Speak Out
December 2014
17
Continuing Professional Development – 2014 National Tour
The Association is incredibly grateful to the 2014 National Tour speaker Dr Julia Starling...
Dr Julia Starling
is a speech-language pathologist with extensive clinical and research experience
with populations of young people with language and literacy difficulties. This interest has led to
recently completed postgraduate research at the University of Sydney targeting the nature and impact
of, and interventions for, language impairment in adolescence. It has also resulted in many national
and international presentations and publications. For example, Julia was an invited author for a
clinical forum on language and communication disorders in adolescents in the October 2012 issue of
Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools
.
Julia maintains her private caseload of mainly older school aged children and adolescents, is
implementing her evidence-based teacher training program in a group of Sydney schools, regularly
lectures and presents seminars and workshops, and continues an active involvement in research projects. Additionally
Julia is president of the Learning Difficulties Coalition of NSW.
•
Throughout 2014, Dr Julia Starling presented her
two-day workshop in Brisbane, Melbourne, Darwin,
Adelaide, Perth, Hobart, Canberra and Sydney.
•
During this two day workshop on supporting children
of upper primary school age and adolescents with
language and literacy difficulties, a range of different
approaches were covered. The background and
rationale for the various approaches was discussed,
looking to approaches with a foundation in Clinical
Best Practice (CBP) or – where available – Evidence-
Based Practice. The “Nature, impact and general case
management approaches” were covered during Day 1.
The content of Day 2 followed on from the previous
day’s discussion, and covered “Specific case
management approaches” relating to a range of
workplace settings/situations.
•
Learning objectives for registrants included: Gaining an
increased insight into the nature and impact of language
and literacy difficulties in upper primary children and
adolescent populations; Expanded knowledge of
evidence-based and clinical best practice management
approaches for supporting this population; A greater
awareness of, and direct experience with, a wide range
of language and literacy resources appropriate for both
school-based and clinical service delivery.
•
There were a total of approximately 300 registrants across
all the workshops and nearly all workshops sold out – this
speaks to the respect that Dr Julia Starling is held in.
We extend our sincere thanks to Julia for sharing her knowledge and experience as the National Tour speaker.
Let’s hand over to the registrants who expressed their thanks via their comments on the evaluation forms. Here are
some of these comments:
Brisbane:
•
“Great workshop. Loved the practical ideas and anecdotes
from personal experience. An obvious, genuine concern
for this population.”
•
“Wonderful – great insight to theory and practical ideas.
Thanks Julia.”
•
“Completely new perspective on working with this
group.”
Melbourne:
•
“So much helpful information to take directly into practice.”
•
“Julia – you are such a warm hearted, down-to-earth,
caring person, and this shines through.”
•
“Thank you for covering a topic not often available
despite the number of clinicians working with
adolescents.”
•
“Strategies provided were very relevant. I will be able to
implement these immediately and easily.”
Darwin:
•
“Helps me think about this client group more holistically
and gives me practical strategies I can start using upon my
return to work.”
•
“Has made me re-think our role in written expression and
comprehension and I have come away with so many ideas
that could be used now!”
•
“Excellent event. Great to have this needed important topic
– thank you!”
•
“Thank you to Julia for coming to the NT!”
Adelaide:
•
“Very generous with ideas/resources & easy to listen to.”
•
“Many great ideas that can be shared with teachers.”
•
“Loved the fact that there were a lot of practical ideas that
could be easily applied in any setting. The handouts with
the key take home messages were well produced and
great guidelines.”
About the National Tour workshop –
Supporting older school-aged children and adolescents with language
and literacy difficulties: Time for some creative thinking!
