Bedfordshire and Luton Children's Speech and Language Therapy Service

Welcome to our service

Our speech and language team aim to provide advice, help and support for children and young people aged 0 to 19 years old who have difficulties with speech, language, communication and swallowing.

• How we work

  We offer a mixture of face-to-face, telephone and virtual appointments. These will be matched with the needs of each child and family.

  We have three speech and language teams who specialise with different groups of children:

  Community speech and language team. We help children of all ages. We assess and help children with disordered speech and language development. This includes children with a stammer or nonfluent speech, voice disorders, difficulties understanding and using language, and disordered speech development.

  Early communication support team. We help preschool children. We help parent and carer speech and language groups, provide early advice sessions and home visits to help with children's early communication skills. 

  Special needs team. We help early years children with complex needs, children with speech, language and communication needs and children with eating or swallowing difficulties. We work with families and professionals. We will agree Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) goals.

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  Once your child has had an assessment, you may be offered a package of support. This is a plan that is tailor made to your child. It will focus on ways to help your child and ways to encourage them to reach their targets. A package of support may include:

  • Information and guidance on communication tools such as visual supports.
  • Suggest strategies and methods to help your child’s everyday communication.
  • Sessions to show strategies and techniques.
  • Training workshops to learn strategies and techniques for parents and professionals.
  • A review with a speech and language therapist or support practitioner. This is to check that you understand the plan and strategies. It is also to check that they are becoming a part of your child's daily life.

  Please be aware that your child’s package of support may not contain all these suggestions. A package of support is to help with the challenges that your child is experiencing at that time.

  A package of support is completed when the Speech and Language therapist is happy that your child has the support they need to meet their targets. Completing a package of support does not mean that there is no longer a speech, language or communication need. 

  If there are changes or new concerns that require support. Your child may need another package of support. You can make a request by contacting our service. 

• Toddlers and pre-school children (1 to 4 years old)

  We offer a range of information, advice and workshops for babies and toddlers aged 0 to 5 years old.

  Workshops

  We offer 'Chattertots' or 'Little Talkers' workshops for babies and toddlers aged 12 months to 3 years old. These workshops are to help you support your baby or toddler's early communication skills. 

  Read more about Chattertots and Little Talkers

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  Helpful information and advice

  If your child is under 2 years old, you can read our online information and advice. This includes:

  • Helping your baby or toddler to talk
  • Stammering
  • Attention and listening skills
  • Playing and social skills
  • Understanding language
  • Using language
  • Speech sounds

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  Early advice sessions

  We offer early advice sessions for parents and carers to briefly discuss their speech and language concerns with a specialist.

  The early advice sessions are for toddlers and pre-school children aged 2 to 5 years old who are not attending school.

  Read more about our early advice sessions

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  If you have any questions or wider concerns about your baby or toddler's development, please contact your health visitor.

• Children and young adults (5 to 18 years old)

  If you are worried about your child’s speech, language and communication skills and your child has started school, please speak to the school directly about your concerns.  They will be able to discuss any support already in place.

  Referrals for children and young people, up to 16 years old, must be completed and submitted by school staff. Children and young people with identified special educational needs can be referred until they are 18 years old.

  If your child is homeschooled, the school aged referral form can be completed by parent, carer, trainer or appropriate professional if your:

  • child or young person is home-schooled
  • young person is not in education or training

  Read our referral and guidance section for more information.

• Who you will see and speak to

  • Speech and language therapist are specialists who assess speech, language and communication skills. They investigate any possible reasons for difficulties and provide advice on programmes and strategies to help children with speech, language and communication skills. 
  • Speech and language therapy support practitioners work under the direction of a speech and language therapist. They provide speech and language therapy to individuals and small groups, deliver training, make resources and much more. 
  • Administrators are very skilled NHS professionals that provide all the organisational support for the clinical teams. They are also the friendly voices at the other end of the phone when contacting the service.

• Where we work

  We work in the community across Bedfordshire and Luton. As our team are integrated in the local community and schools they will be in lots of locations in the local areas offering support.