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Background The existing evidence is limited in terms of perspectives of pre-school children with speech and language needs, and their views on activities used to support their needs. This paper discusses a stream of work from the interdisciplinary research programme known as [‘Child Talk’, based in England, UK. The overall purpose of this work stream was to gain the perspectives of pre-school children aged 2 to 5 years 11 months, with speech and language needs, to use in the development of an evidence-based framework of activities. Methods Twenty-four pre-schoolchildren with a variety of needs from diverse backgrounds took part. An observational methodology was used to capture children’s experiences. Children were filmed during a series of sessions, with innovative head mounted cameras worn by the children and supported by researcher field notes. Framework analysis was used to analyse the data based on the body movement, vocalisation and visual attention of the children during these sessions. Results and Conclusions. Results included that children expressed enjoyment and engagement in the activities. The children expressed themselves and demonstrated their focus ‘multimodally’ through combinations of body language, vocalisation, and visual attention. These modalities were present across all contexts and children. It highlights the importance of encouraging participation in pre-school children and consequently this innovative piece of work has national and international importance.

Background: A number of studies have suggested that practitioners hold speech and language therapy (SLT) practice as tacit and consequently it is difficult for the therapist to describe. The current study uses a range of knowledge elicitation (KE) approaches, a technique not used before in SLT, as a way of accessing this tacit knowledge. There is currently no agreed framework that establishes key factors underpinning practice for preschool children with speech and language disorders. This paper attempts to address that gap. Aims: The aim of this study was to develop a framework of speech and language therapists’ practice when working with preschool children with developmental speech and language disorders (DS&LD). Methods and Procedures: A mixed methods approach was adopted for this study. Data were collected iteratively, from 245 speech and language therapists with experience of working with preschool children with DS&LD across sites in England, by means of focus groups and national events. There were three stages of data collection; local sites, specific interest groups and two national events. KE techniques were used to gather data, with initial data being collected in local site focus groups. Findings from groups were taken to subsequent larger groups where a combination of concept mapping, teach-back and sorting exercises, generated a more detailed description of practice, using discussion of consensus and disagreement to stimulate further exploration and definition and provide validatory evidence. Outcomes and Results: This paper provides a high-level framework of therapy for preschool children with DS&LD that makes practice explicit in this area. The framework proposes that therapists’ aims for this group of children fall into three categories: addressing children’s areas of impairment and skills; achieving functionally meaningful skills and carryover; supporting adults to provide a supportive communication environment. The exact configuration is shaped by the child’s context and needs. Conclusions and Implications: The framework highlights themes that are well researched in the literature (e.g. speech) and others that have been little studied (e.g. adult understanding), indicating a disconnect between research evidence and practice. The research also highlights the complex nature of interventions for preschool children with DS&LD and the importance therapists attribute to tailoring therapy to individual needs. The framework provides a scaffold for speech and language therapists to focus their clinical practice and encourages us as a profession to better understand and explore the gaps between research evidence and clinical practice, for preschool children with DS&LD.

BACKGROUND NHS case note data are a potential source of practice-based evidence which could be used to investigate the effectiveness of different interventions for individuals with a range of speech, language and communication needs. Consistency in pre- and post-intervention data as well as the collection of relevant variables would need to be demonstrated as a precursor to adopting this approach in future investigations of speech and language therapy intervention. AIMS To explore whether routine clinical data collection for children with speech sound disorder (SSD) could be a potential source for examining the effectiveness of intervention(s). METHODS & PROCEDURES We examined case notes from three UK NHS services, reviewing 174 sets of case notes and 234 blocks of therapy provided for school-age children with SSD. MAIN CONTRIBUTION We found there was significant variation in pre- and post-intervention data and variables collected by the services. The assessment data available in the case notes across all sites were insufficient to be used to compare the effectiveness of different interventions. Specific issues included lack of consistent reporting of pre- and post-intervention data, and use of a variety of both formal and informal assessment tools. CONCLUSIONS & IMPLICATIONS The case notes reviewed were from three sites and may not represent wider clinical practice, nevertheless the findings suggest the sample explored indicates the need for more consistent and contemporaneous collection of data for children with SSD to facilitate the investigation of different interventions in practice. Researchers should work with the clinical community to determine a minimal dataset that includes a core outcome set and potential variables. This should be feasible to collect in clinical practice and provide a dataset for future investigations of clinically relevant research questions. This would provide an invaluable resource to the clinical academic and research communities enabling research questions to be addressed that have the potential to lead to improved outcomes and more cost-effective services. WHAT THIS PAPER ADDS What is already known on the subject While there is some evidence for the efficacy of therapy for children with SSD, studies typically focus on very specific populations who meet strict selection criteria and take place in university clinics or laboratory-style settings which do not reflect typical clinical practice in the UK and elsewhere. An alternative approach to investigating the effectiveness of interventions would be to use NHS case note data. It is not clear from the existing literature whether case note data are sufficiently robust to facilitate such an analysis. What this paper adds to existing knowledge This study found that case note data, in particular assessment data, were highly variable across services and would be insufficient to compare different interventions for this population. Agreement on what should be included in a minimal dataset for children with SSD is required to maximize the potential for NHS clinical case notes to become a resource for future research. What are the actual or potential clinical implications of this work? This study indicates that current clinical practice in SLT for children with SSD is inconsistent with regards to the reporting of pre- and post-intervention assessment data and other important variables in case notes. We make the case for agreeing a minimal dataset with a need for clinicians to work with researchers to determine core outcomes and additional relevant data, which can be feasibly collected in clinical practice.

Every government has its own impact on policy, but no government starts from a blank page. As was the case with the Labour governments that came before them, the Conservative and Conservative-led g...

Children’s speech development begins in infancy. The pattern of this development has been explored in studies over a number of years using a range of research methodology and approaches to investigation. A systematic review of the existing literature was carried out to determine the collective contribution of this literature to our understanding of early vocalizations and babbling through the period 9 to 18 months. Eight bibliographic databases were searched as well as the Cochrane library. Thirteen studies were identified for inclusion, which were mostly longitudinal observational case series. The review identified progressive increases in the complexity and volume of infants’ early vocalizations through the period. It also found a broad order of phonological acquisition. Although the studies in this review demonstrated marked individual variation, the review provides indicative patterns of development which can be used as a basis to explore relationships with later speech development in future studies.

This paper seeks to reconceptualise state secrecy and asks whether it is adequately understood in the UK. It argues that state secrecy is systemic not exceptional and that it is supported by complex institutional structures and cultural practices. It analyses the legislative armoury of state secrecy, including investigatory powers (RIPA, DRIPA and IPA) and develops a tripartite model of state secrecy. Properly understood, state secrecy can be divided into three categories: esoteric, operational and efficient. Esoteric state secrecy restricts access to decision-making and information. It is a facet of power, utilised to control. Operational state secrecy protects techniques, procedures and investigations. It is not as all-encompassing as esoteric state secrecy, but can be cumulative where one demand for secrecy creates another. Finally, efficient state secrecy references the pragmatic sense in which secret conditions allow faster decision-making and the conceptual limits of transparency in a modern complex state. These categories illuminate how state secrecy’s true effects are masked because it is so entrenched.

This article explores object-based learning (OBL), a burgeoning pedagogical approach in higher education. Object-based learning engages students’ pre-existing visual and conceptual literacy as a ga...

This chapter presents a thematic analysis of 24 interviews with actors we identified as undertaking, participating in, or interacting with counter-terrorism review, including former Home Secretaries, former Independent Reviewers of Terrorism Legislation, high-level political actors, representatives of regulators and complaints bodies, civil servants, lawyers, and representatives from a range of civil society organisations. The chapter considers this data across five themes: (i) the purposes of review, (ii) how those purposes are pursued in practice, (iii) the values that underpin review, (iv) how the different elements of the counter-terrorism review assemblage relate to one another, and (v) the impact of review.

The United Kingdom should now be understood as a counter-terrorist state, that is a state in which counter-terrorism law, policy, discourse, and operations are mainstreamed across the domains of law and government in forms that are conceptualised and designed as ‘permanent’ in at least some cases; in which non-state actors are responsibilised for counter-terrorism; and in which all persons are the subjects of counter-terrorism, although not to equal degrees. This book argues that counter-terrorism review—which it defines as the legal, political, and policy processes that consider the application and impacts of counter-terrorism law and policy in theory as well as in practice, with a view to assessing its merits and contributing towards its improvement—has the capacity to enhance accountability in the counter-terrorist state. Building on exclusive interviews with political actors and practitioners, as well as detailed empirical analysis of existing reviews—it presents the first comprehensive, critical analysis of counter-terrorism review in the United Kingdom. While this reveals substantial pockets of good practice, it also shows that the accountability enhancing potential of counter-terrorism review is limited in practice by executive domination, parliamentary limitations, persistent state secrecy, and the absence of trust in the counter-terrorist state.

This chapter presents an in-depth analysis of the (statutory and non-statutory) reviews that are possible in respect of two key parts of counter-terrorism: Prevent, and Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures (TPIMs). In addition to describing the counter-terrorism review assemblage that attaches to Prevent and TPIMs, the chapter also identifies the reviews that have been undertaken over the five-year period from 1 January 2014 to 31 December 2018. For each of these, it includes a consideration of the standards against which these reviews evaluated the law or programme, identified by close textual analysis of the reviews themselves. This analysis shows that, in spite of the persistent reliance on review as a safeguard in counter-terrorism legislation, Parliament’s historical tendency not robustly to challenge security narratives from Government is remarkably resilient. While these mandated reviews do take place (and non-mandated or discretionary reviews seem to be less frequent), their success in evaluating the measures, engaging in reality, and showing capacity for action is questionable.

This chapter contains a characterisation of the UK as a counter-terrorist state, tracing its historical development and the processes through which counter-terrorism has become permanent in this jurisdiction. Alongside this permanence, the chapter shows how counter-terrorism pervades a wide range of fields, beyond policing and security, extending both the range of actors responsible for counter-terrorism and those subject to the state’s counter-terrorist gaze. In spite of some marginal disagreement around counter-terrorism law and policy, the chapter shows that UK politics is marked by a hegemonic consensus on the counter-terrorist state’s core propositions. Finally, the chapter shows that the counter-terrorist state is also reflected in the emergence and the stabilisation, through law, of at least some forms of counter-terrorism review, illustrating the potential for counter-terrorism review to reinforce and legitimate the counter-terrorist state.

This chapter outlines the core argument of the book and the methodological approach to the research. It develops the concept of counter-terrorism review as legal, political, and policy processes that consider the application and impacts of counter-terrorism law and policy in theory as well as in practice, with a view to assessing its merits and contributing towards its improvement. It also establishes the importance of considering counter-terrorism review as a distinct phenomenon with the potential either to legitimate or to enhance accountability in the contemporary counter-terrorist state.

This concluding chapter argues that, notwithstanding the successes of counter-terrorism review, the counter-terrorist state is not characterised by a commitment to meaningful accountability through evaluative counter-terrorism review. It argues that meaningful accountability requires a commitment to evaluation, to the diversification of evidence, to hearing and recognising the importance of communities’ experiences of the unintended social and security impacts of counter-terrorism, and to the possibility of change. These commitments are not yet in evidence, and without them the chapter argues the counter-terrorist state struggles to establish liberal democratic legitimacy. Such a shift would require the state to recognise that counter-terrorism is now an ordinary state of affairs and that, as a result, the state can no longer appeal to ‘the exception’ in the attempt to exempt itself from our ordinary constitutional expectations when taking steps to combat terrorism. Instead, the conclusion argues, it must inculcate a culture of justification in counter-terrorism that is based not only on bare claims of necessity, but on arguments of legitimacy, legality, long- and short-term effectiveness, rights-respectfulness, and openness to challenge.

Aim: To explore a novel and efficient way of calculating transcription reliability of connected speech data using the concept of near functional equivalence. Using this approach, differences between two transcribed phonemes that are nearly phonetically equivalent are disregarded if both reflect two plausible and acceptable pronunciations for the word produced. Method: The study used transcriptions of connected speech samples from 63 five-year-olds who participated in a large-scale population study. Each recording was phonetically transcribed by two speech and language therapists. Two independent researchers then examined agreement ­between the two sets of transcripts, marking differences in vowels, consonants and diacritics and identifying segments which represented near functional equivalence. Results: Overall percentage agreement between the transcripts was 77%. One quarter of the differences between the two transcripts were identified as showing near functional equivalence. When this category was excluded, the transcripts showed 82% reliability. Conclusions: This study demonstrates the issues to consider when calculating transcription reliability. Other methods are often time-intensive and may highlight differences between transcribed units which are audibly very similar and would be negligible in ordinary conversation. Inclusion of the concept of “near functional equivalence” can result in higher reliability scores for transcription, without loss of rigour.

Name Advisory panel Provider Young Women's Trust Summary Charity that aims to broaden understanding of issues affecting disadvantaged young women created an advisory panel of members to shape its work.