About Us

The Communication Trust is funded by the Department for Education and other funders and was founded by BT, Afasic and Council for Disabled Children and I CAN. I CAN is hosting the Trust.

There are over 40 voluntary and community groups who contribute to the work of the Trust. In addition the Trust is consulting with a number of representatives of the children’s workforce, who form our Advisory Panel.

The purpose of the Trust is to raise awareness of the importance of speech, language and communication across the children’s workforce and enable practitioners to access the best training and expertise to support all children’s communication needs.

Our core messages:

  • Speech language and communication are crucial to the achievement of the Every Child Matters (ECM) outcomes.
  • All children and young people will benefit from support to further develop their speech, language and communication skills.
  • As many as 50%1 of reception children find speech, language and communication skills difficult.
  • 5-7%2 of children have a specific language impairment.
  • Most children with special educational needs (SEN) will have speech, language and communication needs.
  • If left unmet speech, language and communication needs can lead to challenges in behaviour, a lack of attainment and isolation.
  • All of the children's workforce need to understand what typical speech, language and communication development looks like for the age group that they are working with, to recognise the signs of potential difficulties and to know where to go for more information and support.

1Basic Skills Agency (2002) Summary Report into Young Children's Skills on Entry to Education
2 Tomblin, J. B. et al (1997) Prevalence of Specific Language Impairment in Kindergarten children Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research 40 and Law j., Boyle J., Harris F., Harkness A., and Nye C., (2000) Prevalence and Natural History of Primary Speech and Language Delay; findings from a systematic review of the literature IJLCD Vol 35 no.2 in Lindsay G and Dockrell J with Mackie C and Becky Letchford (2002) Educational Provision for Children with Specific Speech and Language Difficulties in England and Wales CEDAR