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https://doi.org/10.1177/0265659020967711
Child Language Teaching and Therapy
1 –15
© The Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/0265659020967711
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Are Australian speech-language
therapists working in the literacy
domain with children and
adolescents? If not, why not?
Tanya Serry
La Trobe University, Australia
Penny Levickis
Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, Australia
University of Melbourne, Australia
Abstract
A cross-sectional online survey was completed by 219 speech-language therapists (SLTs)
to explore their views and practices when working with children and adolescents who have
literacy difficulties. They were recruited via 11 workshops hosted by Speech Pathology Australia,
held across Australia and completed the survey prior to attending their respective workshop.
Participants reported overwhelming support for SLTs to work with students struggling to learn
literacy and supported not only a role for SLTs to work with children in the preschool years to
promote readiness to learn to read at school, but also a role for services to students beyond the
early years of school. While SLTs valued specific clinical and collaborative activities, a significant
gap was found between their perceived feasibility of those activities and their perceived value.
Results show SLTs are less confident providing written support to students than they are in
providing phonological awareness and vocabulary interventions. While SLTs clearly value their
role in the literacy domain, this study highlights evident gaps in preservice training in this area, as
well as a need for improved SLT and teacher knowledge exchange, and collaboration in supporting
children and adolescents with literacy difficulties.
Keywords
collaborative practice, literacy, reading difficulty, scope of practice, speech-language therapist
Corresponding author:
Tanya Serry, School of Education, La Trobe University, EDU1, Melbourne Campus, Bundoora, VIC 3086, Australia
Email: t.serry@latrobe.edu.au
967711CLT0010.1177/0265659020967711Child Language Teaching and TherapySerry et al.
research-article2020
Special Issue: Language and Literacy
2 Child Language Teaching and Therapy 00(0)
I Introduction
Learning to become literate is critical to academic achievement, vocational success and wellbeing
(Snow, 2016). Competency in literacy is a process which begins from birth, with oral language and
phonological skills the foundations of literacy development (Snowling and Hulme, 2012). Evidence
is well-established that children with poor reading skills often have concomitant oral language dif-
ficulties (e.g. Catts et al., 2002; Stothard et al., 1998). These close links between language develop-
ment and literacy skills support the vital role that speech-language therapists (SLTs) can play in the
growth of literacy for children and adolescents.
SLTs have high levels of knowledge about the construct of ‘language’, which, by definition,
refers to the continuum from oral to written language modalities (Snow, 2016). This means that
SLTs should be well-equipped to support children and adolescents who are struggling with master-
ing literacy (written language) skills. However, SLTs’ role in this domain is variable and often
poorly understood. In a US national survey of school-based SLTs, Fallon and Katz (2011) found
that over one third of SLTs reported that they did not provide any written language services to their
students with written language disorders, consistent with findings from the ASHA Schools Survey
(ASHA, 2018). A qualitative study by (Serry, 2013), explored the perspectives of nine primary
school-based SLTs regarding their work with low-progress readers. Semi-structured interviews
revealed that SLTs face more barriers than enablers to becoming members of written language sup-
port teams in schools, including factors such as: time constraints; resistance from educational col-
leagues and, a theoretical divide between educators and SLTs regarding reading difficulty. This
may be unsurprising, given that although inter-professional collaboration is critical, a New Zealand
study of SLT students and preservice teachers demonstrated limited understanding of one another’s
expertise in literacy curriculum and spoken language concepts, and are shown to demonstrate
minimal knowledge of spoken-written language relationships (Wilson et al., 2015).
It is important to acknowledge the contribution that SLTs can make to the literacy domain in
order to improve literacy standards internationally but specifically in Australia, where the role SLTs
are able to play in working with children and adolescents with literacy difficulties has been widely
unrecognized (Speech Pathology Australia, 2011) and reading performance continues to decline
against international standards (Thomson et al., 2019). The limited international research exploring
the extent to which SLTs have expanded their scope of practice to include a focus on literacy has
been mixed (Tambyraja et al., 2014). Response to intervention (RTI), a multi-tiered approach to the
identification and support of children with behaviour and learning needs, is a recent educational
initiative aimed at providing children with an intensity of instruction appropriate to their individual
needs (Fuchs et al., 2003; Weiss, 2013). There has been a push for SLTs to make major contributions
schoolwide for students with language and literacy needs within the RTI framework (Justice, 2006;
Spencer et al., 2008), but the extent to which this is occurring is not clear.
Staskowski and Zagaiski (2003) identified the most important factors of successful primary
school literacy teams (i.e. SLTs collaborating with other professionals and parents), are interprofes-
sional practice, the understanding of another’s expertise and feeling part of the group. Self-efficacy
refers to a belief about what an individual can do with a set of skills and knowledge (Bandura,
1977), such that those with high self-efficacy are far more likely to attempt tasks compared to those
with low self-efficacy (Pasupathy and Bogschutz, 2013). To date, there have been no reports exam-
ining SLT’s perceptions and beliefs regarding their own self-efficacy in their roles contributing to
the support of children with literacy difficulties. This is critical in order to address barriers to suc-
cessful collaboration between SLTs and other school staff. While SLTs may perceive themselves as
possessing the knowledge and skills to support children with poor literacy, self-doubt and low
confidence may contribute to undermining their self-efficacy to work in the literacy domain.
Serry et al. 3
Moreover, Spencer et al. (2008) reported that while SLTs’ phonemic awareness skills were superior
compared to other groups of teachers (e.g. reading teachers, first-grade teachers etc.), collectively,
they did not score at ceiling. On their measure worth 47 points, SLTs’ mean score was 37.34 (79%)
(Spencer et al., 2008).
Therefore, the purpose of this study was to explore SLTs’ views about and experiences of work-
ing with children and adolescents who have literacy difficulties. Literacy is a less well-established
area of practice for SLTs, particularly in Australia, and we sought to understand the enablers and
barriers to working in the literacy domain. Specifically, the aim of this study was to address the
following:
1. How and where are services provided and who is providing these services?
2. What do SLTs consider is their scope of practice when working in the literacy domain?
3. What is the relationship between what SLTs believe are valuable clinical activities and what
are feasible clinical activities when working in the literacy domain?
4. To what degree do SLTs feel confident about their role working in the literacy domain?
5. To what degree do SLTs feel recognized by peers from other disciplines about their role
working in the literacy domain?
II Method
A quantitative cross-sectional, survey was used to gather data (see Appendix A in supplemental mate-
rial). The survey was completed online and was anonymous. Approval to conduct this research was
provided by La Trobe University and from Speech Pathology Australia (SPA).
1 Participants
Participants comprised 219 SLTs who attended a two-day workshop delivered by the first author.
The workshops were titled ‘Speech pathology in the literacy domain: From prevention to interven-
tion’. Eleven workshops hosted by SPA were held across Australia during 2017. To be eligible to
attend a workshop, registrants had to either meet requirements for membership of SPA or be
enrolled in an accredited training program in speech-language therapy. In total, 429 people attended
these workshops and 219 (51%) participated in the survey. All participants except for one person
was qualified.
2 Recruitment
Information about the survey was provided immediately following confirmation of registration to
attend a workshop. This process was managed by SPA. For those who chose to complete the sur-
vey, an electronic link took participants to the survey, which was hosted on the Qualtrics platform.
Invitations were made on this one occasion only and all participants completed the survey prior to
their attendance at a workshop. Participants were included regardless of whether they currently or
previously had worked in the literacy domain or not.
3 The survey tool
A brief online, anonymous survey was used in the current study (see Appendix A in supplemental
material). The survey was adapted from the questionnaire developed by Fallon and Katz (2011) to
be suitable for SLTs working in the Australian context. Four experienced SLTs completed the
4 Child Language Teaching and Therapy 00(0)
adapted survey as a pilot and their feedback resulted in the addition of questions comparing how
SLTs valued various practices compared to how feasible they believed these practices were in their
regular work (see Appendix A, Section B in supplemental material). Participants were provided
with a definition of the term ‘working in the literacy domain’ as it applied to the survey. Responses
required participants to select one option from a list or to use a five-point Likert scale. The first
section of the survey contained demographic questions about participants’ time in the profession
and their current role. This section was followed by questions asking about participants’ attitudes
and experiences about SLTs working in the literacy domain. Most questions were directed to all
participants, however, sections C and D were specifically aimed at those who were currently work-
ing in the literacy domain, regardless of their employment sector.
4 Analyses
All data were analysed descriptively. Frequency of responses were reported for Likert scale ques-
tions. Due to the nature of the questions, the denominators for the variables referring to SLT work-
place and caseload varied. Fisher’s’ Exact test was used to compare the perceived value and the
feasibility of intervention approaches and processes when working in the literacy domain (research
question 4). Value and feasibility activities were compared by collapsing strongly agreed and
agreed responses into single variables. Finally, chi-square tests were used to examine associations
between the degree to which SLTs feel recognized by peers from other disciplines about their role
working in the literacy domain and their level of experience working in the literacy domain
(research question 5).
III Results
1 The sample
The key characteristics of participants in terms of experience, qualification, workplace and case-
load are shown in Table 1. Thirty-two percent (70/219) of participants had worked as an SLT for
five years or less; including one who was still a student SLT. Twenty-seven percent (59/219) of
participants had worked for between six and 15 years. The largest group of participants (41%,
90/219) had been working as an SLT for more than 16 years. The distribution was more evenly
spread regarding the numbers of years that participants had been working in the literacy domain.
The group most commonly represented as working in the literacy domain had worked for between
two and five years (28%, 62/219). This was followed by 20% (42/219) of participants who reported
working in the literacy domain for one year or less. The smallest group was those who reported
never having worked in the literacy domain (8%, 17/219). No significant differences were evident
in relation to participants’ years of experience as an SLT and their years of experience working in
the literacy domain. Of the 33 participants (15%) who were dually-qualified, over half were quali-
fied as teachers (55%, 18/33).
a Their workplace. Just over half of participants (53%, 116/219) worked in a private practice and
close to one-quarter worked for an educational system; 17% in State Education and 5% in Catholic
Education. Other common places of employment included the university sector, health services
and not-for-profit organizations.
Of the 130 participants (59% of 219) who reported working within schools; either as private
contractors or employees, nearly two-thirds (61%) worked across five or fewer schools per fort-
night. A further 21% worked at one school at least five days per fortnight. Seventeen percent of this
Serry et al. 5
Table 1. Key characteristics of participants.
Frequency Percent
Years as an SLP* (n = 219):
Not at all 1 0.5
Less than one year 22 10.0
2–5 years 47 21.5
6–10 years 32 14.6
11–15 years 27 12.3
16+ years 90 41.1
Years working in the literacy domain (n = 219):
Not at all 17 7.8
Less than one year 42 19.2
2–5 years 62 28.3
6–10 years 38 17.3
11–15 years 21 9.6
16+ years 39 17.8
Dual qualification (n = 33):
A psychologist or neuropsychologist 1 3.0
An educator 18 54.6
Other 14 42.4
Main employer (n = 219):
A private practice operator 72 32.9
Self-employment 44 20.1
State government educationa37 16.9
Catholic educationb10 4.6
An independent school (or schools)c4 1.8
A university 9 4.1
Other 43 19.6
Work within one or more schools (n = 130):
One school for at least five days/fortnight 27 20.8
Across five schools or fewer/fortnight 79 60.8
Between six and 10 schools/fortnight 19 14.6
Eleven or more schools/fortnight 5 3.9
Level of school attended by caseload (n = 386 as participants could select two options):
Preschoold74 19.2
Early primary schoole (first three years) 179 46.4
Later primary school (> first three years) 104 26.9
Early secondary schoolf (first three years) 21 5.4
Later secondary school (final three years) 8 2.1
Notes. * In Australia speech-language therapists (SLTs) are called speech pathologists or speech language pathologists.
aIn Australia, all states and territories fund state government schools to provide education to students at all year
levels. Schools are administered by state or territory-based Departments of Education. All children have access to
state government ‘public’ education. State Government Departments of Education employ SLTs and psychologists to
provide support to students who are referred for services. There is significant variability between and within states and
territories regarding the number of SLTs and psychologists employed to serve students.
bCatholic schools are run by Catholic Archdioceses. Parents/Guardians may choose to send their children to a
Catholic school which are partially fee-paying and partially subsidized. Catholic Education departments also SLTs and
psychologists to provide support to students referred for services although the distribution of services is variable from
school to school.
(Continued)
6 Child Language Teaching and Therapy 00(0)
participant sub-group contracted their services to specific schools while the remaining participants
worked with clients regardless of what school they attended.
b Their caseload. In response to the educational levels of students on participants’ caseloads, par-
ticipants were asked to select two options across five brackets. Nearly 75% (283/386) of responses
indicated that participants worked with students in primary school.1 Further, 19% (74) of responses
indicated that participants selected working with pre-schoolers.2 Of the close to eight percent of
participants (n=29) working with students in secondary school,3 21 participants reported working
with students in the first three years and eight participants reported working with students in the
final three years of secondary school.
2 Beliefs about the scope of speech-pathology practice
When asked about their beliefs regarding the scope of SLT practice in the literacy domain, partici-
pants responded on a five-point Likert scale in relation to six pre-determined practice targets (see
Appendix A, Section B, part one in supplemental material). Figure 1 illustrates the percentage of
participants who agreed or strongly agreed with each of the six areas of practice. There was over-
whelming support for SLTs to work with children who struggle to learn to read (95% agreed or
strongly agreed, 165/173). Further, a similar proportion of participants (92.8%, 168/181) supported
a role for SLTs to work with children at the pre-school level to facilitate their readiness to learn to
read at school. In addition, 92% (155/169) believed that SLTs should offer services to students
beyond the early years of school. A notable minority of participants reported being neutral as to
whether SLTs’ practice should extend to include working with students who have spelling chal-
lenges (11%, 18/162) or difficulties with extended writing (16%, 28/180).
3 Perceived value and feasibility of specific clinical activities
Participants were asked to report their support for the value and for the feasibility of seven clinical
and/or collaborative activities in relation to working with children and/or adolescents in the liter-
acy domain (see Appendix A, Section B, parts two and three in supplemental material). Figure 2
illustrates that using the same five-point Likert scale, all seven activities were highly valued as
indicated by a response of ‘agree’ or ‘strongly agree’. The most valued activity was to consult to
preschool settings about preparing children to be ‘reading-ready’ when starting school, with 92%
(176/191) of participants agreeing or strongly agreeing. Using a response-to-intervention (RTI)
model when providing intervention attracted the lowest amount of support with 75% (140/186) of
participants agreeing or strongly agreeing.
The perceived feasibility of implementation was lower than the perceived value for six of the
seven activities as shown in Figure 2. Fisher’s Exact test was used to compare the perceived value
cIndependent or ‘private’ schools are is full fee-paying and are often but not always faith-based. Parents/Guardians
may choose to send their children to an independent school. Some independent schools employ an SLT and/or a
psychologist. Other independent schools contract these services to private providers. Some offer no in-school services.
dIn Australia, preschool refers to the year prior to school entry. Formal reading instruction is not part of the preschool
curriculum. Children are typically four years old when attending preschool.
eIn Australia, primary school refers to the first seven years of formal schooling. Although there is some variability across
Australia, children are typically five years old at school entry.
fIn Australia, secondary school refers to the final six of education. Students are typically aged between 12 to 18 years of age.
Table 1. (Continued)
Serry et al. 7
0% 20%40% 60% 80% 100%
Be involved with literacy curriculum planning
Work with students who have difficulties with
extended writing tasks
Work with students who have spelling
difficulties
Work with students who continue to have
difficulty with reading even when they are
beyond the early years of school
Work at the preschool education level for
children to be 'reading-ready' when starting
school
Work with children who are struggling to learn
to read
Strongly agree Agree
Figure 1. Percentages of those who agreed and strongly agreed to each of the six pre-defined activities
being within the scope of speech-language therapy practice.
0% 20% 40% 60% 80%100%
To use a Response-to-Intervention model when
providing intervention
To team-teach alongside the classroom teacher
To team-teach alongside the specialist teaching
staff
To intervene with one or more students within the
classroom
To provide consultative support for another person
to conduct your intervention
To intervene with one or more students outside the
classroom
To consult to preschool settings about preparing
children to be 'reading-ready' when starting school
Valuable SA/A Feasible SA/A
Figure 2. Speech-language therapists’ (SLTs’) support (indicated by choosing strongly agreed [SA] /
agreed [A]) for the value and the feasibility of various clinical activities.
8 Child Language Teaching and Therapy 00(0)
and the feasibility of intervention approaches and processes when working in the literacy domain.
There was a large gap for three of the seven activities where the perceived value significantly out-
weighed the perceived feasibility. The activities were: (1) To team-teach alongside the classroom
teacher (p = 0.001), (2) To team-teach alongside the specialist teaching staff (p < 0.001) and (3)
To intervene with one or more students within the classroom (p < 0.001).
For activities that were rated as notably less feasible than valuable, the proportion of partici-
pants who selected ‘Neither agree or disagree’ or ‘Disagree’ was greater than three of the four
activities that were rated closely for value and feasibility. To demonstrate, for the activity of team-
teaching alongside the classroom teacher, 22% neither agreed nor disagreed that it was feasible
while 28% disagreed it was feasible. When it came to team-teaching alongside the specialist teach-
ing staff, the proportions were 16% and 18% respectively for feasibility and for intervening with
one or more students within the classroom, responses were 18% and 15% respectively.
The matter of using an RTI model when providing intervention was the only activity that broke
with the overall trends in relationship to perceived value and feasibility. Twenty-four percent of
participants neither agreed or disagreed that this activity was valuable and 29% responded simi-
larly regarding its feasibility. In contrast, the proportion of participants who responded with
‘Disagree’ or ‘Strongly disagree’ in relation to value and the feasibility of using an RTI model
when providing intervention was one percent or zero.
4 Self-rated preparation and confidence to work as a speech-language therapist in
the literacy domain
Table 2 shows that only 10% (17/174) of participants agreed or strongly agreed that they left uni-
versity with the expertise to work in the literacy domain with children and adolescents, while 82%
disagreed or strongly disagreed that they were prepared to work in this area of practice on gradua-
tion. In contrast, 82% (142/174) of participants agreed or strongly agreed that they had gained their
knowledge and skill to work in the literacy domain mainly through post-university training.
Regardless of the number of years working as an SLT, no association was found with SLTs agree-
ing that they left university with the expertise to work in the literacy domain.
Regarding participants’ confidence to work as an SLT in the literacy domain, two-thirds agreed
(48%) or strongly agreed (18%) that they felt confident to do so. Seventeen percent were neutral
while a further 17 disagreed (16%) or strongly disagreed (1%) that they were confident to under-
take work in the literacy domain. Figure 3 shows that a large proportion of SLTs agreed/strongly
agreed to feeling confident in providing intervention for phonological awareness (95%), vocabu-
lary (87%) and phonics (86%). However, 45% of SLTs disagreed/strongly disagreed to feeling
confident in providing intervention for written narrative skills for essay writing, while 29% disa-
greed/strongly disagreed to feeling confident providing intervention for written narrative skills in
story writing. In the area of spelling, almost one quarter of SLTs (23.8%) disagreed/strongly disa-
greed to feeling confident delivering intervention in this area.
5 Views about how colleagues perceive the role of the speech-language therapist
working in the literacy domain
Just over half (55%, 93/170) of participants agreed/strongly agreed that their non-SLT colleagues
appreciated their expertise as an SLT in the literacy domain. Nevertheless, 28% (48/170) of partici-
pants were neutral and 17% (29/170) disagreed or strongly disagreed. Participants were less posi-
tive about how well they believed their non-SLT colleagues understood their specific role. Just
over one-third agreed or strongly agreed (38%, 64/170) that they felt their colleagues understood
Serry et al. 9
the role of an SLT in the literacy domain. A similar proportion were neutral (30%, 51/170) while
the remaining third disagreed or strongly disagreed (32%, 55/170). A similar distribution was
revealed when participants responded to how easy they believed it was to collaborate with their
non-SLT colleagues. Figure 4 displays these data.
Both classroom and specialist teachers were perceived as being more likely to seek the input of
an SLT compared to school leaders and psychologists. Just over half of the participants agreed or
Table 2. Capability and confidence to work as a speech-language therapist (SLT) in the literacy domain
(percentages, with n in parentheses).
Item Strongly
agree/agree
Neither agree
nor disagree
Disagree/
strongly disagree
I left university with the expertise to work in the
literacy domain
10 (17) 9 (15) 82 (142)
I feel confident to work as an SLP in the literacy
domain
66 (115) 17 (29) 17 (30)
I gained my knowledge and skill in this area of practice
mainly through post-university training
83 (143) 10 (17) 8 (13)
I am confident to provide intervention for:
– Phonological awareness 95 (163) 3 (5) 2 (4)
– Phonics (letter–sound correspondences) 86 (148) 8 (13) 6 (11)
– Spelling 59 (103) 16 (28) 24 (41)
– Vocabulary 87 (149) 5 (9) 4 (6)
– Morphological awareness 70 (73) 15 (26) 16 (27)
– Written narrative skills in story writing 56 (97) 15 (25) 30 (50)
– Written narrative skills needed for essay writing 37 (66) 16 (28) 45 (77)
Note. n ranges from 171 to 174.
0% 20%40% 60%80% 100%
Written narrative skills (essay writing)
Written narrative skills (story writing)
Spelling
Morphological awareness
Phonics
Vocabulary
Phonological awareness
Strongly agree or agree Neutral Disagree or Strongly disagree
Figure 3. Speech-language therapists’ (SLTs’) self-rated confidence to undertake intervention in specific
areas within the literacy domain.
10 Child Language Teaching and Therapy 00(0)
strongly agreed (56%, 94/169) that classroom teachers would be likely to liaise with an SLT and
similarly, 54% (90/168) agreed or strongly agreed that specialist teachers would do the same.
Approximately one-quarter of the participants disagreed or strongly disagreed that both types of
teachers (teachers: 27%, 46/169; specialist teachers: 24%, 40/168) would seek their support. This
rose to just over 40% who disagreed or strongly disagreed in response to whether school leaders
(73/168) and psychologists (71/169) would do the same.
Chi square analyses were conducted to explore the associations between years of experience
working as an SLT in the literacy domain as well as number of schools SLTs worked in, and
perceptions about how colleagues perceive SLTs’ roles working in the area of literacy. There was
little evidence of an association between number of schools SLTs worked in and their beliefs
about how colleagues perceive their roles in the literacy domain. Chi square comparisons did
show an association between years of experience working in the literacy domain and the follow-
ing perceptions of how colleagues perceived their role: well recognized for my role, x2 = 28.01,
p < 0.001; appreciate my expertise in this area, x2 = 7.36, p = 0.007; collaborations with other
non-SLT colleagues about a child/adolescent is easy, x2 = 4.18, p < 0.04; specialist teachers
seek my input about students who have difficulty in the literacy domain, x2 = 5.01, p < 0.03;
psychologists seek my input about students who have difficulty in the literacy domain, x2 =
4.75, p < 0.03. There was no evidence of an association between years of experience and
respondents agreeing that teachers or school leaders seek input about students who have diffi-
culty in the literacy domain.
IV Discussion
In this study, we sought to explore SLTs’ views and practices of working with children and adoles-
cents who have literacy difficulties. Study findings show that SLTs clearly support their role work-
ing with children and adolescents who have literacy challenges. Importantly, the majority of SLTs
in the current study supported a role for SLTs to work at a preventative level with children at the
preschool level to facilitate their readiness to learn to read at school. They also believed that SLTs
should offer services to students beyond the early ‘learning to read and spell’ years of school. It is
0% 20%40% 60%80% 100%
Colleagues understand my role
Collaboration with other non-SLP colleagues
about a child/adolescent is easy
Colleagues appreciate my expertise in this area
Strongly agreeAgree Neither agree nor disagree Disagree Strongly disagree
Figure 4. Speech-language therapists’ (SLTs’) views about how colleagues perceive the role of the
speech-language pathologists working in the literacy domain.
Serry et al. 11
promising that almost three-quarters of SLTs responded that they felt that it is valuable to use an
RTI model when providing intervention and that almost 70% felt that this is feasible. In order for
RTI to be effective and the best use of SLT and teacher skills and resources, SLTs need to be direct-
ing their expertise toward Tiers 2 (targeted interventions in small groups) and 3 (intensive, highly
specialist interventions), rather than focusing on Tier 1 (universal instruction for all students)
(Snow, 2016).
While it is concerning that only 10% of respondents agreed that they left university with the
expertise to work in the literacy domain, it is reassuring that a large proportion (over 80%) of par-
ticipants felt that they gained knowledge and skill in this area of practice through post-university
training. This reflects previous findings from a number of countries including New Zealand,
Australia and the USA, which have highlighted that SLT students are not provided with adequate
knowledge and training during preservice, although they do appear to acquire these skills post-
university. Perhaps unsurprisingly, results from the current study suggest that SLTs feel more con-
fident providing interventions aimed at improving aspects of language situated primarily in the oral
modality such as phonological and phonemic awareness, morphology and phonics than they do
providing interventions for spelling and extended writing skills which are located within the writ-
ten language modality. Similarly, Fallon and Katz (2011) found in a US-based survey of 645 SLTs
that while SLTs reported feeling knowledgeable about phonological awareness, they felt least
knowledgeable about spelling and writing skills (narrative and expository). Interestingly, while
‘speaking’ and ‘listening’ have traditionally been viewed as falling within the work of SLTs and
‘reading’ and ‘writing’ have been viewed as the responsibility of the teacher, phonological aware-
ness has always tended to be part of the SLT’s role (Ukrainetz and Fresquez, 2003). This may
contribute to explaining why this is an aspect of the literacy domain that SLTs feel most confident
in and likely receive sufficient preservice training in.
In terms of collaboration and how SLTs consider their role in the literacy domain is perceived
by their non-SLT colleagues, only a little over half of participants felt that their non-SLT colleagues
appreciated or called for their expertise as an SLT in the literacy domain. In an Australian study,
Stark et al. (2015) measured the performance of teachers on a 56-item questionnaire examining
language and linguistic constructs (including phonological, morphological and sentence-level
information). These 78 teachers; all of whom were teaching beginner students, were also asked to
self-rate their knowledge on these language and linguistic constructs. Stark et al. (2015) et al
reported widely variable4 but on average, poor performance on the questionnaire among their par-
ticipants whose mean score was 55%. There were relatively comparable results across the ques-
tionnaire’s items. Findings from Stark et al. (2015) echo earlier studies of Australian teachers
(Fielding-Barnsley and Purdie, 2005; Mahar and Richdale, 2008) and international teachers’ (e.g.
Arrow et al., 2019; Bos et al., 2001; Cohen et al., 2017) incomplete knowledge about linguistic
constructs that are considered critical for teaching reading competently. Importantly, Stark et al.
(2015) identified no significant relationship between teachers’ perceived knowledge about lan-
guage and linguistic constructs and their actual performance on the questionnaire. The implication,
albeit from this one study, is that teachers may not know that they don’t know, and this phenome-
non is likely to be a contributing factor as to why teachers may not necessarily call on the expertise
of SLTs in relation to students with literacy challenges. This phenomenon – that teachers may not
know that they don’t know – is further compounded when considering the findings of a recent audit
of content taught to preservice teachers about literacy at Australian universities (Buckingham and
Meeks, 2019). They noted that the total tuition time remains limited5 and that many subject coor-
dinators of literacy units were not content experts. Taken together, not only do SLTs face barriers
for interdisciplinary practice in literacy because their educational colleagues may not appreciate
12 Child Language Teaching and Therapy 00(0)
their capacity, they may also be challenged by the fact that their colleagues may not actually per-
ceive a need to seek additional expertise.
On the upside, our findings suggest that with more years of experience, SLTs are more likely to
feel recognized for their role in the literacy domain and find collaborations easier to negotiate.
Furthermore, in the current climate where, according to our findings, SLTs tend to feel poorly pre-
pared by their university training to work in literacy, combined with the external challenges
described above to interdisciplinary practice, it appears essential that SLTs pursue the additional
professional development as well as professional mentoring to guarantee both adequate prepara-
tion and confidence to work in the literacy domain. There are also important questions that must be
addressed to ensure that future SLTs graduate with the requisite competencies to work in literacy
as well as the perception that literacy is as much within their scope of practice as more traditional
domains such as fluency and aphasia.
1 Limitations and future research
Only SLTs attending the two-day workshop were able to participate in the study. This may have
resulted in a skewed sample of SLTs with a greater interest, more knowledge and greater capacity
to work in the area of literacy. Further research utilizing qualitative research techniques would
assist to explore in depth SLT beliefs and practices in the literacy domain and could be used to
identify barriers and facilitators to this, in their own profession as well as in working collabora-
tively with non-SLT colleagues in schools. The gap found in the current study between the activi-
ties that SLTs value and the feasibility of carrying out those activities is an important finding which
warrants further investigation. The next step would be to explore why SLTs feel this gap exists, so
identifying the barriers to carrying out those activities that they feel are valuable.
2 Implications
Current research supports the interrelationships across language and literacy with SLTs making a
significant contribution to the literacy achievement of children and adolescents with communica-
tions disorders, as well as others who are at risk of school failure or who struggle in the school
environment (‘Roles and responsibilities of speech-language pathologists in schools, [professional
issues statement]’; ASHA, 2010). However, there is an urgent need to ensure that all entry-level
SLTs are graduating with the requisite knowledge and confidence to practice in the literacy domain
as they would in other areas of practice, such as working in dysphagia or fluency management.
This would serve to bridge the disconnect that we identified regarding Australian SLTs’ lack of
confidence to work in the literacy domain upon graduation, which stands in contrast to their strong
support for SLTs to have a prominent role working with children and adolescents who have literacy
difficulties. In addition, having clearly articulated, mandated entry-level competencies to practice
in literacy for all graduating SLTs would position the profession to outwardly present a more con-
sistent stance about their scope of practice is in this area.
More specifically, the breadth of any proposed entry-level competencies requires careful con-
sideration in light of our participants who reported substantially less confidence working to support
children and adolescents’ spelling and extended writing skills compared to areas more traditionally
aligned with speech-language pathology practice; namely, phonological and morphological aware-
ness along with vocabulary and semantics. Few would doubt SLTs have the theoretical linguistic
knowledge necessary for them to support students’ spelling and extended written language. It is
possible that there is a perceived risk of boundary-violation between SLTs and educators that
Serry et al. 13
results in SLTs working less in these areas and feeling less confident about working in these areas.
It is also conceivable that SLTs actively choose to engage less with spelling and extended written
language intervention as a means of managing a busy caseload. Further research is necessary to
determine the underlying reasons for this divide in confidence to practice in certain sub-compo-
nents of literacy.
Finally, when considering the needs of children and adolescents who are struggling to become
competent in literacy, ideal outcomes are far more likely when there are effective and productive
collaborations between all stakeholders; teachers, SLTs, educational leaders. Such partnerships are
founded on trust and a clear knowledge about what each member of the team can contribute. As the
relative newcomers to the literacy support team, it is vital that SLTs feel empowered to present a
consistent and united message about how they can contribute expertise while also engaging in col-
laborative practice with the more established members of the literacy support team.
Acknowledgements
We gratefully acknowledge Speech Pathology Australia for facilitating the professional development work-
shops that created an opportunity for this research. I would especially like to recognize Sharon Crane and Anita
Roddicks for their support and their tireless work. We also thank Speech Pathology Australia for their support
for this research project and in particular, for advertising this study to people who registered to attend the work-
shop. We would like to thank each and every person who took the time to respond to this survey.
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or
publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
ORCID iD
Tanya Serry https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1538-7327
Supplemental material
Supplemental material for this article is available online.
Notes
1. In Australia, primary school refers to the first seven years of formal schooling. Although there is some
variability across Australia, children are typically five years old at school entry.
2. In Australia, preschool refers to the year prior to school entry. Formal reading instruction is not part of
the preschool curriculum. Children are typically four years old when attending preschool.
3. In Australia, secondary school refers to the final six of education. Students are typically aged between 12
to 18 years of age.
4. Scores ranged from 14/56 to 45/56 items correct.
5. This is despite recommendations made in 2005 resulting from a Australian National Inquiry into Teaching
Literacy (Rowe, K., and National Inquiry into the Teaching of Literacy, 2005)
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