Speech

Speech for children and young people is an essential part of growing up. Speech is the process of vocalising language. Speech is produced by the muscle actions that occur in the head and neck, chest and abdomen. When children and young people learn to speak they discover how to regulate and coordinate their muscles to produce a number of different sounds, which then when combined results in words that others can understand. There are more than 40 sounds to master in the English language alone.

Language

Language is a symbolic communication system. The symbols can be spoken aloud, written down and signed (Makaton and BSL) there are rules about the way these symbols are used, once these symbols and actions are understood, the rules allow people to say anything they want within their own vocabulary. For example: -
We can say sentences that we have never heard or said before.
Symbols in the language system have their own distinctive meaning these are often abstract, which makes them very complex to learn. An example of this is: -
The word “egg” in no way resembles an egg. The only way that a child or young person will learn the meaning of the word egg is if they hear it used in context – when they are being offered a boiled egg. However children and young people will also need to learn that the term egg also applies to raw egg, scrambled egg, fried egg and so on. Humans as a whole are unique is using a learned symbolic system so it is often said that language is the essence of being human.

Communication

Communication is a very complex way of communication, it’s a two way process, in order to communicate effectively, children and young people need to develop a number of