In Part 1 of this series on motivation – https://secondaryschoolslt.com/2026/10/09/getting-adolescents-on-board-motivation-engagement-and-behaviour-part-1/ – I talked about some of the challenges involved in supporting older students with language disorders, in particular with regards to motivation and behaviour.
Over the course of this three part series, I’d like to share the solutions that have had the biggest impact on my practice. In this post, Part 2, the focus is on using a student-focused approach to motivate students to engage in Speech and Language Therapy (SALT).
A personal rapport
The first thing that helped was developing a more personal rapport with my students. This may sound obvious, but in the beginning I was so earnest and concerned about “boundaries” and doing the right thing, that I think my sessions probably felt a bit clinical.
As I gained experience, and grew in confidence, I became more comfortable sharing a bit more of myself with my students. I obviously don’t go around adding them on Instagram or sharing anything too personal! But I’ve shown them pieces of art that I painted and I tell them about my weekend. During the social group, it’s sometimes felt appropriate to share a couple of difficulties I’ve experienced in my own social life and how I resolved them.
I think it helps our students to know that the staff working with them are human beings too, with their own complex lives, feelings, struggles, personal strengths and weaknesses. We are not aiming for perfection, but progress.
“Mediation of optimism”
For students who have historically received no, little, or inconsistent support with their difficulties, the power of an intervention session delivered consistently, week after week by a Speech and Language Therapist (SLT) who believes in them should not be underestimated. As I began to see evidence of the accumulated gains of the interventions I was delivering, I also began to believe more in my ability to really help my students. I think they could tell, and that this gave them more confidence in the sessions, resulting in reduced resistance.
The importance of believing our students are capable of deep, structural change, is something emphasised by Feuerstein et al (2010) in describing his mediated learning approach. For a more detailed description of mediated learning and how to apply it to your sessions, please see my post: https://secondaryschoolslt.com/2026/08/31/supporting-generalisation-part-4-mediated-learning-and-bridging-questions/.
A “student-centred” approach
Something else that has had a huge impact on my practice is using a “student-centred approach”. Simply put, this means involving our students in decisions regarding their assessment and treatment and seeing them as active participants in the whole process.
When children are young, they do not really need to know the long-term goals their SLT has set for them. But as they mature and move towards greater independence, older students have a strong need to be able to make some decisions for themselves. So it’s important that we help them feel like they are part of the process, not that things are just “happening to them” (Paul and Norbury, 2012).
Involving older students in planning their targets may not be news to you. You may well have used “talking mats” for this purpose. But Larson and McKinley (2003, p.325) recommend that we “communicate openly and honestly about what needs to be accomplished and why it is to be done” at every stage in the process, including during the initial assessment.
When I truly took this advice on board, instead of considering it as something I “should” do, I noticed how much more receptive, cooperative and motivated my students were. They seemed to appreciate this new transparency, rather than being kept in the dark, and were willing to try their best, now that they understood the reasons behind my requests. I’m sure the same could be said of most of us. So, how do we apply such an approach?
When we first assess our students, it is important that we clearly explain the reasons for the assessment. We might then interview them to find out their perspective on the situation. Nelson (1998, p.204) recommends asking students for their “lists” and their “stories”, i.e. a list of their difficulties and examples of specific times when they experienced these. This initial conversation can be very enlightening. It also helps students to feel that we value their point of view and that these sessions are truly for them.
Then, instead of simply administering tests without any explanation as is sometimes done, we should discuss the behaviours we are going to assess using words that students are familiar with, e.g. “listening”, “speaking”, “writing”, etc (Larson and McKinley, 2003; Larson and McKinley, 1995 in Paul and Norbury, 2012, p. 540). Ideally, we would then connect these behaviours to the difficulties the student has just described.
For example, I might say, “You told me earlier that you find it hard to understand what is going on in class. This assessment is testing your listening skills. It will help me to understand why this might be hard for you”. By doing this simple thing, students immediately see the relevance of the assessment to their lives, and they are more likely to give it their best effort.
Please see my post on assessment for more information: https://secondaryschoolslt.com/2026/07/08/language-assessment-at-secondary-school-challenges-and-solutions/.
Once we have the results, we can share these with the student, including their relative strengths and weaknesses. Do the results tally with what the student has told us about their difficulties? Ideally, we need to explain the results in such a way that students are made aware of their communication disorders, and of the need for intervention (Larson and McKinley, 2003).
It is also important that students accept ownership of their communication disorder, and that they understand it is they who will lose out if they do not work on their communication skills. Larson and McKinley (2003) argue that if students deny there is a problem, refuse to accept responsibility, or are otherwise unmotivated to change then SALT is not recommended, since they are unlikely to put in the necessary effort required to change.
Larson and Mckinley (2003) also advise that we should be prepared to “counsel” our students about their communication disorders. Of course, we should not overstep the bounds of our role when a referral to a counsellor would be more appropriate. But when a student arrives with an urgent issue to get off their chest, it may be more productive to spend some time listening to them than attempting to plough on with the session regardless.
This has been my experience of working in schools. My student, A, would sometimes arrive at my session distraught, having been disciplined for something else that he’d done! It seemed counterproductive, and also a denial of his feelings to try to force the session I had planned with him in this state.
So, instead, I’d ask if he wanted to talk about the situation, and try to turn it into a learning opportunity. For example, I’ve sometimes used the “emotions” worksheet from Kelly and Sains’s 2017 Talkabout for Teenagers to work through his thoughts and feelings associated with the situation, his actions and the consequences, as well as whether there was anything he might do differently next time. This felt more productive in the moment, and better for our relationship in the long-run.
Since I want my students to feel that they have agency, I offer choices when I can, and I do my best to accommodate any reasonable requests. For example, I try not to take my students out of their favourite lessons, and if one makes a last minute request to swap their session and it’s possible, then I do it. If I am unable to accommodate their request, then I explain the reasons why.
A little consideration can go a long way. Recently a new student refused to attend his first social group. I initially thought he had just decided he didn’t want to come anymore. But when we dug a little deeper, it turned out that he was supposed to be removed from his last lesson with his favourite LSA to come to the group. The situation was easily resolved by asking the LSA to attend the session with the student, who then happily obliged.
Implementing a student-centred approach has resolved many of the issues I was experiencing with student engagement and motivation. Now, when I encounter resistance from a student, I tend to ask, “Do you understand why we are doing this?” If they say, “No!”, then I explain again the reasons for the activity and how it is relevant to their life (at school and beyond), as well as offering them a choice of a different activity. Following this discussion, the session usually gets back on track.
Some of these techniques could also fit into a “mediated learning” approach. Please see my post for more information: https://secondaryschoolslt.com/2026/08/31/supporting-generalisation-part-4-mediated-learning-and-bridging-questions/. To read more about how to deal with challenging behaviour when running social groups, please see Part 3 – coming soon!
Notes
Feuerstein, Reuven, Refael S. Feuerstein, and Louis H. Falik. 2010. Beyond Smarter: Mediated Learning and the Brain’s Capacity for Change. New York: Teachers College Press.
Kelly, Alex, and Brian Sains. Talkabout for Teenagers: Developing Social and Emotional Communication Skills. 2nd ed. Abingdon: Routledge, 2017.
Larson, V.L. and McKinley, N.L. (2003) Communication solutions for older students. Thinking Pub.
Nelson, N. W. (1998) Childhood Language Disorders in Context: Infancy Through Adolescence. 2nd edn. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Paul, R. and Norbury, C. (2012) Language Disorders from Infancy Through Adolescence: Listening, Speaking, Reading, Writing, and Communicating. 4th edn. St. Louis, MO: Elsevier.
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