation as the nine teachers who took part in the study had different teaching styles (although thecurriculum area was the same). However, the messageappears clear – the more absorbency in a room themore likely it is to be acceptably quiet. Because noother variables were manipulated in the study, thechanges must be a consequence of altering theamount of absorbency in the rooms.

DiscussionThis short report on interim findings from the Essexstudy has given a tantalising glimpse at the effect oftaking control of the physical environment. One of themore important findings is that sound treatment can beadded to very ‘typical’ classrooms. It is not complicatedand not particularly expensive and we found thatmodifying rooms to have a short reverberation timewas much easier than accurately achieving relativelylong reverberation times recommended in BB93. EssexCounty Council calculated the costs to be small in

relation to the benefits. More importantly, there issupport for avoiding the minimum standard (0.8seconds reverberation time) and aiming for the 0.4seconds as a target for all work regardless of anyexpected inclusion of deaf children. This would beconsistent with some international approaches and the current drive in the USA to introduce ‘internationalbuilding standards’ of below 0.5 seconds for allclassrooms.

We will have to wait until the full report is available later this year to discover whether the classrooms have been able to create opportunities for appropriatesignal-to-noise levels in all communication activities;however, a recent See Hear programme interviewedchildren from the school. They reported that the sound-treated rooms were now ‘fair’ and made them feel‘equal’ and able to participate on equal terms in aclassroom.

If you would like further information about the study,have a look at the acoustics bulletin maintained byEcophon (http://acousticbulletin.com) and search forEssex. Some information about the classrooms is alsoavailable online (http://tinyurl.com/UCLAPDCA).

David Canning is Study Leader and Director ofHear2Learn, an independent educational audiologyconsultancy.

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Further reading Building Bulletin 93: Acoustic Design of Schools,David Canning et al, DCSF, 2003, TSO

Classroom Acoustics, A New ZealandPerspective, Oriole Wilson et al, OticonFoundation in New Zealand, 2002

Classroom Acoustics – Milestone 6 Report – Aninvestigation of the classroom acoustics needs ofprimary school children, James Whitlock andGeorge Dodd, University of Auckland, 2002

One of the classrooms before the study

The same classroom after refurbishment – the roomsremained visually similar for all acoustic conditions

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Oral English is related to written English in two ways. The first is by letter-soundcorrespondences. Letters represent the sounds

of English language, so students need to accesssounds in order to know what letters stand for. Thisis difficult for deaf children but many methods havebeen developed to improve their access to sounds.

The second connection between oral and writtenEnglish is less explored in teaching deaf students.Written English represents units of meaning, calledmorphemes. The word ‘magician’, for example, hastwo morphemes, magic + ian: the ‘ian’ is a suffix (ie a morpheme at the end of a word) used to form person words (eg mathematician, musician,electrician). Suffixes have the same spelling acrosswords: they are visual units and it should be possibleto help deaf students use them in reading andwriting, if they understand how suffixes work inEnglish.

Raising deaf students’ awarenessof morphemes should help themwith reading comprehension andwriting skills

Morphemes are important for word recognition andfor reading comprehension as well. For example, the sentences ‘I visited my parents on Sunday’ and ‘I visit my parents on Sundays’ have differentmeanings. In order to understand the differencebetween these two sentences, you need to useinformation from suffixes. It goes without saying thatwhen you want to convey meaning in writing, youneed to use suffixes too. So, raising deaf students’awareness of morphemes should help them withreading comprehension and writing skills.

Finally, the written vocabulary in books used inprimary school exceeds oral vocabulary by tens ofthousands of words. If you are a primary school childand want to reach good reading comprehension inEnglish, you will be better off if you know how toanalyse written words which are new to you, inmorphemes. Think of the word ‘disheartened’, forexample. We can say that it is a bookish word. Inconversation, we might say that someone was sad; it is unlikely that we would say ‘disheartened’.‘Disheartened’ has four morphemes: ‘dis’, ‘heart’,

‘en’ and ‘ed’. Each one conveys some informationabout the meaning of disheartened. If you comeacross this word for the first time in a book, and youknow something about morphemes, you can have agood stab at its meaning. The difference betweenoral and written vocabulary gives us one morereason to promote deaf students’ awareness ofmorphemes.

With the support of the Nuffield Foundation and theNational Deaf Children’s Society, my colleagues andI carried out a project in which we first assesseddeaf children’s awareness of morphemes. Later, we developed materials to promote this awareness and studied the impact of improving awareness ofmorphemes on reading comprehension and writingskills. Each step in the project is described herebriefly.

Assessing deaf children’s use of morphemes in writing In order to assess deaf children’s awareness ofmorphemes, we analysed how they used suffixes inspelling. We dictated to them words in the context ofsentences so that they knew what the words were.The sentences and words were spoken and signed.We also showed them pictures to help them knowwhat we expected them to write. For example, weshowed them a picture with many windows andasked them to write the word ‘windows’, completingthe sentence ‘These are ______’. Some of thewords had simpler suffixes, such as the ‘s’ for pluraland ‘ed’ for past tense, and others had more difficultones, such as the ‘ian’ in the end of ‘magician’ andthe ‘ion’ in the end of ‘confusion’.

We compared the deaf children’s spellings ofsuffixes with the spellings produced by a sample of hearing children whose scores in the SchonellSpelling Test were equivalent to those obtained by the deaf children in this same test. The deafchildren’s (270 in number) age range was from 6 to12 years; the hearing children’s (72) age range wasfrom 6 years to 9 years and 2 months. The hearingchildren were younger because we wanted them tohave equivalent spelling scores to the deaf children.We then compared the deaf and hearing children’sscores in suffix spelling – ie we analysed only howwell they had written the 42 suffixes at the end of thewords we asked them to spell in our own test. The


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Morpheme trials Terezinha Nunes’s project investigated the use of deaf students’ visual skills to

promote their knowledge of English literacy

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deaf children’s mean was 13.1 suffixes correct; thehearing children’s mean was 19.4 suffixes correct.This difference was statistically significant, whichindicates that the deaf children performed less wellthan the hearing children in the use of suffixes inspelling, even though they had similar spelling abilityin other words that do not have suffixes.

Many teachers who tried out theprogramme have found that theirstudents developed an interest inlearning new words

The delay that the deaf children showed inknowledge of suffixes puts them at a disadvantagein word reading as well as reading comprehensionbecause, as pointed out earlier, much information ina sentence comes from suffixes. Following this, wedecided to develop a programme to raise deafchildren’s awareness of morphemes in writtenEnglish.

Promoting deaf children’s knowledge of suffixesand its impact on literacyIn order to help deaf students use morphemes inreading and writing, it is necessary to raise theirawareness of English grammar also. The ‘s’ at theend of a noun indicates plural (eg ‘The boys run in the playground’) but, at the end of a verb, itindicates singular, present tense (eg ‘The boy runsin the playground’). So the teaching programmeneeded to help students become more aware ofgrammar and morphemes in written English.

The programme was based on work that we hadcarried out with hearing children and designed over four years. We had the opportunity to test itseffectiveness twice, once at the end of the first twoyears and a second time when we completed theproject development (referred to as the first andsecond trial, respectively). Before each trial, theteachers who were going to test out the programmeparticipated in a workshop in which we discussedthe basis for the programme and its differentcomponents. The teachers who signed up to test the programme and could not be invited for theworkshop, due to large numbers already signed up,went on a waiting list. Their students formed thecomparison group for analysis of the effects of theteaching programme. At the end of the project, the teachers on the waiting list were invited to aworkshop in which they had access to informationabout the programme and to all the materials.

The programme includes teacher-led activities,supported with the use of PowerPoint in the

computer, board games and online computer gamesto offer the children further practice, and booksdesigned to create opportunities for the children touse their knowledge of morphemes in text.

For both trials we compared the progress made bythe children who had been taught about morphemesto that made by the children in the comparisongroup over approximately six to eight months. Forboth trials, the taught group made significantly moreprogress than the comparison group in the use ofsuffixes in spelling and also in reading comprehensionand writing skills. Many teachers who tried out theprogramme have found that their students developedan interest in learning new words and these teachershave continued to use it with their new students.

The programme can be downloaded from ourwebsite: www.education.ox.ac.uk/research/resgroup/cl/ndcs/resources.html/ The site contains informationon the background to the programme, its aims andfit with the English framework for teaching literacy,and information on the assessment.

Terezinha Nunes is the Chair of Educational Studiesat the Department of Educational Studies, Universityof Oxford.

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Mention of the National Sensory ImpairmentPartnership (NatSIP) occurs throughout theBATOD Magazine and by the time you receive

this we shall have had the third working day on 17 March. It is never too late to thank you for theactive support that you have shown in the realisationof the national partnership, nor to let you know a littlemore about the behind-the-scenes co-ordination ofthe working groups.

The agreed purpose of NatSIP is to improveoutcomes (with reference to Every Child Matters) forchildren and young people with sensory impairments,narrowing gaps with their peers through joint workingin services for these children.

Our launch and first working day, in September 2009,was well attended with good national representationand a commitment from all present to participate inworking towards the goals set in the agreed actionplans. The photographs shown here are a reminder ofa very useful day. More are available, with information

about NatSIP and associated activities, on thewebsite at www.natsip.org.uk/

NatSIP is no different from any other organisationtoday; we set targets and have to deliver outcomeswithin a timescale. Targets are always SMART(Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant andTime-bound), and they should be DUMB too (Doable,Usable, Manageable and Beneficial). Perhaps thatreflects the way we like to work in NatSIP – looking atthings together, from a different point of view, beingsolution focused and working on challenges thatimpact on children and young people with sensoryimpairment, their services and schools.

The second working day on 14 January aimed tobring us up to date on the progress towards thoseoutcomes, and the workstream leaders have beenactively pulling together the strands of work beingundertaken in regional and local groups. This is nomean task as it takes place on top of everyone’s ever-growing day job. The results and benefits ofgetting together to tackle issues and discover goodpractice to share are so worthwhile though that thosewho participate find the time given well spent.

There seems general agreement that NatSIP serves a valuable purpose and we would encourage you tobecome aware and involved in the work. There shouldbe a small working group happening near you, andwith electronic communication, partnership workingwith others further afield is possible too. BATOD andother SI regional groups may be linked in to a specificactivity of interest and use to you.

Lindsey Rousseau is the facilitator for the NationalSensory Impairment Partnership

Time well spentLindsey Rousseau focuses on the activities of the National Sensory Impairment

Partnership

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Over the years Teachers of the Deaf have triedto give their pupils full literacy – with variedsuccess. But what do children need in order

to become literate?

According to the Rose Report (Jim Rose’sIndependent Review of the Teaching of EarlyReading) children need two different but connected‘skills’ or ‘areas of knowledge’:

• Language comprehension processes• Word recognition processes or phonics.

See the diagram below:

Different patterns of performance

Source: Jim Rose’s final report: Independent Review of the Teaching ofEarly Reading, March 2006.

Good readers fit into the top right-hand quadrant; they have ‘good word recognition’ and ‘goodcomprehension’. Poor readers may have problems witheither word recognition or language comprehension.But the most disadvantaged children are those in thebottom left-hand quadrant with problems in both areas.

It is immediately apparent why most deaf childrenstruggle with reading; with a lower than normalunderstanding of both language and phonics they arefirmly in the most disadvantaged quarter. No wonderthey have literacy problems! Their deafness cuts themoff from both spoken language in its entirety and –inevitably – the sounds which are the building blocks of spoken language.

So how can this be changed? How do Teachers of the Deaf give deaf children access to language andphonics?

BSL will give deaf children a language which they canuse to think, but it has no direct relationship withspoken or written language. Users of BSL will haveno day-to-day knowledge of phonics. Althoughvarious systems of ‘visual phonics’ can teach thesounds of English, BSL users cannot apply thesesounds to the (sign) language they use because it’s a totally different language. Like finger spelling,visual phonics cannot be used on a whole languagelevel.

The combination of visual phonics and BSL can give deaf children some word recognition andcomprehension – but word recognition is in Englishand comprehension is in BSL! The two do not tie up,which is surely the whole point of learning phonics.

Deaf children need a way to access fully andunderstand all of the sound-based spoken English in day-to-day interaction and one which also ties in with the individual sounds of spoken English. They need good word recognition and goodcomprehension in the same language. This is a prescription for Cued Speech.

Using eight handshapes in four positions CuedSpeech conveys whole language sound by soundand in real time by clarifying the ambiguous orinvisible lip-patterns of speech. Through CuedSpeech deaf children can learn and understand thewhole of the English language – acquired naturallyin the same way as hearing children acquirelanguage, but visually. They can then bring thisunderstanding to learning to read; they can make theassociation between the words they already knowand the sounds these words contain.

Cued Speech can be used on a whole languagelevel and on a phonetic level. Deaf children broughtup with Cued Speech have good word recognitionand good comprehension; they fit firmly into JimRose’s top right-hand quadrant – the best readers! It is not surprising therefore that research shows thatchildren brought up with Cued Speech have readinglevels which equal those of hearing children.

The success of Cued Speech in giving access towhole language is well documented. It can be usedfrom babyhood and will give deaf children the abilityto think in English. Research shows that deafchildren brought up with Cued Speech learn to readusing phonics in the same way as hearing children.


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Access to phonics and literacy Anne Worsfold advocates Cued Speech as a tried and tested method of developing good word recognition

and good comprehension in deaf pupils

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A parent whose son was born profoundly deaf andwho started to use Cued Speech when her son wasjust a few months old says, ‘Just after my son’ssecond birthday he received a cochlear implant. I think this was when I really began to marvel atwhat Cued Speech had given him. Just five daysafter “switch on” he began to respond to sound thathad simply not been accessible to him before.Within a couple of months he had literally mappedthe new sound onto the Cued Speech that he wasused to seeing. I found that day by day I was able to cue less and less. He was already completelyfamiliar with seeing English through Cued Speechand quickly became used to hearing it. He didn’thave to learn English from scratch; he had alreadyinternalised it. It was literally just a few weeks beforehe started talking and at just one year post-implanthe had caught up the language gap and had age-appropriate expressive and receptive language. I don’t doubt that without Cued Speech he would not have been in that situation.

‘At two-and-a-half he started to notice letters andwords around him and his big brother’s JollyPhonics homework and school reading books. I puteach written sound his older brother was learning on the kitchen wall and then added a cued graphicto each one too. By three years old Z knew all his letter sounds and names; again he seemed simply to map the visual representation of a soundhe had through Cued Speech onto a new visualrepresentation of the written letter. By three yearsold he had started sounding out consonant-vowel-consonant words for himself and was able to readthem. I remember being amazed at the time by whathe was able to do and by what Cued Speech hadgiven him easy access to. My amazement justcontinued to grow, however, as he quickly startedreading more complicated words and over a periodof six months zoomed through the Jolly Phonicsusing Cued Speech. He has now become anamazing little reader, far exceeding everything mytwo hearing children were able to do at the sameage.

‘When Z was first diagnosed as deaf, one of mygreatest fears was whether he would be able to learn to read. As it turned out I really had nothing to worry about. Z at three years and seven monthshas just had a reading test with an educationalpsychologist and has come out with a reading age of seven and a half! If I hadn’t witnessed it myself I’m not sure I’d actually believe it was possible.Undoubtedly Z has a love of and talent for the writtenword, but I know this talent would not have beenrealised if he hadn’t had access to Cued Speech.’

Although designed to give whole language access,Cued Speech is very efficient at giving access to

phonics and some teachers have used it specificallywith phonics work in the classroom. It has a numberof advantages over other systems:• There are only 12 cues for the 44 sounds (the rest

of the information being on the lips) so it is easy tolearn.

• It very clearly shows the difference betweenconsonants (shown by handshapes) and vowels(shown by position); this instantly gives pupilsextra information about the composition oflanguage.

• Children pick it up quickly and easily.• Research shows dramatic improvements in

phonetic awareness with little input in terms of time. • It can be used to build whole words and sentences

– in real time.• Because lip-reading is an integral part of the

system, deaf children familiar with Cued Speechare more skilled at lip-reading people who do notcue.

Used at a whole language level it will also give theinformation about the stress and duration of wordsand phrases that is so important for speech and lip-reading.

The Cued Speech Association UK, a national charitywhich provides information about and training in Cued Speech, is offering low-cost one-dayworkshops. The workshops will cover the basics ofthe system, the research which proves its success,and information about how to use Cued Speech.They will also introduce the e-learning programme.

These one-day workshops are suitable for: • parents and professionals who just want a ‘taster’

in order to decide if they want to use orrecommend Cued Speech

• parents and professionals who wish to learn CuedSpeech primarily through the e-learning website:www.learntocue.co.uk

• professionals who need to know about CuedSpeech in order to ensure that they pass onaccurate information to parents.

To enquire about low-cost workshops or to arrangeone for your group contact: [email protected] discuss the use of Cued Speech contact:[email protected]. For more generalinformation or research details visit the website atwww.cuedspeech.co.uk or call 01803 832784 oremail [email protected]. The e-learningprogramme can be found at: www.learntocue.co.uk/(Please note that we strongly recommendattendance at a one-day workshop before using this website to learn to cue.)

Anne Worsfold is Executive Director of the CuedSpeech Association UK.

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Iam soooooo happy! I have passed my English. Ta Mrs K.’ I was thrilled to read that text. So oftenexam result day reveals passes in all subjects apart

from English, or at best a poor pass.

English is a complex and at times confusing subjectbut nevertheless an important one. Deaf pupils wantto succeed but often experience frustration at havingto study components of the mainstream Englishcourse when they have a weak grasp of the rubric ofEnglish. The content is often inappropriate for themand focuses on aspects of English which many deafpupils view as unimportant.

Four skills – speaking, listening,writing and reading – are internallyassessed at each level

This is more so when the pupils use BSL as their firstlanguage or their preferred language to communicateand/or to access the school curriculum. So often thepupils have good study skills and high levels ofmotivation but they do not receive a grade thatreflects their cognitive ability.

Individual v mainstreamEnglish for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL)qualifications focus specifically on developing anindividual’s English speaking, listening, writing andreading skills in the context of his or her daily life.There is little focus on literature, but rather on thedaily application of English. There are five levels in the Scottish curriculum: Access 2, Access 3,Intermediate 1, Intermediate 2 and Higher. AtIntermediate 2 and Higher, the pupil is required tostudy two units from a choice of three – ‘EverydayCommunication’ is mandatory and one from ‘Workand Study’ or ‘Transactional’ as a second choice. Fourskills – speaking, listening, writing and reading – areinternally assessed at each level and in each unit withan external exam. All four outcomes must be passed.

ESOL courses were not specifically developed fordeaf pupils. The courses are accredited by thenational qualification bodies: in Scotland this is theScottish Qualification Authority (SQA). I contactedthem when I first contemplated the possibility of someBSL pupils studying an ESOL course and also foradvice concerning special exam arrangements.It is possible to study this course alongside amainstream English course either as extensionmaterials (this proved to be highly successful for one

senior pupil who had difficulties grasping tensestructures), expanding vocabulary relevant to thesituation and/or as a stand-alone course.

Practical v theoryPractical-based tasks are set for outcomes 1 and 2: a conversation with another person and a written task.Duration and length of task will vary according to thelevel. During preparation of their talk the pupils areactively encouraged to consider the vocabulary theywill use. This enables them to think about wordchoice, sentence construction and appropriateconversational repair strategies while retaining theintegrity of the communication task. This lends itself tocollaborative working with the speech and languagetherapist.

Drafting of the written task is not only permitted butencouraged. Pupils are encouraged to reflect, reviewand modify their work, giving them ownership of theirlearning in a meaningful manner: key components ofthe Curriculum for Excellence. Creativity cannot beignored or be tokenistic.

By embracing change we can driveup standards, improve confidenceand equip pupils for their future

The assessment of outcomes 3 and 4 is test basedfollowing controlled and supervised conditions. Theassessment tools range from true/false, multiplechoice and short answer questions, sentencecompletion and matching for the understanding ofspoken English. Applying for live speaker(s) waspermitted under the ‘candidates with disabilitiesand/or additional support needs’ (SQA special examarrangements, www.sqa.org.uk/ sqa/14976.html).Guidance and support are readily available eitherfrom the course arrangement document, online and/or directly with SQA – I am appreciative of all the support and assistance I received from the SQA.

Innovation v status quoI believe that we, as Teachers of the Deaf, need to beopen to making changes to the way we support thiscore subject. By embracing change we can drive upstandards, improve confidence and equip pupils fortheir future. Since introducing this course, I now havepupils with real desire to engage in this subject. Nolonger am I greeted with sullen downturned mouths at1.40pm on Monday afternoon! The pupils enjoy therich and diverse learning experience: paper and pen


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A new perspectiveSearching for an alternative and more engaging approach to teaching English to deaf pupils who use

BSL, Margaret Kinsman explored the ESOL qualifications

‘

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work, interactive CD-ROM program and a variety ofactivities. There are many additional activities andresources on the internet.

The rainbow v the pot of gold While this rainbow brightens a dark sky, the pot ofgold appears slightly more elusive. ESOL clearlyaddresses the needs of people who are speakers ofother languages but there are limitations – it is notaccessible to deaf pupils who don’t use BSL and/orthose who have no (or very poor) speech.

It is important to strike the rightbalance of being inventive andinnovative yet retaining integrity

Speech intelligibility is subjective and depends on anumber of factors, some out of the control of thespeaker. The oral presentations have to be videoed,not as part of the assessment process but forexternal verification. However, videoing instantlyreduces clarity and intelligibility and therefore whenreviewed by an external verifier the presentation ofthe pupil’s speech maybe deemed poor.

There are inherent difficulties to listening – backgroundnoise, room acoustics and absence of lip patterns,especially when listening to a CD.

Ability v disabilityWhen I consider any new course, material orresource I ask the simple question ‘Is it fit forpurpose?’ It is important to strike the right balance ofbeing inventive and innovative yet retaining integrity,of being robust and reliable yet avoiding duplicity anda watering-down of the task.

It has been said that great innovations often stem fromlooking at an old problem from a new perspective.ESOL has provided a new perspective to this age-oldproblem and has supported my aspirations to improvedeaf pupils’ acquisition of English.

Margaret Kinsman works in Dingwall Academy, alarge secondary mainstream school in Scotlandsupporting deaf pupils to access the curriculum. Sheis also an associate assessor with Her Majesty’sInspectorate of Education and a qualified andregistered sign language interpreter with the ScottishAssociation of Sign Language Interpreters.

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Learning to communicate is the most complicatedprocess our brains have to master. Understandingand organising language and communicating

messages so that they make sense to others areincredibly complex tasks. Children use language andcommunication skills to learn, interact, think andreason; they need these skills in order to make friendsand share their thoughts, feelings and experiences,and to access information and learn. For manychildren, including those with hearing impairments,several aspects of this process do not come easily.

I CAN estimates that 10% of children have long-termspeech, language and communication needs (SLCN),either as their primary disability or as part of anothercondition such as a hearing impairment or learningdifficulty. In addition, there are large numbers ofchildren in some areas of the UK starting primaryschool with delayed language. In some areas,particularly those of social deprivation, around 50% of children are starting primary school without thebasic speech and language skills they need to learnand make friends.

To raise awareness of the importance of communicationfor all children, and in particular for those children whofind it difficult, I CAN has developed the ChatterboxChallenge. It runs on the principle of making language

and interaction fun; there are songs, games andactivities, all of which help to support different aspectsof language and communication. Each year activitiesare based around a particular theme – this year, thetheme is mini-beasts and the garden.

For early years settings there are songs and activitiestied into the theme. For primary-age children there are ideas for school assemblies, including the use ofdrama, with follow-up activities that can be done withinthe classroom, as homework or extended schoolactivities to support vocabulary, categorisation andinteraction between pupils.

The activities are designed to support language and communication for all children and though notcreated for children with specific language needs, such as those experienced by children with a hearingimpairment, they aim to be as inclusive as possible.

For early years settings the Chatterbox Challengeincludes the use of songs, which are often part of theirplans and routines and are a great way to supportcommunication. They are fun for young children to do as they are full of repetition, which helps withremembering words. Singing action songs means thatwords and meanings in songs can be linked togetherand children with the poorest language can join in. The


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The Chatterbox Challenge Wendy Lee explains why the annual campaign from I CAN should be of interest to

Teachers of the Deaf

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visual support suggested through pictures and signsmakes songs accessible to the majority of children.

Support for vocabulary development is also embeddedin the Chatterbox Challenge. Evidence-informedprinciples around best practice for vocabulary teachingform the foundation for the exercises. Activities areused that encourage the repetition of words andsentences in different situations, link new vocabularyto words children already know and practise them inreal-life situations. This helps with understanding aswell as expression and there are activities linked to all the songs in the Chatterbox Challenge whichencourage this to happen. For example, sortinggames are included, which are great for gettingchildren to understand category words, think about theattributes of different words and how words are similaror different, both in terms of meaning and phonicmake-up.

One of the main principles running through theChatterbox Challenge is how much fun communication

can be and the important role adults play incommunicating with children and supporting theirlanguage through developing and scaffolding theircurrent skills. Children really benefit from adultscommunicating with them, sharing new words andideas, encouraging them to take turns and developlanguage and communication skills. Building languageand communication skills through conversations, playactivities and day-to-day routines is a great way tosupport children’s development and is encouragedthrough the Chatterbox Challenge materials.

I CAN aims to raise awareness of how importantcommunication is for all youngsters. For children with SLCN, this will involve collaboration betweenprofessionals and parents, including specialist supportfor children, and following key principles around thefundamental role played by adults in supporting theseskills.

Taking part in I CAN’s Chatterbox Challenge not onlyraises awareness around communication and thosechildren who struggle, but is a good way for allchildren to have fun with communication.

As well as Chatterbox Challenge, I CANworks in many different ways to ensureall people who have a responsibility tochildren – from parents and teachers toservice commissioners, providers andpolicy makers – understand thefundamental importance of goodcommunication skills for children’sdevelopment and future life chances.

I CAN produces a wide range ofinformation, training, support and onlineresources for children, families andprofessionals which are availablethrough the I CAN website atwww.ican.org.uk/ The resources coverthe early years and primary schools and are freely accessible. Although not

designed for children with a hearing impairment, theymay be useful additions to materials used by Teachersof the Deaf to support language and communicationskills. Many work on the principle of supportinglanguage through multi-sensory approaches, with an emphasis on visual materials to support languagedevelopment. The majority are based on a foundationof evidence around strategies that work to supportlanguage in children with SLCN.

Additional information is available through the TalkingPoint website, which is a great source of up-to-dateinformation on all aspects of communicationdevelopment and disability, with information andresources for parents and professionals –www.talkingpoint.org.uk.

Wendy Lee is a speech and language therapist and a professional adviser for I CAN.

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Following the National Deaf CAMHS stakeholdermeeting which I described in the NovemberMagazine I was asked to chair a conference

on recognising ADHD, autism and deafness in theclassroom. I was pleased that I had available advancedcopies of the Magazine to share with delegates, asthere were several articles which supported theconference content.

This conference was designed to develop a betterunderstanding of deaf children with ADHD and autismand provide tools for working with them effectively inthe classroom. The clinical team at Corner House In-Patient Unit provided the speakers. Dr NicolettaGentili, a consultant in child and adolescent psychiatry,began by outlining the diagnosis (or not) of ADHD. Itappears that there is a basic disagreement betweenprofessionals about the diagnosis and management of ADHD, which is not a neurological disorder but a developmental disorder of self-control. Normalcontributing factors in the population are, for deafchildren, exacerbated by the effects of deafness wherecommunication is involved. Nicoletta’s presentation canbe found on the BATOD website at Articles >> Mentalhealth and self-esteem.

Joanna Hoskin, a speech and language therapist atCorner House, outlined autistic spectrum conditions.One of the biggest challenges is sorting out if alanguage, social or emotional delay is due to theeffects of deafness or if it is indicative of autism.Assessments that could be used normally have notbeen standardised for deaf youngsters and there is ascarcity of guidance and resources for parents andprofessionals. Following the talk delegates had a betterunderstanding of the challenges facing these childrenwho may have a lack of communicative intent, no jointreferencing and a lack of shared attention. Joanna’spresentation is also available on the BATOD website.

There were two workshops during the afternoon –delegates choosing the ADHD workshop were asked toidentify concerns within the age group they work with,and Matty Chalk, a chartered psychologist, offeredstrategies and ideas for practice. Using a case study,he suggested that the distraction of the environmentwas a major factor in behaviour, and that behaviourmanagement was most successful when the family and home life are involved. If each ‘symptom’ is dealtwith, the situation will need constant evaluation andreassessment so Matty suggested that the label wasnot as important as the outcomes.

The alternative workshop, run by Joanna Hoskin andRichard Walker (Head of Corner House School), wasvery popular. After a discussion about approaches toyoungsters in the most severe situations that bringthem to Corner House for assessment and treatment,the group shared individual examples. The result wasseveral Teachers of the Deaf leaving with new ideas for approaching situations with the young people withwhom they work. The handouts from this workshop canbe downloaded from the BATOD website.

It was evident that both workshops gave similarmessages and that the approach to behaviourmanagement has to be consistent from all involvedwhether the ‘label’ is autism or ADHD. To ensure thateveryone knows what actions are expected in responseto behaviours a system must be in place to quantifyaction and reaction frequency, and good team workmust be operating (professionals and parents).

One important aspect which came out of thediscussions was the need to demonstrate whathappened and to work out if situations could beimproved. Richard Walker provided those present witha pack suggesting a format for developing a behavioursupport plan. This aims to show when the behaviourthat caused concern happened, possibly what caused itand what the reaction of staff was. Staff can then agreeon a particular action and verbal response for futureoccasions. The plan helps to record the frequency ofinappropriate behaviour and the effect of the agreedaction. Richard discussed strategies for consistentsupport for good behaviour and suggested a format fordealing with transgression of agreed ‘rules’. Recordingthis evidence is very important, especially for reviews,as records can be used to show that further help isnecessary or that approaches are not succeeding. Thesuggested format is available on the BATOD website.

This was a useful conference offering support andstrategies to delegates that could be put in placeeffectively to help deaf youngsters improve theirbehaviour and interaction, and that could also improvegeneral classroom discipline. In fact, many mainstreamschools do have positive behaviour managementtechniques and policies in place which parallel thesuggestions made during the day. If there is stillcause for concern then the assistance offered by theNDCAMHS will provide a firm basis to begin furtherguidance and treatment.

Ann Underwood is President of BATOD


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Conference content Late last year Ann Underwood chaired a fascinating conference offering

support and strategies to professionals working with deaf pupils who have

ADHD or autism

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Visitors to www.signedstories.com are bucking thetrend that has seemed to indicate that nurseryrhymes are too old-fashioned to interest young

children today.

Since Handy Rhymes – a unique collection ofanimated nursery rhymes – was launched onBookstart Day, they’ve been enjoyed by hundreds ofchildren in the UK and from around the world. Thatcomes despite a Booktrust survey revealing thatalmost a quarter of British parents have never sung a nursery rhyme to their child, and more than 20% of parents under 24 think they have no educationalvalue.

Malcolm Wright, Managing Director ITV SignPost,says, ‘Booktrust believes that songs and rhymes helpbabies and toddlers to develop their vocabulary, whichin turn enables them to achieve more when they startschool.

‘Hearing children have always had access to the funand stimulus of nursery rhymes. Our Handy Rhymesproject ensures that the same access is now availableto deaf children. With our Signed Stories website weare committed to creating this kind of new accesswherever and whenever we can.’

The nursery rhymes were produced by animatorsworking alongside Curtis Jobling, designer of theBafta-award winning cartoon Bob the Builder.

Curtis says, ‘Signed Stories has huge potential to reach an audience which can sometimes beneglected, and I’m excited by the prospect ofproviding deaf children access to animatedentertainment.’

Gary Sturrock, a deaf technical operator at ITVSignPost who animated Little Miss Muffet, adds,‘Deaf children might not always appreciate the natureof rhyme because they can’t hear how it sounds, butthat doesn’t mean they should miss out on somewonderful stories.’

Signed Stories is viewed by 200,000 children in overa hundred countries around the world every month.It’s being used in classrooms with both deaf andhearing children, and it’s also proving to be a valuableresource for teachers of children with specialeducational needs and those who are learningEnglish as a second language.

‘The website is spreading virally as teachers andparents promote it through their own networks,’ addsMalcolm.

‘What started out as a venture targeted very much atdeaf children is morphing into a fun resource used byeveryone here and abroad. The joy of the internet isthe unexpected way in which content is used andvalued.’

The nation’s favourite nursery rhyme is ‘TwinkleTwinkle Little Star’ – see it on Signed Stories!

Time for rhymes Signed nursery rhymes can now be appreciated by deaf children thanks to a new collection on the

Signed Stories website

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Working closely with parents is always achallenge for a regional provision like Longwill,a Birmingham community day special school

for deaf children aged 2–11 years. We find that thereare distances, other family commitments and lack oftransport that stop us seeing as much of parents aswe would like.

We have had to be very creative either to encouragethe parents in to school or find other ways of keepingin touch. We all know that it’s partnership and sharedunderstanding with parents that work best for ourchildren. This is especially true for deaf childrenlearning their first and second languages, and parentslearning to communicate with their deaf child. Many ofour parents speak a different language at home andneed to learn English and BSL to be able to sharewith their child.

We run a wonderful Wednesday morning parents’communication class with five of Longwill’s deaf staff.The parents pay £1 and two minibuses zip around thearea and pick them up and take them to the DeafCultural Centre. This has been going for nearly 20years and as well as teaching parents to sign withtheir children, it doubles as a club and a crisisintervention point, a place for social work or othersupport to happen, friendships to form and children to meet other children to play with at weekends. Wehave a dedicated home–school link worker who has agreat way of rounding parents up for ‘Keeping up withthe children’ workshops. The teachers do a lot tomaintain contact through phone calls, home–schoolbooks and running termly ‘Inspire’ workshops.

The deaf learning mentors run a six-week interventionwhere we target particular families who could becomea little more engaged with their child’s needs at home.They soon learn that ‘deaf rules apply’ for thatprecious hour and many hearts and minds aretransformed after those visits.

And then there’s all the ‘techie’ stuff we do to teach,engage and inform parents…. They say that somemarriages are made in heaven, and when, as a seniorteacher in a sign bilingual school for deaf children, Imarried Paul, a graphic designer and senior tutor of auniversity visual communication department, I hopedsecretly for some hidden benefits!

First came the ‘Hafgraph’. My complaints about how todemonstrate our children showing progress over timeled to Paul creating a brilliant piece of ‘info-graphics’showing, as a graph, a child’s ‘history, assessments

and forecast’ through the P scales and NationalCurriculum levels. This now enables us to makeparents aware of how well their child has progressedcompared to the child’s starting point.

At Longwill we use this at reviews and any time weneed to demonstrate individual progress. Ofsted likedit, too.

The website has released me from all the difficulties withmaking contact

Paul then became my school prospectus designadviser. ‘Would you just have a quick look at theseproofs, please?’ The poor woman at the printers wasput through her paces ‘once removed’. The end resultwas an award winner for her – and she never actuallyknew that an MA-level graphic design tutor wasmarking and assessing her every designer move. The school and parents got a great school brochure.

The biggest coup was actually me solving his problembut to the greatest benefit for Longwill families. Theneed for Paul to find ‘real business and industrydesign placements’ for some of his third-year studentsled to a great parent-friendly website we could neverhave afforded to commission. The SMILE team, as they became in their final year, worked with ussupported by the university and Paul, to design amodern, clean look that allows, most importantly, really easy blogging. Randip, one of our deaf mentors,shows you around the site and taps the screen to make you click! It has all the usual galleries and timetables and policies and prospectus-typeinformation, but I can take a photo of Father Christmasgiving out the presents at the party and zoom it straightup from my iPhone to a place in the sky, where, beforethe children get home, parents can see what’s beengoing on and be ready to ask their child all about it!

The photos and text blogs are stored in date order to be pored over and discussed with mum and dad,auntie and grandma at every opportunity when thechild gets home.

The website has released me from all the difficultieswith making contact that happen because our schooltakes children from all over the West Midlands region.I should be able to stay under the duvet and text‘School closed due to snow and extreme weathertoday’ and it appear in a few seconds… but why do Ialways have to spend an hour from 5.30am huddled

Babs Day explains her school’s creative approach to building relationships with parents


Keeping in touch

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at the computer downstairs looking for Met Officeadvice before the central heating comes on!

The most amazing ‘parent-engager’ ever, though, hadnothing to do with my husband, but my alternative‘significant other’, Alison Carter, the best deputy it’spossible to have. Alison discovered the use of thePlayStation Portable or PSP for providing an instanthome–school record of photos and films that can beshared. We gave one to each child, trained the parentsand now pictures of new babies or dad playing rugbyat the weekend can be shared with the whole class onthe whiteboard. Farm trips or spelling tests, wordssigned by the teacher, art days or ‘my brilliant storytelling’ can be shown at home, and signs can belearned and questions asked in BSL to deaf parents –there are endless possibilities for fun and learning.

We are constantly thinking up new ideas for how wecan keep our relationships with parents vitalised.Watch this space!

Babs Day is the Head at Longwill School for DeafChildren in Birmingham (www.longwill.bham.sch.uk).There is more about Alison’s PSP project on thewebsite, and the Hafgraph can be purchased fromLongwill School.

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Given the basic premise that visual learning isimportant for the vast majority of deaf children,the effective use of visual materials should

promote communication, vocabulary and access tothe curriculum. If one accepts this then the provisionof these visual resources should be a priority for anyhearing-impaired service or setting.

Personalised graphic resourcesEffective graphic resources can be used flexibly tofocus on the individual needs of a child. In this example(below left) where a child’s disorganised bedtimeroutine and resultant lack of sleep impacted on hishome and school life, a routine was agreed with hiscarer and illustrated in a simple five-stage diagram.

Reward stickers and targets are graphically illustratedand really do stimulate motivation. In the example(above right) good work is rewarded by a stickershowing the child’s favourite cartoon character Bobthe Builder.

Display materialsPosters such as Total Communication and Basic

Signs illustrate issues surrounding effectivecommunication with deaf children. These postersprovide a means of raising awareness and can beadapted to meet the specific needs of deaf childrenusing varied communication modes. Posters can betailor-made to promote the sign vocabulary of topicsor the attainment of individual sign vocabulary targets.

While the internet offers the ability to downloadgraphic resources easily and quickly, it doesn’tprovide for this level of resource personalisation. Howmuch time do teachers spend searching the internetjust looking for the right pictures to help illustrate aspecific concept, feature or object and never quitefinding the perfect illustration? Visual resources,gleaned from the internet, with varied layouts andstyles, don’t have a uniform child-friendly format suchas those produced by the Educational Service forHearing and Vision (ESHV) to promote livinglanguage.

The ESHV’s Living Language cardsIs it the best use of ateacher’s time to spendhours producingthe visualresourcesneeded ratherthan planninghow the resourcesshould be usedeffectively? Graphicvisualisers allow theTeachers of the Deaf,teaching assistants anddeaf instructors to focus on their work with thechildren rather than on the production of theresources. Graphic resources are ordered, produced,reviewed and frequently amended. This qualityassurance process is routine and wouldn’t easily bereplicated where materials are produced on avoluntary basis.

Following interest and experiencesFollowing a young child’s interests and first-handexperiences is an important principle in deafeducation, especially in the early years. Graphicvisualisers can illustrate deaf children’s experiencesand can be used to promote vocabulary, languagedevelopment and written work. In the example at thetop of the next page, Adam’s dad is paying for a toy


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Graphically illustratedadvantagesJon Parker outlines the advantages of access to high quality graphic support for

deaf children within the Educational Service for Hearing and Vision

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purchased at a car boot sale. This type ofimmediate illustrationhas the addedadvantage of helping topromote the effectiveuse of home–schoolbooks when parents seethe resultant illustrationsand the ensuinglanguage developmentwhich stems partly fromtheir direct input.

Sign graphic resourceThe prime goals in the development of all theESHV’s sign graphic resources are ease and flexibilityof use. The signs can easily be used by all membersof staff. Graphics can be enlarged to suit anypurpose. The signs also have to be attractive to theusers – the deaf children. A number of sign headswere trialled with the children and it was decided touse two heads for each sign, one male and onefemale, as illustrated below. The signs are totallyflexible in that they can be very small or placed onlarge posters without loss of quality, and their simplejpeg format allows them to be imported into virtuallyany Windows-based document.

Reading with signsOne of the most excitingdevelopments has been therecent agreement of OxfordUniversity Press to allow theESHV to adapt its OxfordReading Tree Scheme, albeit withunderstandable restrictions, toinclude sign directly on the page.While this is still very much in theearly stages of development, theadapted scheme will ultimately bean invaluable resource for theteaching of reading to our youngsigning children. Another

advantage accruing from this includes the potential forincreased involvement of non-signing parents in theirsigning children’s reading at home. These resourcescan be flexibly used either on the page, as shown inthe draft example, or on additional separate pages,depending on the focus of the teacher.

Subject-specific signs and curriculum resourcesUsing photographs the ESHV has developed ‘signdictionaries’ covering early vocabulary and maths,with further resources planned. Other posters areproduced to cover key topics and vocabulary. TheESHV’s adult signing classes provide another avenuefor the graphic resources produced, with classesbenefitting enormously from the visual resources.

Corporate image and newsletters A professional image for any service is important,especially with the parents ofdeaf children, butalso with otherprofessionalsworking ineducation, healthand social services.Our graphicvisualisers enhance theprofessional look of the ESHV’s documentation.Information leaflets have been produced, includingTransferring to Adult Services, Early Years Team andThe Hull and District Deaf Children’s Society. Theattractive and professional look of these informationleaflets provides further benefits.

I have attempted to outline the significant benefits to the deaf children within the ESHV of graphicvisualiser support. This has only been made possibleby recognition of the importance of providing highquality graphics and the joint arrangement mechanismthat funds the service, the latter leading to economiesof scale which spread out the cost of this provision. It means that the service doesn’t have to rely on thetime and abilities of talented volunteers, which canresult in qualified staff losing direct contact time with deaf children. There is also no need to ‘cobbletogether’ resources from the internet which are oftenunsatisfactory in a number of ways. One question thatservices should ask is, ‘Should deaf children haveaccess to high quality visual graphics to enhance their education?’ If the answer to this is ‘Yes’, furtherquestions should centre on how to achieve this andhow the sharing of resources could be encouraged tomaximise the potential benefits to our deaf childrenand young people.

Jon Parker is Head of the Educational Service forHearing and Vision’s Hearing Service, which, under a joint arrangement, covers the East Riding ofYorkshire, Hull and North East Lincolnshire.


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Our research considered developments in the useof generally available or specialist technologiesand looked at the attitudes of children, young

people and the relevant adult constituencies totechnology-supported learning. The data collectedcovered their experiences in learning to read, writeand communicate, and the factors affecting theseareas. It was obtained from controlled experiments as well as from field research comprising interviews,group discussions and focus groups with deaf pupilsand young deaf adults.

A multi-pronged approach was taken, which includeda project involving a testing phase using the BritishAbility Scales (BAS) and the Neale Analysis ofReading Ability (NARA) at nine-month intervals; anEnhanced Learning Through Technology (ELTT)programme to ascertain whether specific technologieswould make a significant difference to deaf pupils’reading, writing and communication skills; and theuse of online ‘deaf-friendly’ materials to enhancereading, writing and computer skills through theEuropean Computer Driving Licence (ECDL)programme. Other activities planned includedseminars relating to children’s reading and writing;assessments of different software; questionnaires to,and interviews with, Teachers of the Deaf, hearingPGCE students and deaf pupils.

Seven schools were involved in the testing; 40Teachers of the Deaf participated in the seminars,focus groups and questionnaires; 14 hearing pupils were tested; 50 PGCE students returnedquestionnaires; and 51 deaf pupils were tested,interviewed and completed questionnaires.

Research Team and Advisory GroupThe research ran from 2007–09 and was funded bythe Leverhulme Trust. It was conducted by me andHarold Silver (a former Professor of Education at theUniversity of London). We were assisted by threeassessors, Dr Rachel Pye, Dr Catherine Foy and Jonathan Heanen, from the Department ofPsychology and Clinical Language Sciences at theUniversity of Reading; a research assistant LouiseMann; Deafax staff, Graham Hocking and RubbenaAurangzeb-Tariq; and Prue Goodwin, a lecturer invisual literacy and communication at the University of Reading.

The Advisory Group consisted of the Chair, HelenLansdown, Chief Executive Officer of Deafax, and Dr

Vesna Stojanovic from the Department of Psychologyand Clinical Language Sciences at the University ofReading.

Seminars and responses to questionnairesTwo seminars were held; the first focused onmeaning and visual literacy. The teachers undertookassignments with their deaf pupils and went on togive presentations focusing on ‘making meaning’which involved the deaf author Joyce Dunbar.

Questionnaires were received from 35 deaf pupilsaged 8–14, highlighting issues of confidence andattainment in relation to time spent using ICTequipment at school, communication with teachersand other adults, and the use of software reviewed aspart of this project. 20 questionnaires were returnedfrom teachers responsible for some 276 pupils with arange of degrees of deafness.

ELTT and ECDL programmesThe ELTT programme addressed tasks undertaken bya group of eight deaf pupils aged between six andten. The ECDL programme was used with 21 deafpupils in three schools, taking a module focusing on‘presenting’. The pupils were tested twice, and theresults were analysed. The pupils who used onlinematerials between the two tests achieved improvedmarks, although these still did not reach the ECDLpass mark.

BAS and NARA TestsThe ELTT project involving BAS and NARA tests hadthree groups of participants, including a hearingcontrol group consisting of 14 pupils with an averageage of eight; a deaf group of 14 pupils aged ten(these were matched to the hearing group on verbal,non-verbal and reading abilities); and a deafexperimental group consisting of eight pupils agedten, who had significantly lower verbal, non-verbaland reading abilities compared to the other twogroups.

Cognitive measures, including non-verbal and verbalstandardised tests, were taken from all pupils at twotime points. The pupils in the deaf experimental groupreceived a series of specially constructed ICT-basededucation programmes. The hypothesis tested in thisdesign was that the children in the experimental groupwould benefit from a relative improvement in literacyprogress in comparison to both control groups. TheNARA II test was used to assess reading ability.

Research summaryRecent research at Deafax explored the significance of ICT in improving the

reading, writing and communication skills of deaf people. Ken Carter has the details

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StatisticsInferential statistics carried out investigated relativeimprovement in reading, language and non-verbalabilities in the three groups of participants. The deafgroup which received ICT intervention significantlyimproved their reading accuracy from time one to time two. They also improved their readingcomprehension and their reading rate. Verbal andnon-verbal abilities also improved. This pattern ofimprovement was also seen in the hearing controlgroup; however, this is to be expected given theirtypical general development. The results suggestthat the developmental disadvantage associated withthe deaf control group is not present (or is reduced)in the deaf experimental group, which could beattributed to the presence of training courses. The deaf control group who did not receive ICTintervention showed hardly any improvement. Theyimproved their non-verbal abilities; however, therewas a loss over time with regard to their verbalabilities. Not only did this group not improve on anyof the components of reading skills assessed, butthey seem to have deteriorated, in particular withregard to reading comprehension and reading rate.

Interpretation of resultsAs this study explored the use of ICT training as ameans of improving literacy, there are aspects of thedesign which should caution the interpretation ofthese results. The first is the sample size. Groupsizes started relatively small, which is reflective ofthe difficulty in recruiting this sort of sample. By thesecond test phase, many individuals were no longeravailable for assessment for various reasons (suchas illness, moved out of the area, progressed tosecondary school). Group attenuation of this sort istypical of longitudinal experiments, but the resultingsample sizes suggest that further research on larger groups should be conducted to repeat and corroborate results. Additionally, the group age matching was not ideal. Due to recruitmentdifficulties some of the pupils included in the studywere at secondary school level. Future studies wouldbenefit from using a smaller range of ages within thegroups.

As a final point, the deaf samples wereheterogeneous in that the majority of pupils hadsome sort of general hearing difficulty, but theirdifficulties ranged from profound hearing impairmentto mild hearing impairment. As a generalobservation, those children with milder hearingdifficulties were generally less cognitivelydisadvantaged than others. Thus, in future studies,an estimation of hearing difficulty and success ofelectronic augmentation should be collected asbackground information for the participants, andshould be used as a controlling variable in resultanalysis.

Pointers for the futureThe results of the different strategies for exploringrelationships between the use of ICT and deaf pupils’literacy and communication skills indicate some ofthe difficulty in the recent period of recruitingsufficient numbers of schools for the deaf andhearing support units in mainstream schools toachieve the comprehensive data and analysis. Thisdifficulty was counterbalanced by using a multi-pronged approach that brought together a range of insights into the perceptions and use of ICThardware and software by deaf pupils and ToDs.

In the planning stages are British and internationaljournal articles on the project procedures andoutcomes; a book on the project, its outcomes,background, contexts and pointers for the future;contributions to conferences, mainly in Britain and the US; and at least one invited seminar fordeafness-related professionals in governmentdepartments and agencies, professional associationsand research bodies.

Discussions are underway with two UK universitiesand a US university about collaborative fundedresearch with Deafax on studies involving greaternumbers of deaf pupils.

Ken Carter is the Founder and Director of Researchof Deafax.

Useful websites

Deafax – www.deafax.orgAccess Ability Communications Technologyfor Children – www.aact4children.orgDecibels – www.decibels.org.ukInclusive Environnments – www.inclusive-environments.org.uk

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1 PresentMaria Bailey, Andrew Burgess, Jill Bussien, Nicki Harris,Andy Owen, Paul Simpson (Chair), Simon Thompson.Apologies: Sue Lewis

2 It was agreed that the notes were a truerepresentation of the previous meeting except that Nickihad indicated that the guidelines for interpreters workingin educational settings were on the ASLI website (in theGuidance section) rather than that she was going tocirculate them.

3 Matters arising from the previous meeting:• Lindsey Rousseau, facilitator of NatSIP, is aware of

DESF and its role. Paul and Andrew will keep herupdated.

• Gillian Coles of Berkshire has produced a list drawnup by SERSEN of training opportunities for thoseworking with SI children. Action: Nicki will forward thedocument to members of the group.

• BATOD will host a page on its website listingqualifications for those working in a support role. Thiscan be updated when new information is available.Action: Paul to email the link to the group:(www.batod.org.uk/index.php?id=/articles/learning-support/supportworker-courses.htm).

• Nicki will raise the data collection issue at theforthcoming ASLI NEC and report back next time aswell as raising the issue of who is employing whom.

• Paul will suggest to BATOD that the role of the TAmay be a suitable topic for a forthcoming conference.

• Andrew has had some success with the informalquestionnaire to heads of service through persistence– Maria has the findings.

4 The group considered the logos which Andy haddesigned. He was congratulated on his work. After a short and focused discussion it was agreed toadopt the one containing the offset square – at thetop of the agenda of the day. There will be somemodifications to the accompanying text and the colourwill be changed to lilac to improve contrast for VIreaders. The letters will be white. The logos of theindividual organisations in the footer will contain thehome page address.

5 The questionnaire about levels of qualification andnumbers of support workers was discussed. It is almost ready to be sent out and any proposedamendments should be sent to Andy before the end of Tuesday 1 December.

There was a discussion about which staff belong in which category; it was agreed to remove the‘peripatetic’ category; it was agreed also to ask aquestion about the use of agencies so information could be built up. Nicki will also ask about agencies on the e-group. Simon suggested that we make it clearon the form why we are asking this question and heformulated a sentence about this. The questionnaire will be finalised and sent out by the end of the weekwith an initial return date of 18 December 2009. Non-respondents could be followed up later.

6 Maria updated the group on the I-Sign project. Shehad a meeting with Edexcel about joint awarding butwas warned that in the current climate the awardingbody might not continue with it and this decision wasindeed made. NATED was not informed even thoughMaria had been assured that it would be. She waspleased to say that Signature, ACSW and NATED were all now working together on the qualification. Theworking title is Level 3 Certificate in Learning Support(Educational Communication Support Worker orCSW). As the majority of CSWs are working ineducation it is hoped to be able to drop the wordEducational.

A meeting also took place with LLUK. A tight series ofdeadlines has been laid down if it is to be accredited by May/June 2010 including online consultation atwhich point it would go on the Qualification CurriculumFramework. The role of BSL is crucial and has indeedstimulated the qualification’s development so must be acentral part but other key aspects of the work of a CSWwill need to be strongly represented through the unitsalso. It is possible that entry will be at level 2 BSLand English. It is important that the initiative showsdevelopment of skills in BSL. It was pointed out that there are no national standards at level 3 forinterpreting. CILT is currently developing standards forpreparing to interpret – in all languages including signlanguage.

The Signature interpreting advisory group will beadvising on the development of the course. There maybe some resistance from the interpreting professionals.The course should include units, which will have equalpriority and status, on note-taking; extending language;audiological issues; supporting young people with CIs;supporting for exams; those with other disabilities;mental health issues. There will also be compulsoryunits from the LLUK framework.

Representing you – DeafEducational Support ForumJill Bussien updates members on the latest meeting of this group at the RNID offices on

30 November 2009

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A meeting with the TDA in Manchester was lessencouraging. The TDA is developing one qualification atlevel 3 for all support workers which will be embeddedin the National Curriculum – it will be entitled ‘Supportfor Teaching and Learning’. It is not going to be possibleto have a qualification to suit schools and colleges. Thisis very much in the development stage at the momentbut will be open to consultation.

There is concern about the fact that schools oftenemploy their own LSAs and find training them to beexpensive.

Maria was thanked for sending the group her I-Signproject research findings.

7 Paul and Andy were among colleagues who hadreceived a very skeletal account of a qualification indevelopment by the University of Leeds. It was agreedthat before comment could be made on the suitability ofthe course – despite their strong reputation in the field –we would need to know about entry criteria, includingwhat degrees would be acceptable, modes of delivery,assessment, external certifiers and much more detail onthe structure of the course.

8 Andy raised concerns about oral language modifiertraining. There are ongoing concerns that the trainingdoes not have enough depth, is expensive and needsstrengthening. The future of the OLM is still in doubt asthere are concerns about the number of technical termswhich are being inappropriately explained. It wasagreed that Paul would contact Ofqual asking for ameeting on behalf of the DESF about this. The urgentneed to raise awareness in schools and centres aboutaccess arrangements which are available was raised. Inparticular, parents and schools need to be aware whenoptions are being made (now in Year 8 in some cases)of the implications of their choices for assessmentthroughout and at the end of the course.

9 Update from the organisations. ACSW is working with Maria on the qualificationdevelopment; ASCW tries to increase membershipthrough meetings mainly rather than advertising.

BATOD ’s conference in March is a joint one with theRCSLT; Gary Anderson becomes the President inMarch; there is a special membership of BATOD forTAs/CSWs etc.

Signature: all is progressing well.

ASLI: there has been no change in personnel; thecurrent debate within the organisation is aboutcompulsory CPD which has been agreed at the AGMbut is not finding favour with a significant number ofmembers who point out that they are not an awardingbody.

NATED is also working on the qualification; they willmake contact regarding reviving regular/annualmeetings with BATOD

10 The date and place of the next meeting will be 1 March 2010 at 3pm at the RNID.

Summary of actions• Paul and Andrew to keep NatSIP updated about the

work of DESF.• Nicki to forward the document about training

opportunities for professionals working with CYP withSI to members of the group.

• Nicki to report back about outcome of ASLI NECmeeting at next DESF meeting.

• Paul to pass on link to training course/qualificationpage on BATOD website.

• Paul to suggest the role of TA for future BATODconferences.

• All to send final comments to Andy regarding thequestionnaire by 1 December.

• Andy to make agreed adjustments to the logo andaccompanying text.

• Andy to send out the questionnaire.• Nicki to ask about agencies on the e-group.• Paul to contact Ofqual asking for a meeting regarding

OLMs and their training.

Jill Bussien works with students in FE and is a memberof BATOD NEC.



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1 Present: Jo Campion, Anne Duffy, Brian Gale(chair), Ian Noon, Peter Preston, Paul Simpson

2 The minutes of the last meeting were agreed tobe accurate and the following matters arose:• Paul has been contacting course providers to

discover how many additional TDA-funded ToDsin training there are.

• The Northern Ireland SEN consultation period hasbeen extended again as a result of the weight ofresponses. Both NDCS and BATOD havesubmitted responses.

• Anne pointed out that a recent publicationhighlighting some 12 ‘outstanding’ special schoolsincluded some ‘dispersed services’ not justtraditional special schools. This list can be seenon the Ofsted website.

• The Lamb Inquiry report is still awaited – most ofthe content has already been published throughthe interim reports. NDCS understands the reportwill now be published in mid-December.

• Waltham Forest Service expressed appreciationfollowing Brian’s recent visit to talk to parents.The LA has decided to delegate central servicesfunding for the service to a school – currently aspecial school is bidding to host the service andthis is causing concerning among parents andprofessionals.

• Jo and Paul agreed that their recent meetingswith Ofqual show a desire to respond to theinterests of disabled candidates in examinationsalthough there is a worrying increase in theemphasis on the public confidence duty whenbalanced against the needs of disabled students.The duty will be further strengthened through theEquality Bill, unnecessarily according to NDCSand other bodies, including the Equality andHuman Rights Commission. There is no need toreiterate the public confidence point as it is clearlycontained within Ofqual’s objectives. It is a matterof concern that these objectives do not contain anequality objective.

• The arrangement with The Ear Foundation for the NDCS to share a Teacher of the Deaf willcontinue into the next academic year when Lornareturns after maternity leave. She will be workingtwo days per week.

3 Anne responded to a range of issues relating toOfsted, some of which had been raised by BATODmembers. Key points discussed include thefollowing:• Ofsted is anxious to support the view that there is

no reason why pupils with sensory impairmentshould achieve less well than their hearing peersin the absence of additional difficulties. It isimportant to maintain high expectations. Thisdoes not mean, however, that schools with deafpupils with complex and significant needs wouldbe penalised in their overall grading becausetheir pupils would inevitably achieve less thannational averages. Provided clear progress could be demonstrated the overall grading wouldnot necessarily be affected. Inspectors do notsolely rely on raw scores. The limiting areas aresafeguarding, equality and diversity and progressand attainment. Lack of progress would thereforeaffect the final grade.

• Paul pointed out that as the framework haschanged some schools which had notdeteriorated since an ‘old’ inspection maynevertheless get a lower grade and, in commonwith all other schools which might be similarlyaffected, it would be necessary to explain this.Brian informed us about a school which had beengraded ‘good’ after a previous ‘outstanding’ on thegrounds that they had followed two deaf pupilsand were not satisfied with their performance.

• Ofsted guidance says that as far as possiblespecialist inspectors should inspect specialistprovision, for example resource bases for deafchildren. It would be expected in the case of aspecial school for deaf children that there wouldbe a ToD on the team. If there are exampleswhere this has not happened, colleagues shouldcontact Ofsted or Anne. There is a problem withthe supply of qualified inspectors who are alsoToDs. The inspection teams are assembled by theISPs but have to follow Ofsted guidance (which isguidance, not statutory). All HMI inspecting SENhave been given updated training recently. Everyyear there are opportunities – advertised in thenational press – for teachers to be seconded asadditional inspectors to Ofsted. ToDs who areinterested should apply.

• Ofsted is not an advisory body but can makerecommendations for how improvements couldtake place. There are now two HMI from socialcare backgrounds and there is a move, in thecase of residential schools, towards moreintegrated care/education inspections. This makessense in view of the 24-hour curriculum.

• NDCS pointed out that parents were concernedabout little mention of resource bases in somecases. The guidance is that this should bementioned in the report.

Representing you – NDCS and HMIPaul Simpson shares his notes from a meeting between NDCS, BATOD and Anne Duffy (HMI) held on

7 December 2009 at NDCS in London

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• Anne will seek clarity about to what extent thepupil questionnaire can be adapted to make it‘friendlier’ to specific types of pupil.

• Interpreters should accompany teams where BSLis used in the school.

4 Paul talked about the launch of NatSIP, explainingthat the four strands of work for the year are:outcome measurement (the Government isespecially keen on this activity), emotionalresilience, workforce reform and future strategy and funding.

5 There is some uncertainty, nationally, about therelationship between LAs and academies. Thereseems to be little clear guidance. Some LA supportservices do not visit academies at all unless thevisits are paid for – others continue to support as before. This needs clarity, especially as bothmain political parties wish to expand the scheme,including, in the case of the Conservative party,extending it to primary schools. There is concernthat academies do not need to follow SENCOregulations and are not subject to Freedom ofInformation requests. The NDCS is involved in twoschools which have applied to be Trusts – showingthat it is not in principle opposed to this type ofdevelopment but rather is concerned at their effecton the education of deaf children.

6 NDCS is working with a group of deaf youngpeople who will, it is hoped, interview the three mainparties’ education spokespeople regarding whatthey would do for deaf children after the nextelection. The interviews will appear in the springNDCS magazine.

7 NDCS has produced a briefing document aboutthe Children, Schools and Families Bill. It is broadlysupporting the Bill, particularly the proposed newright for parents to appeal if a statement is notupdated, but is seeking reassurances on a numberof areas to see if further improvements can bemade. The Bill contains references to the licence topractise teaching and there was a discussion overwhat this might mean in practice for teachers withan additional mandatory qualification. It is by nomeans certain that it will become law, because ofthe forthcoming general election.

8 Following the NDCS survey, letters are being sentto services to verify the information received. Thissurvey will form the basis of the CRIDE survey nextyear. There are two groups in CRIDE working onthis – one analysing this year’s data and onepreparing the next version of the survey.

9 NDCS feels that the Government is taking theissue of acoustics seriously following its campaign.

NDCS has been asked to be on the steering grouplooking into related initiatives, representing disabilitygroups. It was agreed that BATOD would considerwhether to be represented by NDCS in this purposein view of the difference of opinion on some aspectsof the recent campaign. There will be a widerimplementation group. Ian drew attention to somerecent research carried out by David Canninglooking at the effects of the more stringentreverberation requirements in a newly built school inEssex (for more on this see page 20). The researchshows that this was not as expensive as had beenfeared and that there are wide benefits to improvedacoustics. BATOD will look at this research.

10 Research carried out with Manchester Universityhas highlighted serious problems with the socialcare of deaf children in children’s services. Thereport is due to be published in mid-January. Thereseems to be little structure and deafness is widelynot seen as a risk factor. The research states thatLAs are failing in their duty. Local safeguardingboards were asked to review the provision for deafchildren in 2005 but it appears they are not doingso. NDCS intends to campaign on this and wouldwelcome information from Teachers of the Deafabout social care provision in their area.

11 The Communication Trust under theCommunication Champion Jean Gross includesdeafness in its remit.

12 There is concern about the practical impact ofchanges to the training of audiologists. Thereseems to be a general downgrading of basicaudiologists’ training although for work with childrena Master’s degree is now required which is anupgrading from the current situation. A key concernis that funding is being withdrawn from existingtraining programmes, even though the newproposed changes are not yet in place. NDCS fearsthis will lead to a shortfall of specialist audiologists.

13 NDCS publications: the phonics guidance will be available in January. Other publications beingconsidered include teaching MFL in primary schools(Anne wondered whether BSL had been consideredas an option under the heading of MFL); standardsfor hearing support resource bases and FEguidance.

14 Date of meeting: meetings were arranged for theyear: 15 March – 11am–1pm (to be confirmed)10 June – 2–4pm20 October – 2–4pm13 December –11am–1pm

Paul Simpson is the National Secretary of BATOD.

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The December NEC saw a change to thetraditional agenda with the newly createdworkstream groups meeting during the morning

session. Some issues that have been previously dealtwith in committees are now to be managed by theBusiness and Administration workstream group;others will be dealt with by the Steering Group. Fourother groups considered topics under the headings of Quality Standards; Continuing ProfessionalDevelopment; Policy and Practice; and Technology for Learning.

Some of the items discussed by the Business andAdministration group were dealt with in the course ofbusiness throughout the day and are reported later.However, changes are planned to the layout of thewebsite to make it easier to navigate. Feedback frommembers about both the website and the Magazinewill be sought. It was also raised that BATOD islooking for an additional Commissioning Editor for theMagazine. This does not need to be a person fromNEC, and someone working at ‘grassroots’ would be warmly welcomed. There is a job descriptionavailable on the website – if you feel this could be a role for you do please contact the Editor [email protected].

The Policy and Practice group is working on threeareas of focus: • To gain a clear picture of the variety of service

delivery models that exist across the UK andstrengthen BATOD’s understanding of thesemodels. A short questionnaire has been draftedwhich will go to 40 sample authorities to representthe contrasts and differences that currently exist.

• To ensure that members remain up to date withcurrent government initiatives – this will includeinformation around Children’s Hearing ServicesWorking Groups (CHSWGs), guidelines onconsistency of practice across authorities, theNational Service Framework and the CommonAssessment Framework.

• To identify future workstream topics.

The Continuing Professional Development group isinvestigating the possibility of working with TeachersTV to produce a programme focusing on how tobecome a Teacher of the Deaf – career developmentfor mainstream teachers. The aim is to makemainstream teachers aware of the opportunitiesavailable within the profession but also to raise the

awareness of the existing range of support, adviceand expertise available in local authorities. A proposalwas drafted to send to Teachers TV.

The Quality Standards group is working on severalstrands at present. Members began by looking atways to improve information sharing betweenaudiology and education but felt that this may bebetter achieved by working alongside a CHSWGworkstream. They have established initial links withVIEW, the professional association for teachers of the visually impaired, with the aim of exploringpartnership work through ‘soft’ federation workingwhich may include joint submissions to governmentand so on. There have been positive responses frommany colleagues working in VI. Auditory processingdisorder was also raised as a possible workstreamfocus. As more information becomes available,particularly through David Moore at the MedicalResearch Council Institute for Hearing, it is becomingpossible to recommend advice and strategies to helpmanage the condition.

The Technology for Learning group is working onproducing information on Soundfield systems that willbe accessible to a wide audience. This will includepractical pre- and post-use advice for schools usingor planning to use Soundfield amplification. Anapproach will be made to the BATOD Foundation tosee if this can be published and distributed to thiswider audience. The group is also looking at theNDCS quality standards for the use of personal FMsystems and is hoping to investigate how they arebeing used by the profession.

The afternoon session saw the regular businessitems of NEC discussed. The President presentedher report and was pleased to have attended BATODNorth, Midland and Northern Ireland AGMs. Ann hasalso been instrumental in working together with JoyceSewell-Rutter to establish a Special Interest Grouplooking at autism and deaf children. It was hoped togather people with an interest in this area together at the National Conference in March but it may be amore realistic target to do this on 22 May when OakLodge is putting on a study day: ‘Mind over Matter’.Ann also noted that David Couch chairs a NatSIPworkstream on ‘emotional resilience’. This was Ann’sfinal NEC as Chair as she will pass the Presidency toGary Anderson at the National Conference in March.Ann was thanked for her hard work and enthusiasm.

What went on at NEC on 5 December 2009Andrea Baker files her report on the last BATOD gathering of 2009


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There have been two nominations for President Elect– Karen Taylor and Andrea Baker. Voting papers wereincluded in the January Magazine.

There was discussion about the movement of theDeafness and Education International Journal fromWiley publishing to Maney. Its first Journal will bepublished early in 2010 and Maney will be at theNational Conference in March to provide informationabout benefits for BATOD members. In future Journalarticles will be available electronically via the membersonly area of the BATOD website and this will also giveaccess to back issues. Linda Watson is to attend theInternational Congress on the Education of the Deaf inVancouver in July 2010 and this will raise the profile ofthe Journal internationally.

There have been two nominations for the EichholzPrize – congratulations to Alison Bruce and LouizeMiller.

Paul Simpson, National Secretary, reported thatfollowing a query from a student concerning signlanguage qualifications for staff working with deafchildren, BATOD has written a response which will be put on the website in the open access area.

Paul reported that BATOD has been involved inmaking improvements to the Fair Access by Designdocument which is used by examiners whendesigning examaminations. BATOD’s suggestionswere accepted. Paul is a member of the OfqualAccess Consultation Forum and the Access toAssessment and Qualifications Advisory Group. It is good that BATOD’s voice is being heard at thehighest levels. Paul reported that Ofqual is tryinghard to be responsive to the needs of disabledstudents but it also emphasises its need to maintainthe integrity of examinations and public confidence in the system.

The European project looking at the development ofcore competencies for Teachers of the Deaf acrossEurope has started its work and BATOD is involvedthrough its membership of FEAPDA. Members will beasked for their views in a consultation.

The Treasurer reported that there was an overall lossin revenue but this has been balanced by a profit fromthe year before. However, there remains a need tomake savings and several suggestions were discussed.It was agreed to raise subscriptions by £5 per year tomeet the rising costs of running the organisation. Inorder to aid progression planning the role of AssistantTreasurer is to be added to the Constitution andnominations will be sought in the near future. Details of the new Constitution were available in the JanuaryMagazine and will be voted on at the AGM in March.

There was nothing new to report from the Regions andNations and the submitted reports are available on thewebsite and in the Magazine. A new region of BATODEast has now been established. All members in theEast area have been contacted to inform them of thenew area and only one member has opted to remainin their existing area. 12 members attended the firstmeeting and there was interest from many othermembers. The new region will be formallyacknowledged at the AGM in March.

During the meeting Peter Preston, the BATODConsultant, was warmly congratulated on his sterlingwork in developing the BATOD submission to theSchool Teachers’ Review Body for this year. It waswith great sadness and shock that we learnt of Peter’sdeath not long after the meeting. Our deepestcondolences are extended to his family and friends.An obituary for Peter is to be found on our website.

Andrea Baker is a member of the NEC and currentlyworks in the CPD workstream.

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Ofqual has a duty to consult a range of bodies onall aspects of examination policy. BATOD isamong the regular consultees.

A summary of the main points of the meeting• The Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill

received Royal Assent on 12 November and formallysets up Ofqual.

• Its duties include maintaining the quality ofqualifications, including those in the NationalCurriculum and EYFS, maintaining public confidenceand raising awareness of their existence and valuefor money.

• It is responsible for recognising and accreditingawarding bodies.

• It is a non-ministerial government department.• The Equality Bill should be on the Statute Book by

spring 2010.• It gives the powers to Ofqual to determine which parts

of a qualification cannot be subject to reasonableadjustments and must consult on this; judicial reviewwill be possible in case of unresolved dispute.

• The Bill has three purposes related to generalqualifications: recognising the needs of disabledstudents, maintaining standards and maintainingpublic confidence.

• In Northern Ireland it is intended to amend the SENand disability legislation to bring it in line rather thanhave a separate single Equality Bill.

• There will be non-statutory guidelines produced bythe Equality and Human Rights Commission toensure that examinations are fit for purpose. Therewill be widespread consultation.

Recommendations for BATOD• Remain alert to the various consultations and

contribute where appropriate – using the small groupof NEC and other BATOD members who areexperienced in this area, while encouraging allmembers to respond.

• Attend relevant meetings to ensure that the voice ofthe deaf candidate is heard.

Paul Simpson is the National Secretary of BATOD.

The Ofqual Equality BillPaul Simpson reports on a seminar concerning the Ofqual Equality Bill held in

Coventry on 11 November 2009

BATOD was there representing you...Between the NEC meetings, members of BATOD attend various meetings that are of particular interest to Teachersof the Deaf. This list is not exhaustive. Your representatives at the meetings listed included: Gary Anderson, AndreaBaker, David Couch, Paul Simpson, Ann Underwood.

Date External participants Purpose of meeting Venue

January

14 NatSIP Second working day London14 Birmingham Consultative Committee Annual meeting Birmingham15 Manchester University Mentoring project Manchester27 Institute of Education Launch of Mobility 21 London

February2 NatSIP Reference group London4 University of Leeds BSL workshop University of Leeds23 GTC Subject specialists London24 Ofqual Access Consultation Forum London

March 1 NatSIP Outcomes group London3 FLSE Regular meeting London6 FEAPDA Regular committee meeting Luxembourg7–8 Leonardo project Second partnership meeting Luxembourg15 NDCS, Ofsted, RNID Regular meeting London17 NatSIP Third working day tbc

Please inform the National Secretary, Paul Simpson, if you know of any meetings where you feel representation on behalf ofTeachers of the Deaf would be of benefit. Although there is no guarantee that BATOD would be able to attend every meeting,situations could be monitored and the interests of ToDs represented.


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Reviews

Title Communication begins at home DVDPublisher NDCSPublished 2009Reviewer Corinda M Carnelley, peripatetic

Teacher of the Deaf, London Borough of Croydon

Produced by the NDCS, this DVD is aimed at familieswith a deaf child aged three years or younger. It followssix children and their families on a typical day to seehow they communicate, and aims to show howcommunication can be supported during everydayactivities and routines. The package includes a DVDand three copies of a booklet called All about me whichis for the child and parent to complete together and giveto other people who need to know about the child. It isintended to help them communicate with the child.

The DVD is very easy to use. Each family has their own‘chapter’ in addition to an introduction and a ‘sibling’chapter, so a family could choose the part of the DVDmost relevant to the age of their child.

A range of different families is shown, although all sixare in a traditional mother/father/child(ren) setting. Thepublisher has clearly tried to cover most situations; forexample one family uses Urdu as their home language;one of the families receives a visit from a Teacher of the

Deaf; one of the parents wears hearing aids and the children wear a range of hearing aids and have cochlear implants as well as using differentcommunication styles. The language used is parent-friendly, as you would expect from an NDCS publication.I was disappointed, however, that none of the deafchildren featured has additional disabilities.

There are some good ideas for communicationopportunities; for example, one granddad explains howhe always kneels down when he rings the doorbell, so that when the deaf toddler opens the door, he is ateye level with her. Another example is a mum talkingthrough and writing a shopping list with her son, thenusing it as they move around the supermarket.

The DVD does touch briefly on some of the trials ofbeing a parent of a deaf child, but on the whole it isrelentlessly upbeat.

It is important that the teacher looks at the DVD beforesuggesting that a parent watches it because while manyToDs will find this extremely useful, those working ininner cities or more economically diverse environmentsor with families in challenging circumstances may find itless relevant. However, generally this is a good additionto the extensive NDCS library and many families willfind the suggestions and comments helpful.

Title Let’s Sign – Songs for ChildrenVolume One

Authors Cath Smith and Vicki GilbertPublisher DeafBooks.co.ukPublished 2010Price £13.99 (or book £6.99 and CD £8)ISBN 1 905913 12 5Reviewer Corinda M Carnelley, peripatetic

Teacher of the Deaf, London Borough of Croydon

This is a new CD andbook from the verypopular Let’s Signseries. It featureschildren’s songs withBSL and is intended for use in schools, baby signing classes,

nurseries, children’s centres and families.

This little package was keenly fought over in the reviews office, such is the popularity of all Cath Smithproductions and this in no way disappoints. The book is produced to a very high standard: A5, ring-boundformat, and not only includes the words of the songs

with the familiar sign diagrams, but an introduction, topten tips, days of the week, sign variations and otherwebsites and contacts. Everything has been thought of.

So, it’s a book with some songs, and some additionalinformation. Why is it so popular? Well, because it isaccompanied by a CD with someone singing the songsto unambiguous accompaniments. The singing is clear;the music is straightforward and easy to listen to, withno long introductions or ‘flowery’ bits. Every time I say toa parent, ‘Singing with your deaf child is a really goodactivity – there are lots of benefits particularly for theirspeech production,’ the answer is always the same: ‘Ican’t sing.’ This CD would encourage even the mosttone deaf individual to join in. It also overcomes theproblem of needing to face the child when singing andhave hands free for actions/signs – not possible whenplaying the piano, guitar or recorder.

All of the usual songs are here, ‘Wheels on the bus’;‘Baa baa black sheep’ and ‘Five little ducks’. There iseven a ‘goodbye’ song to end the session. I will beusing this CD at the pre-school parent group andencouraging parents to buy their own copy – I’mcertainly not lending mine! A fabulous resource whichfills a huge gap in the market.

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In the words of Mark Twain ‘Everybody talks aboutthe weather, but nobody does anything about it.’ As I write this Britain has just been in the grip of what

the Met Office described as severe weather. Thesnow fell, roads became impassable, schools andbusinesses closed and the country ground to aresounding halt. Anyone with any sense stayed in beduntil things got back normal. While trying to predictwhat the weather was going to do and if the schoolwould be able to open, I started to think about howICT can enhance teaching about weather andclimate.

The obvious starting point is the Met Office whosewebsite tells us that it predicts the weather fortomorrow, next week, next season and beyond. It is also a significant contributor to the globalunderstanding of climate change. The Met Officeuses a powerful supercomputer capable of 1,000billion calculations every second. The computer ishoused in special halls bigger than two footballpitches, has 15 million megabytes of memory and ismore powerful than 100,000 PCs. The website giveslocal and regional forecasts and has sections aboutclimate change and science as well as weather newsfrom around the world – www.metoffice.gov.uk/

A simpler site, but one which still uses the Met Officeforecasts, at the moment, is BBC Weather. Here youcan see UK summary forecasts, or by entering yourtown or postcode you can have a more local view.The ‘Find a Forecast’ also allows you to enter a non-UK town or city thus providing the facility tocompare the weather in different countries. Theseforecasts make use of symbols as well as numericaldata and so are readily accessible. The site also hasinformation about climate change, a photo gallery andWeatherwise facts – http://news.bbc.co.uk/weather/

The schools’ section of the Royal MeteorologicalSociety website contains downloadable resourcessuch as presentations, quizzes, images,experiments and lesson plans. The society also has ambassadors who will visit schools to talk to pupils and demonstrate experiments –www.rmets.org/activities/schools/index.php/

The What is Weather website is part of the BBCwebsite and has resources for Key Stage 2 and theScottish 5–14 curriculum. The aim is to help to furthergeographical skills and knowledge and understandingof the environment and how people and places areaffected by weather. There are lesson plans, activities,worksheets and links to other weather-related websites– www.bbc.co.uk/schools/whatisweather/home.shtml/

The British Council offers a range of online activitiesdesigned to help with the teaching of English. Thesecover a variety of topics, including a section to learnthe vocabulary to talk about the weather – howEnglish! For hearing-impaired pupils I particularlyliked the weather maze which had a cartoon videowith subtitles which could be used to develop memoryand listening skills – www.britishcouncil.org/kids-topics-weather.htm/

The National Center for Atmospheric Research,Education & Outreach has stories and games relatedto weather in the US which could be useful forcomparative study – http://eo.ucar.edu/webweather/

The Climate Change Schools Project is aneducational programme operating in the North East of England. The project aims to put climate change at the heart of the National Curriculum via an organicand pioneering network of Climate Change LeadSchools who build climate change understanding andpositive action from the ground up. Visionary schoolsand teachers are at the core of this approach,although the focus of the project is on young people,helping them to achieve a better understanding of thenuts and bolts of climate change science, as well as to discover solutions and explore how to adaptpositively to the challenges brought by climaticchanges over the coming decades –www.slcne.org.uk/climatechange/

Weather for Schools is an educational weather sitededicated to explaining how to collect basic weatherdata. The site owners hope to help and encourageyoung weather enthusiasts. The site is meant forchildren between the ages of 7 and 11, but is also

ICT newsSharon Pointeer has some suggestions for turning this winter’s Big Freeze into an

educational opportunity

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useful for teachers. There is information about readingweather instruments, setting up a weather station,identifying and recording important features of theweather, using computers and digital equipment tohelp study the weather and lots of useful backgroundinformation – www.weatherforschools.me.uk/

Snow Crystals is an online guide to snowflakes, snowcrystals and other ice phenomena from CaliforniaInstitute of Technology – www.snowcrystals.com/

Atmosphere, Climate and Environment fromManchester Metropolitan University is no longerupdated but the site has useful resources for primaryand secondary teachers. There is a Key Stage 3weather and climate teaching pack which can be used online or can be downloaded in pdf format –www.ace.mmu.ac.uk/

Juicy Geography is Noel Jenkins’s personal collectionof ideas, lessons and resources for school geographyat Key Stage 3 and 4. The emphasis is on creativity,ICT and original Google Earth lessons. It includesanimations and interactive web pages which can beused on data projectors and interactive whiteboards –www.juicygeography.co.uk/

Kudlian Soft is one of the UK’slongest established, award-winning and independentpublishers of qualityeducational softwarefor both primary and

secondary education. It produces innovative softwareto support the teaching of weather. Weather Reporting& Geography for iLife is a plug-in for iMovieHD (Mac)which allows pupils to produce weather maps asan iMovie effect. Each chart can be resized andpositioned anywhere within the clip. The map can beplaced behind the subject with the use of a chromakey background. The maps are created with an easy-to-use editor which contains a range of maps andweather symbols. The software is easy to use and myYear 7 pupils enjoy writing their own forecasts, beingvideoed reading them and superimposing their videosonto weather maps using the iMovie software. Theresulting weather report videos look professional andpupils derive great satisfaction from viewing theirwork. Kudlian has recently released Weather Studiowhich is a similar application for PCs. They also sellchroma key, green screens for filming against and youcan download a chroma key guide which explains theprocess – www.kudlian.net/

Atomwide markets a Networked Weather Stationtaking advantage of the latest data-gatheringtechnology to monitor a wide range of weather

variables and send their values across the internet toa central database – without the need for a dedicatedPC. It has a website giving temperature, barometricpressure, rainfall, wind and so on for over 70locations across England and Wales. You can displaydata for a specific station in a range of views such asgauges and graphs, and there is an option to showone measurement, for example temperature, for allstations for comparative analysis. Schools whichpurchase the equipment can become part of thenetwork, and data collected by their weather station canbe shown on the site – http://weather.atomwide.com/

A classroom weather station does not, however,need to be expensive. A good starting model, costing £20–30 will measure indoor and outdoortemperature and barometric pressure. Thesegadgets are supplied with a small temperaturesensor which has to be placed outside and whichtransmits wirelessly back to the display unit. The display shows figures for temperature, oftenincluding maximum and minimum, and a visualindicator, using weather symbols, of the forecast forthe next few hours. Some even have a little weatherman who will dress appropriately for the conditions,ranging from swimming trunks and sunglasses toovercoat, scarf and umbrella, making this an idealtool for a class of younger children. If you have a bit more budget and have somewhere to locate a range of sensors, then £100 will buy you a more sophisticated system with an anemometer for measuring wind speed and direction and a raingauge. These weather stations will also store datafor a period of time thus allowing pupils to look attrends. Systems are available from around the £160mark which will connect to your computer to allowthe downloading and analysing of the data collected.Other sensors can also be added, such as humidity,wind chill and sunshine, at additional cost. Makes tolook out for include Oregon, La Crosse and Davis.Two online retailers which provide information andadvice are Weather Station Products (www.weather-station-products.co.uk) and The Weather Shopwhich also has a shop near Eastbourne if you areclose enough to visit – www.ukweathershop.co.uk/

If you would like to contribute anything to thesepages, please contact Sharon Pointeer [email protected].

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R e g u l a r s

This and that…Email news to [email protected]

Ofsted has recently singled out Frank Barnes Schoolfor Deaf Children in Swiss Cottage, naming it as oneof ‘twelve outstanding special schools’ in the UK.This is the only school for the deaf to be recognisedfor an award on this occasion and was cited as being‘the most effective in the country for their specialism’.The school was specifically commended for its‘bilingual’ teaching, for responding to the individualpersonal requirements of each child and for providingopportunity, support and a sense of identity to deaf students.

Accolade for FrankBarnes

Signed Stories scoopsawardITV SignPost has picked up a top human rights award fordeveloping its storytelling website www.signedstories.com/Managing Director Malcolm Wright collected RADAR’sHuman Rights People of the Year award for ‘Doing ITDifferently’ at a glittering awards ceremony at London’sBattersea Evolution. The award was presented by worldfamous deaf percussionist and supporter of Signed StoriesDame Evelyn Glennie.

Contribute to qualitystandards

Would you be interested in contributing to orcommenting on a set of quality standards forunits/resource provision? If so, please get in touch with Joyce Sewell-Rutter [email protected].

Driving test theory in BSLSCARO Training has released aneducational DVD covering theTheory Test Extra with full BritishSign Language translation. Thedouble DVD is presented by

deaf people for the deaf community and includes theinformation needed to pass the driving theory test.

The initial idea came from an approved driving instructorwho teaches deaf pupils to drive and discovered that therewas a high failure rate on the theory test within the deafcommunity. After research proved that relevant resourcesin British Sign Language were non-existent, the idea wasborn.

Students are guided through the various sections oftheory test information with the use of photographs andtraffic signs. A brief revision test is included at the end ofthe second DVD. The Theory Test Extra DVD in BritishSign Language is available through retailers and libraries.

Europe’s topaudiologist

Hearing professionals have an opportunity onceagain to be recognised as leaders in the fieldfollowing the launch of the 2010 Audiologist of theYear award. Rayovac, the manufacturer of hearingaid batteries, has again joined forces with AudioInfos magazine to support this competition whichis widely recognised as Europe’s top prize foraudiologists.

Set up to recognise and reward excellence inaudiology, the award invites patients to nominateprofessionals who have gone above and beyondthe call of duty to care. The title of Audiologist ofthe Year 2010 is awarded to the winner, as well as a cash prize for both them and the nominatingpatient. The kudos and publicity that go withwinning such a prestigious award are also a greatway to boost business and provide a perfect shopwindow for audiology practices.

Audiologist of the Year is open to people living inthe UK, France, Germany, Austria, Spain andSweden. A national champion is chosen in eachcountry before an overall winner is announced.The finale of the competition will come at the 2010 European Union of Hearing Aid AcousticiansCongress in October. The winner will enjoy anexpenses-paid trip to the event in Hannover andbe presented with the prize at a special evening ofexcellence in front of peers and industry experts.

Further details about the competition, how to enterand a range of promotional materials are availableat www.audiologistoftheyear.eu/

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R e g u l a r s

ABR Auditory Brainstem Response

ACSW Association of Communication Support Workers

ADHD Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder

AGM Annual General Meeting

APD Auditory Processing Disorder

ASAG Audiology Services Advisory Group

ASLI Association of Sign Language Interpreters

BAHA Bone Anchored Hearing Aid

BAS British Ability Scales

BATOD British Association of Teachers of the Deaf

BB93 Building Bulletin 93

BBC British Broadcasting Corporation

BETT Educational technology event

BSL British Sign Language

CAMHS Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service

CD Compact Disk

CD-ROM Compact Disk-Read Only Memory

CHSWG Children’s Hearing Services Working Group

CI Cochlear Implant

CILT National Centre for Languages

CMV Cytomegalovirus

CPD Continuing Professional Development

CRIDE Consortium for Research in Deaf Education

CSW Communication Support Worker

CYP Children and Young People

dB Decibel

dBHL Decibel Hearing Level

DCSF Department for Children, Schools and Families

DESF Deaf Educational Support Forum

DfES Department for Education and Skills

DUMB Doable, Usable, Manageable and Beneficial

DVD Digital Versatile Disk

ECDL European Computer Driving Licence

ECM Every Child Matters

EHRC Equality and Human Rights Commission

ELTT Enhanced Learning Through Technology

ESMP Early Support Monitoring Protocol

ESOL English for Speakers of Other Languages

EUHA European Union of Hearing Aid Acousticians

EYFS Early Years Foundation Stage

FE Further Education

FEAPDA Fédération Européenne d’Associations de Professeurs de

Déficients Auditifs (European Federation of Associations

of Teachers of the Deaf)

FLSE Federation of Leaders in Special Education

FM Frequency Modulation (radio)

GRS Global Rating Scale

GTC(E) General Teaching Council (for England)

HI Hearing-Impaired or Hearing Impairment

HMI Her Majesty’s Inspector

HMIe Her Majesty’s Inspector of Education

HOSS Heads of Support Services

ICT Information and Communication Technology

ISP Inspection Service Provider

IT Information Technology

ITV Independent Television

LA Local Authority

LLUK Lifelong Learning UK

LSA Learning Support Assistant

MA Master of Arts

MCHAS Modernising Children's Hearing Aid Services

MFL Modern Foreign Language

MP Member of Parliament

MSI Multi-Sensory Impairment

NARA Neale Analysis of Reading Ability

NATED National Association for Tertiary Education for Deaf

People

NatSIP National Sensory Impairment Partnership

NDCAMHS National Deaf Child and Adolescent Mental Health

Service

NDCS National Deaf Children’s Society

NEC National Executive Council

NHS National Health Service

NHSP Newborn Hearing Screening Programme

Ofqual Office of the Qualifications and Examinations Regulator

Ofsted Inspectorate

OLM Oral Language Modifier

PAVT Paediatric AudioVisual Speech in Noise Test

PC Personal Computer

PDF Portable Digital Format

PGCE Post Graduate Certificate in Education

PSP PlayStation Portable

QA Quality Assurance

QAF Quality Assurance Framework

QET Quality Enhancement Tool

QRT Quality Rating Tool

QS Quality Standards

RADAR Disability network

RCSLT Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists

RNID Royal National Institute for Deaf People

SASLI Scottish Association of Sign Language Interpreters

SCS Sensory Consortium Service

SE South East

SEN Special Educational Needs

SENCO Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator

SEND Special Educational Needs and Disability

Sense National charity for people with deafblindness

SENSS Special Educational Needs Specialist Service

SERSEN South East Region Special Educational Needs

Partnership

SI Sensory Impairment

Skill National bureau for students with disabilities

SLCN Speech, Language and Communication Needs

SLT; S&LT Speech and Language Therapist

SMART Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound

SOECIC South of England Cochlear Implant Centre

SQA Scottish Qualification Authority

STRB School Teachers’ Review Body

TA Teaching Assistant

TBA To Be Arranged

TBC To Be Confirmed

TDA Training and Development Agency

ToD Teacher of the Deaf

TSO The Stationery Office

TV Television

UCL University College, London

UK United Kingdom

UNHS Universal Neonatal Hearing Screening

US United States

USA United States of America

v Versus

VI Visually Impaired/Impairment

VIEW Visual Impairment: Education and Welfare: professional

association for teachers of visually impaired children

Abbreviations and acronyms used in this Magazine

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R e g u l a r s

Date Organisation Meeting topic VenueMarch

17 Manchester Univ and BATOD Mentoring Network: Free professional training as a mentor Manchester

17 Mary Hare Training Services Access to Music in the Curriculum Newbury

18 Mary Hare School Open Day – Mary Hare Secondary School Newbury

19 The Ear Foundation Ushers Syndrome Overview for Professionals – all The Ear Foundation,

professionals working with children or adults with Ushers Nottingham NG7 2FB

Syndrome

20 The Ear Foundation Ushers Syndrome Family Day – children, families and The Ear Foundation,

adults affected by Ushers Syndrome Nottingham NG7 2FB

23 The Ear Foundation Bilateral Implantation – all professionals working with The Ear Foundation,

deaf children Nottingham NG7 2FB

24 The Ear Foundation MED-EL Workshop: Rehabilitation Resources for Children The Ear Foundation,

– Teachers of the Deaf, speech and language therapists, Nottingham NG7 2FB

learning support assistants

25 The Ear Foundation Deaf Professionals and Cochlear Implants – deaf The Ear Foundation,

professionals Nottingham NG7 2FB

25 Mary Hare Training Services Supporting Deaf Pupils with Difficulties in Numeracy Newbury

April

9 City Lit Watch Your Language 2010 – a one-day conference on City Lit, Covent Garden,

training and standards for BSL interpreters and CSWs London WC2B 4BA4

10 City Lit Annual Deaf Day City Lit, Covent Garden,

London WC2B 4BA

16 The Ear Foundation Adult Issues Focus Conference – all professionals National College, Nottingham

working with deaf adults, deaf adults and families

20 BATOD East FM with Phonak TBA

20 The Ear Foundation Supporting Deaf Children at Primary School for LSAs – The Ear Foundation,

learning support assistants Nottingham NG7 2FB

21–23 Department of Language & Assessing BSL Development – Production Test City University, Northampton

Communication Science, (Narrative Skills) Square, London EC1V 0HB

City University

27 The Ear Foundation Working with Children with Cochlear Implants in the The Ear Foundation,

Secondary Years – Teachers of the Deaf, speech and Nottingham NG7 2FB

language therapists, learning support assistants

27–28 Guymark UK Ltd Middle Ear Course (10.5 CPD points by BAA) Birmingham

28 The Ear Foundation Young People and Cochlear Implants 16–18 years – The Ear Foundation,

all professionals working with young people looking to Nottingham NG7 2FB

prepare for, or in post-16 education

29 Mary Hare Training Services Supporting English for the Secondary Aged Deaf Pupil Newbury

29 SOECIC Device Troubleshooting Workshop (13.30–17.00) University of Southampton

(see link professionals, training)

29 The Ear Foundation Assessment & Monitoring in the Secondary Years – The Ear Foundation,

Teachers of the Deaf, speech and language therapists Nottingham NG7 2FB

30 The Ear Foundation Deaf Teenagers: Social and Emotional Issues – all The Ear Foundation,

professionals working with deaf teenagers Nottingham NG7 2FB

May

4 The Ear Foundation Supporting Deaf Children at Secondary School for LSAs – The Ear Foundation,

learning support assistants Nottingham NG7 2FB

6 Mary Hare Training Services Hearing Aid Programming – ‘Hands On’ Newbury

Meetings and training CalendarThis page is an extract from the Calendar to be found on the BATOD website. Please note that it is not exhaustive. Itemsnoted on this Calendar may have been advertised within the Magazine or the information reported by telephone. BATOD isnot necessarily the organising body. Please contact the organising body (column 2) for details of conferences, not the Editor of this Magazine.

The Calendar on the BATOD website is edited as soon as we know about meetings. Additional information about courses and registration forms may also be linked to the calendar entries.

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Officers of Nations and RegionsBATOD contacts and Magazine DistributionNorthern IrelandChairperson: Wendy Martin, 15 Ballyholme Esplanade, Bangor, County Down BT20 5LZSecretary: Heather Lammey, 45 The Oaks, Newtownards, County Down BT23 8GZTreasurer: Antonette Burns, 39 Wynchurch Avenue, Rosetta, Belfast BT6 0JPScotlandChairperson: Jean McAllister, 26 Willowdale Crescent, Glasgow G69 7NLSecretary: Eleanor Hutchinson, Flat 6, Cow Wynd, Falkirk FK1 5EATreasurer: Anne Pack, 63 High Beveridgewell, Dunfermline, Fife KY12 9ERWalesChairperson: Revolving postSecretary: Marian Williams, 2 Woodview Terrace, Bryncoch, Neath SA10 7EQ Treasurer: Rhian Gibbins, Rhianfa, 24c Forest Hill, Aberdulais, Neath SA10 8HDEastChairperson: Kathryn Cutmore, 29 Chapel Road, Tolleshunt D’Arcy, Maldon, Essex CM9 9TLSecretary: Sara Brierton, 16 College Road, Impington, Cambridge CB24 9TDTreasurer: Karen Taylor, CSSS, Woodside Road, Norwich NR7 9QLMidland Chairperson: Cate Latchford, Buxton House,The Row, All Stretton, Shropshire SY6 6JSSecretary: Ursula Walker, 207 Bentley’s Lane, Walsall WS2 8SPTreasurer: Robert Miller, 13 Derby Close, Broughton Astley, Leicestershire LE9 6BENorthChairperson: Elaine Rayner, 25 Frosterley Drive, Great Lumley, Chester-le-Street, County Durham DH3 4SJSecretary: Trish Cope, 23 North Drive, High Legh, Knutsford, Cheshire WA16 6LXTreasurer: Mary Fortune, 30 Alexandra Road, Stockton Heath, Warrington WA4 2UTSouth Chairperson: Mary Ensor, 9 Landrock Road, Crouch End, London N8 9HSecretary: post vacantTreasurer: Donald Allan, Freewaters Cottage, Freewaters Close, Ickleford, Hitchin, Hertfordshire SG5 3TQSouth West Chairperson: Wanda Garner, 10 Ashleigh Road, Exmouth EX8 2JYJoint Secretary: Hazel Sutherland, 8 Osney Crescent, Paignton, Devon TQ4 5EY;

Denise Tudor, Cliff Court, Cliff Road,Torquay TQ2 6RETreasurer: Beverley George, 8 Forder Heights, Plymouth PL6 5PZ

BATOD Magazine distribution from:The Seashell Trust, Stanley Road, Cheadle Hulme, Cheshire SK8 6RQ

Association Magazine ISSN 1366-0799Published by The British Association of Teachers of the Deaf, 41 The Orchard, Leven, Beverley HU17 5QA

Printed by The Nuffield Press Ltd, 21 Nuffield Way, Ashville Trading Estate, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 1RLMagazine Project Manager: Kath Mackrill

Articles, information and contributions for theAssociation Magazine should be sent to:

BATOD SecretaryMr Paul Simpson

tel/fax 0845 6435181email [email protected]

...as should Association information and generalqueries.

Advertisements for the Association Magazineshould be sent to:

Mr Arnold UnderwoodBATOD Publishing and Advertising41 The OrchardLeven, BeverleyEast YorkshireHU17 5QA

tel/fax 01964 544243email [email protected]

Full guidelines for submissions and abstracts ofpapers published in the Journal ‘Deafness andEducation International’ are to be found atwww.maney.co.uk/instructions_for_authors/dei

Enquiries related to the Journal to:Dr Linda Watson

email [email protected]

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.editorialmanager.com/dei

DISCLAIMERThe Editors and the Association do not necessarily endorse

items or the contents of advertisementspublished in the Magazine and cannot accept

responsibility for any inaccuracies.Please note that items from this Magazine may not be

reproduced without the consent of BATOD and the sourcemust be acknowledged.

Photocopying items may breach copyright.

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MAGAZINE • March 2010 • ISSN 1336-0799 • · Karen Taylor and Liz Reed-Beadle have responded...

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Transcript of MAGAZINE • March 2010 • ISSN 1336-0799 • · Karen Taylor and Liz Reed-Beadle have responded...