It is widely recognised that within the United Kingdom there is an issue with young children’s speech and language development, with Law and Levickis (2018) going so far as to say that the area of speech and language development be considered a public health problem.     

This  area of children’s development is one that is of particular interest to me.  When I owned my own nursery I began to notice that children who did not say much within the setting came alive when we went to the forest school and it intrigued me as to why this was the case.  What is it about an outdoor or natural environment that encourages children to speak when they may not do so at other times?  Is there a magic formula within the outside that can aid young children’s speech and language and, if so, what is it?  And can it be replicated elsewhere?

My research into this area therefore explores what makes a quality environment with regards to speech and language and has resulted in a quality rating scale that is transferable between environments, and rates the quality of play and learning environments from a speech and language perspective.  I continue to trial this tool with the aim of publishing this at a later date, once I have collated robust evidence that it works in a variety of environments.

References:

Law, J. and Levickis, P.  (2018)  Early language development must be a public health priority.  Journal of health visiting.  6(12), pp.586-589.