John Cane, who runs an "Access 2 Therapy" blog recently took an Elklan TTP course, and posted his thoughts in his blog.

He wrote:

I attended for two (very intensive) days in London and thought it was excellent.

Liz Elks, one of the two therapists who set up Elklan carried out the training. She is clearly very knowledgeable and passionate about speech and language therapy, and was keen to pass on her experience. I completed the [Total Training Pack for 11-16s] course enabling me to train those working with all young people but especially those with speech, language and communication needs.

Areas covered included 'promoting vocabulary development', 'understanding and using sentences' and 'promoting effective communication and social skills', plus several others. The course materials were designed to help speech and language therapists roll out training to TAs, teachers, etc without using technical terminology. Indeed it was emphasised that some of the terminology we use, such as 'receptive language' and 'expressive language', is not easily understood by everyone.

I came away from the training not feeling that I had sat through a sales pitch for a company's product as so many training courses are, but that my skills had been enhanced. I now feel better equipped to help others work with students with language and communication difficulties, not because I learned something that I did not already know, but because it confirmed that my current practice is correct. It also provided me with plenty of examples of activities to use with teachers in order to help them see things from the point of view of a student with communication difficulties. The most effective of these was reading a poem aloud whilst playing a recording of somebody reciting a recipe for a fruit cake and then asking questions about quantities of sugar etc used in the recipe. This really hammered home how difficult it is for students with attention difficulties to listen out for information in a noisy classroom.

[...If] you are wondering whether or not you should attend an Elklan training course, I would recommend that you do so. Courses catering for all levels of prior knowledge and experience are available. The course materials are very accessible and will provide a useful reference for years to come, and the course I attended was delivered in such a way as to empower those present.