Speech, language and communication needs (SLCN) are prevalent among primary school aged children. Collaboration between speech-language therapists (SLTs) and teachers is beneficial for supporting children's communication skills. The aim of this study was to investigate the needs of both professional groups and their preferences for service delivery when working with mainstream, primary school aged children with SLCN. This study was undertaken within one education region in New South Wales, Australia, using a mixed-methods research design. In Phase 1, all teachers (schools n=156) and all SLTs (n=36) working within the region were invited to complete a questionnaire. Responses were obtained from 14 teachers and 6 SLTs. In Phase 2, a subsample of participants (n=4) contributed to a focus group. Within the study sample, minimal collaborative practice was reportedly occurring. Teachers and SLTs expressed a desire for increased training and knowledge and more collaborative practice. Teachers and SLTs also expressed frustration at perceived systemic inadequacies with regard to funding, personnel and resources. Findings from this study suggest that change to service delivery needs to be considered at an individual, interpersonal and organisational level to enable better outcomes for children with SLCN and increased support for their families and the professionals who work with them.3 Speech, language and communication needs (SLCN) are highly prevalent (Law et al., 2000a), affecting between 12% and 13% of primary and secondary school children (McLeod and McKinnon, 2007). Indeed, SLCN is reportedly more prevalent than other areas of learning need including behavioural/emotional difficulty, physical/medical disability, intellectual disability, hearing and visual impairment (McLeod and McKinnon, 2007).Children with SLCN often have difficulties with literacy, academic achievement and socialisation throughout their school years (Felsenfeld et al., 1994;McCormack et al., 2011).Persistent SLCN has been linked to reading difficulties (Catts, 1997), problems with literacy (Dockrell & Lindsay, 2000;Schuele, 2004), educational underachievement (Snowling et al., 2001, and behavioural difficulties (Botting and Conti-Ramsden, 2000). In addition, children with SLCN have been found to receive lower ratings of social acceptance than typically developing peers (Lindsay and Dockrell, 2002). Difficulties may be due to the impact of SLCN on children's ability to "access the curriculum and interact with their peers" (Dockrell and Lindsay, 2000: 25).In Australia, the presence of SLCN has been identified by teachers as the most important predictive factor for their recommendation that students required a high level of support in the classroom (McLeod and McKinnon, 2010). However, teachers have also reported that the majority of students identified as having SLCN receive no involvement from outside agencies (i.e. speech and language therapists or professionals other than teachers) (McLeod and McKinnon, 2007). Whilst early and timely ...
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