Speaking out: Camden Kids Talk

CHILDREN who are struggling to learn how speak after the Covid lockdowns can still catch up, therapists have said. A new task force is now in place to help them work on speech and language development.

Camden Kids Talk was launched in 2021 in the wake of coronavirus. The initiative aims to draw together a range of local health and social services that work to improve the speech, language and communication skills of children.

“We know that language difficulties are quite strongly linked with social deprivation and we know that the pandemic and austerity have exacerbated that,” said project co-leader, speech and language therapist Kathleen Cavin.

“Those difficulties were there before the pandemic as well – it’s not purely because of that – but we do know that if we put things in place, absolutely some of those children are going to catch up,” she said.

The school closures during lockdown meant many young children missed out on learning key early communication skills.

Ms Cavin said this week: “Thinking about preschool children, there were just not the opportunities to interact with their peers.”

She said “early talking” has “an impact on academic outcomes. If we look at the vocabulary of children when they’re around five, studies have shown that we can predict at a population level how they’re going to do in their key GCSEs.”

In March, a council report found the pandemic had left many children in the borough with underdeveloped social and emotional skills. It was reported that some nursery school age children were pre-verbal.

“Some children were described by the teachers as merely ‘grunting’ in response to questions,” the research found.

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Camden Kids Talk aims to combat this phenomenon by encouraging parents to get involved from an early stage.

“I think sometimes it’s easy to think about communication as starting when a child starts talking, and we’re really keen to get the idea across that it starts in the womb,” Ms Cavin said.

Speech and emotional development are closely linked, Ms Cavin said, adding parents can help their child “name the feeling” as a fix. “One of our tips is around naming the feeling. That’s thinking about: ‘what are you expressing right now?’ They might be in the middle of a meltdown. As an acknowledgement, say: ‘it makes you angry when you have to leave the park’, and by acknowledging the feeling… it gives them the vocabulary that they can then talk about their feelings.”

Parents can also reduce screen time to improve their children’s speech and language abilities.

Ms Cavin said: “One of our tips is ‘screens away, it’s time to play’. But we absolutely acknowledge that we live in a world where screens are part of that, and screens can have some educational value. But what we’re saying is it doesn’t replace those interactions that you have with your child.”

Speech and language therapist Cat Choate said: “One of my favourite – and one of the most important – tips is to speak your home language at home. The research has shown us that speaking one language at home and then a different language at nursery definitely doesn’t cause speech, language and communication difficulties.”

Any parents needing a bit more help to support their child can visit their local children’s centre.