Indicators of SLCN

Speech, language and communication needs (SLCN) is an umbrella term. Children with SLCN may have difficulty with many aspects of communication:

Attention and Listening

• Children may have difficulties sharing their attention with others or listening to what has been said to them.  

• They may struggle to concentrate on a game or activity for even a short period of time, flitting from one task to another without completing anything.

Play and Interaction (interacting with others, including turn-taking and interpreting facial expressions and body language)

• Children may have difficulty interacting with others or with social communication skills. 

• They may struggle to use their language skills effectively to have conversations, play and interact socially with others. 

• This can include poor eye-contact, difficulties taking turns in a conversation, difficulties keeping to the topic of conversation and showing awareness of the listener.

Receptive Language (understanding what others say)

• Children may struggle to understand and make sense of words that they hear. 

• They may struggle to follow instructions and make sense of the language they hear around them.

Expressive Language (selecting and joining words together in the correct order to convey meaning)

• Children may find it difficult to express their ideas, wants or feelings. 

• They may have a small vocabulary for their age or have difficulty building up sentences and using correct grammar.

Speech (using speech sounds accurately and in the right places)

• Children may have speech which is difficult to understand which might include difficulty in making different sounds. 

• They may have difficulty discriminating between speech sounds.

Fluency (the flow and rhythm of speech)

• Stammering or stuttering where sounds or words are repeated or may be difficult to produce without effort. 

• Children might have hesitations in their speech and may prolong or repeat sounds and parts of words or sentences. 

• They may struggle to get their words out at all. 

• Stammering can emerge at any childhood stage, but most commonly between the ages of 2 and 5 years.

Voice (quality of voice)

• Voice problems i.e. hoarse voice or persistent voice loss. 

• An unusual and persistently harsh or unusual voice quality.

Speech, Language and Communication Needs can occur in childhood as primary difficulties with speech, language and communication or secondary to other developmental conditions such as autism. In some cases the cause of a child’s SLCN is unknown.

If you have concerns about your student potentially having SLCN issues, you can use the checklist below as an initial assessment of need before they are referred to a speech and language therapist. Click on the top right corner to download a PDF copy.