Dr Sarah Spencer, PhD, BMedSci, MRCSLT, Reg HPC

Department of Human Communication Sciences
The University of Sheffield
31 Claremont Crescent
Sheffield
S10 2TA
UK



Tel: +44 (0) 114 22 22411
Fax: +44 (0) 114 273 0547

email : sarah.spencer@sheffield.ac.uk

Biography

In September 2011, I joined Human Communication Sciences as a lecturer of developmental speech, language and communication difficulties. My PhD was awarded in 2010, titled `Language and socioeconomic inequality in adolescence: abilities and attitudes´. For my thesis, I worked with a group of 150 adolescents, collecting data on their own views of their language skills in addition to using standardized assessments to explore associations between language levels and educational outcomes.

I am a speech and language therapist, with a clinical specialism in persisting and complex speech and language difficulties, particularly in older children and adolescents. I also have a clinical interest in the multiple associations between language and behaviour and social outcomes. I have worked in a range of settings in the NHS and for ICAN as a professional adviser. I was involved in ICAN´s Secondary Talk programme and worked with a variety of secondary schools to increase and develop whole-school approaches to language and communication. I was also part of The Communication Trust´s training for the youth justice sector, working in partnership with Dyslexia Action, ICAN and youth offending teams across England.

Research Interests:

• Interventions and evidence-based practice for developmental speech, language and communication difficulties
• Including service-users in developing, designing and evaluating interventions
• Speech and language difficulties of older children and adolescents
• Working in contexts of social disadvantage
• Facilitation of effective collaborations with education and families
• Sociolinguistics and speech and language therapy
• Service-level evaluation
  
• Qualitative and mixed research methods

Professional Activities:

• Member of Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists
• Member of Health Professions Council
• Manuscript reviewer for Child Language Teaching and Therapy and International Journal of Language Disorder

Collaborators:

• Dr Judy Clegg and Professor Joy Stackhouse, University of Sheffield
  
• Professor James Law, Newcastle University
• Professor Julie Dockrell and Dr Ioanna Bakopoulou, Institute of Education

Current Research:

Following the completion of my PhD, my participants completed their GCSE exams aged 16 years. I am examining data on the associations between these GCSE outcomes, their language profiles from when they were 14 years old, and measures of socioeconomic status.

My current research is on `Communication Supporting Environments: developing a tool for use in Key Stage 1 (Part of the Better Communication Research Programme)´. This is in partnership with the University of Warwick, the Institute of Education, and Newcastle University. The research team is developing an evidence-based tool for teachers to use to support communication development in reception, year 1 and year 2 classrooms

Publications:

• Spencer, S., Clegg, J., & Stackhouse, J. (in press). Language and social disadvantage: a comparison of the language abilities of adolescents from two different socio-economic areas. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders.
• Spencer, S., Clegg, J., & Stackhouse, J. (2010). ‘I don’t come out with bog words like other people’ Interviewing adolescents as part of a language assessment. Child Language Teaching and Therapy, 26, 2, 144-163.