We’re excited to invite you to take part in piloting the new Talking Mats Spirituality Resource.

This new resource has been developed by The Centre for Autism and Theology at Aberdeen University in partnership with Talking Mats. It grew out of:

• The research of Leon Van Ommen, who has used Talking Mats in his academic work.
• A workshop in Aberdeen (April 2025) attended by representatives from Muslim, Sikh, Buddhist, Pagan, and Christian communities.
• Ongoing contributions—including from a representative of the Jewish faith—through emails, online meetings, and collaboration with the Talking Mats artist.

Our aim has been to create a resource that opens conversations about spirituality in a way that is broad, accessible, and inclusive.

What’s in the Spirituality Resource?

The resource covers four key topics:

Your faith community

Focus: people, relationships, activities, and important life events.

Your place of worship – accessibility and sensory

Focus: sensory experiences, accessibility, and safety.

Spiritual practice

Focus: creativity, contemplation & stillness, and action. This topic can be used with people with no faith community

Beliefs

Focus: exploring specific religious beliefs in a short, focused way.

If you are Talking Mats foundation trained, then please consider volunteering.. We are looking for twenty volunteers. If you are interested please email paula@talkingmats.com giving her details of

• your foundation training,
• why testing this resource would be useful to you
• the faith background of those you will test it with – that includes those with no religious beliefs for Mat 3

We will send you the pilot resource as a PDF ( you will need to cut it up!) in return we will ask you

✅ To use the resource with at least one person (more is even better).
✅ For each person, fill in the feedback form we’ll send you the link .
✅ Share what worked, what didn’t, and your suggestions for improvement.

Deadline

Please return all comments and feedback by 10th October 2025.

Thank you to Meredith Smith for this follow up to her 2024 blog.  In it she described the development of a Talking Mats Resource that allowed young people with Cerebral Palsy to monitor and report on their pain.  In this blog Meredith shares what was learnt and the next steps for making the tools freely available.

Why we did this work?

Chronic pain management services are underutilised by children and young people with Cerebral Palsy (CP).  Traditional pain assessment tools are filled out with pen and paper, but this can be difficult for many children with CP, especially if they have communication difficulties. Often an adult fills out the form for them, which means we don’t get a true sense of the young person’s perspective.

We worked with Talking Mats to create two different ways to use two pain assessments; the modified Brief Pain Inventory (mBPI) and the Fear of Pain Questionnaire (FOPQ).  One approach still used pen and paper and the other used Talking Mats .

Figure 1: Fear of Pain Questionnaire – adapted for CP, pen and paper version

Figure 2: FOPQ; Talking Mats version

How we made sure the tools were valid.

We wanted to make sure these tools measured what they were supposed to measure, and that they made sense to the people using them. This is known as ‘content validity’ ⁽¹⁾, and is considered the most important property of any assessment tool. We used a three step process to achieve this, and published three peer-reviewed papers with the findings:

1. We asked people with CP, their families, and clinicians how the tools could be improved, and gathered their feedback suggestions.⁽²⁾
2. We ran an online survey to see which suggestions from step 1 people agreed should be used to improve the tools.⁽³⁾
3. We tested the new tools in one-on-one interviews with children and young people with CP, including those with a range of communication and thinking abilities, to see whether they understood the tools and if the tools were practical to use in real-life settings.⁽⁴⁾

The third step, when we worked directly with kids and young people to test the assessment tools, was the most fun! We found that most children and young people with CP were able to tell us about their pain using the adapted tools. This included those who used AAC (augmentative and alternative communication) and those with mild to moderate cognitive impairment.

The Talking Mats version was generally preferred by younger children (under 8 years), kids with cognitive difficulties, and AAC users. The symbols were easily understood by almost everyone. For most children and young people, it took about 4 minutes to complete the FOPQ and 6 minutes for the mBPI. For people using AAC, it sometimes took longer, up to 20 minutes,as they needed extra time to process questions and answer using their devices.

What we’ve done since

We then ran a larger study across three locations in Australia, using the CP-adapted tools with 128 children and young people as part of their usual care. We wanted to make sure the changes we made didn’t affect how the tools worked statistically (like how well the questions fit together), and to find out how many children and young people with CP could self-report on the impact of pain using the adapted tools.

This paper is currently under review with a journal, but the early results are really encouraging: up to 80% of children and young people with CP were able to give reliable answers about their pain using the adapted tools.

This is a big step forward.  It means more children with CP can tell use directly how pain is affecting them, so we can better support and improve their access to pain management.

Want a copy?

We’re looking forward to making the tools freely available once our final paper is published. In the meantime, if you’re interested in getting a copy, please email Meredith.smith@adelaide.edu.au – we are very happy to share!

Use this link to access the questionnaires.

Please note: Talking Mats Foundation Training is required if you’d like to use the Talking Mats versions.

References:

1. Terwee CB, Prinsen CAC, Chiarotto A, Westerman MJ, Patrick DL, Alonso J, et al. COSMIN methodology for evaluating the content validity of patient-reported outcome measures: a Delphi study. Quality of Life Research. 2018;27(5):1159-70. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11136-018-1829-0
2. Smith MG, Gibson RJ, Russo RN, Karanicolas S, Harvey AR. Examining tools for assessing the impact of chronic pain on emotional functioning in children and young people with cerebral palsy: stakeholder preference and recommendations for modification. Quality of life research : an international journal of quality of life aspects of treatment, care and rehabilitation. 2024;33(8):2247-59. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11136-024-03693-1
3. Smith MG, Gibson RJ, Russo RN, Harvey AR. Adapting two pain assessment tools for young people with cerebral palsy: a multi-stakeholder consensus study. Pain Rep. 2025:accepted for publication – in press
4. Smith MG, Gibson RJ, Schibani M, Russo RN, Thirumanickam A, Harvey AR. The comprehensibility and feasibility of the modified brief pain inventory and fear of pain questionnaire adapted for children and young people with cerebral palsy. Quality of Life Research. 2025. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11136-025-03981-4

If you would like more information on becoming Talking Mats trained

Thank you to Lisa Jackson, Specialist Speech and Language Therapist with Stockport NHS FT for this blog.

How inclusive is your approach to therapy goals or decisions around communication support for clients? Lisa describes a situation that most therapists, support workers will have encountered over the years and offers a way to listen to the most important people in the therapy process.

I have been a speech and language therapist for 14 years working for the NHS. My caseload consists of primary and secondary aged children who have a range of communication needs. I specialise in the area of Alternative and Augmentative Communication (AAC) and, as a Talking Mats Licensed trainer, I am passionate about capturing the voice of the children, young people and their families.   

Like many professionals, I strive to work in co-production with the service user and the team around them to provide holistic intervention. There are many barriers which can affect a professional delivering a truly person-centred approach and often decisions regarding interventions are completed without consulting the client and their family. 

Talking Mats is a powerful tool to capture the thoughts and opinions of the children and young people. It enables service users to engage in conversations and most importantly, empowers them to influence change and the interventions they receive.  

Case Study: Matthew : age 17 years.  An AAC user and keen gamer. 

• Matthew has a syndrome that affects his cognition, motor skills, social skills, and speech and language.   

• He communicates using a variety of methods including speech and gesture.  

• He recently received an iPad with a text based communication app to augment his spoken communication. 

In Primary School Matthew was given a paper based communication book but it was noted that he did not often use this.  

In Secondary Matthew was assessed for and given an electronic communication device.  He kept this when he transitioned to College. 

At College, staff noted he didn’t take his device out of his bag.  This contrasted with home where Mum said he used it to aid his communication. At this time Matthew was becoming less engaged in Speech and Language Therapy and his awareness of his communication difficulty was increasing. 

On reflection it became clear that Matthew had never been actively involved in the decision-making process around his communication.  Therapy had always “been done to him” and targets had been set “for him” which had led to AAC abandonment in the past. 

A Talking Mat was used to explore his thoughts and feelings about his communication.  

We explored Matthew’s views regarding his device and his spoken communication. Matthew engaged with Talking Mats and was able to contribute his thoughts, feelings and opinions in detail. Alongside the Talking Mat, he used spoken communication and typed sentences on his communication device to expand on his points. 

The key points Matthew shared were: 

Communication device

He likes his communicaiton device, but he doesn’t know how to initiate a conversation / what to say

He finds using his device difficult with new people in the community and when starting a conversation

He finds using his device easy when having a laugh and everyday chat

Speech

Speech is difficult in the community

Speech is difficult when trying to maintain a conversation

Speech is easy at home, when having a laugh, and for general chat.

This demonstrates the importance of gaining the voice of the service user as his reluctance to use his device had been misinterpreted as him not wanting to use it. After exploring his views, this was found not to be the case. 

Matthew was then asked what he wanted to happen from the information given and he independently set his own outcomes for therapy: 

• To widen his friendship circle.  

• To learn to start conversations. 

• To have support with access to gaming.  

• To meet other people who use AAC.  

Following the conversation, the desired outcomes and how they were going to be achieved were discussed with Matthew and the team. THe focus of therapy changed to work on his social skills. The outcomes have been added to his Education Health Care Plan (EHCP). He was signposted to gaming charities and social events for people who use AAC.  

Conclusion  

Without using Talking Mats, the outcome for Matthew could’ve been very different, with his thoughts not being acknowledged or explored appropriately.  Talking Mats has given Matthew a voice to communicate his wishes. Talking Mats empowered Matthew to generate his own outcomes, to influence and drive the focus of his intervention.  

Our Advanced Online module is available to anyone who has completed Foundation Training.

If you are interested in becoming Talking Mats Foundation trained:

Using Talking Mats within a creative participatory research framework with parents and Speech and Language Therapists (SLTs) to explore collaborative practice in Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC). 

The mission statement of Talking Mats is to improve the lives of people with communication difficulties by increasing their capacity to think about, and communicate effectively about, things that matter to them. A few of us in the Talking Mats Research Network are interested in exploring whether the use of Talking Mats can enhance the capacity of different participant groups to articulate their thoughts on a topic of interest to those with communication difficulties. In the research discussed here, the participants were caregivers and professionals rather than individuals with disclosed communication difficulties. 

Workshops  

Talking Mats were used throughout a set of workshops conducted using Participatory Action Research (PAR) methods. PAR is a co-learning research process between communities and researchers which involves problem identification, action and reflection, leading to further inquiry and action for change (Chambers 1994; Kindon et al. 2007; Chevalier and Buckles 2013). The workshops were carried out as part of my PhD project, which aims to develop resources to improve collaboration between SLTs and caregivers of children who may benefit from AAC. Ten workshops took place across England; six with SLTs facilitated by me and two art student research assistants, and four parent workshops facilitated in a co-research partnership between myself and Joanna Holmes, a parent of an AAC user. These workshops involved a total of 20 SLTs and 25 parents.  

Creative methods 

We used a variety of creative methods such as clay modelling and drawing in this research. Art can be used as a tool for encouraging engagement in a research topic, promoting freedom of expression, reducing language barriers within multicultural communities and supporting those with literacy challenges. Art can also stimulate new thought about a topic of interest and help to articulate ideas in a fresh way. The use of Talking Mats as a visual framework to enhance thinking and communication integrated well with these creative methods.  

The Talking Mat 

A large group Talking Mat was used to visualise and discuss the ideas shared by our groups of participants. Traditional Talking Mats elements included the identification of the topic for discussion (collaborative relationships) and the use of a Top Scale, in this case, what improves the collaborative relationship (working well), what makes things worse (not working well) or is neutral. We used a set of shared pictures that were selected from printed and online resources ahead of the main set of workshops by a group of SLTs and parents. All participants were encouraged to engage with the set of shared pictures as per the photo response research method. Unlike a traditional Talking Mat, these pictures were not labelled to represent concepts or activities, instead participants could provide their own labels to indicate what each image meant to them. In addition to the shared pictures, participants produced their own drawings, clay models and post-it notes to represent their own ideas about collaboration. These were also added to the Talking Mat. This echoes the traditional part of the Talking Mat process where the Thinker is asked whether they have ‘anything else’ to add. At the end of the workshops, the pictures, drawings and models were placed onto the large group Talking Mat. Discussions about the meaning and the placement of the created items took place between participants and researchers. Objects and pictures could be moved within the Mat in response to discussion. Photographs of each Mat and audio recordings of the workshops were taken as a record for analysis.   

Within the Talking Mats Research Network, some discussion has taken place about how to analyse the data developed from these non-typical uses of Talking Mats, such as the group method presented here. Our group Talking Mats were analysed qualitatively to identify themes relating to collaboration as presented by the participants.  

Sarah Hayward

Acknowledgments: Joanna Holmes

This research was carried out as part of Sarah Hayward’s PhD supported by a studentship from The University College London, Bloomsbury and East London Doctoral Training Partnership (Ubel-dtp), an ESRC funded organisation ES/P000592/1.  

Sarah’s PhD is supervised by Professor Steven Bloch, Dr Daniel Hayes & Dr Michael Clarke.   

The role of Talking Mats in supporting people to make decisions in a capacity context. 

Context  

At the heart of the different capacity legislation that covers England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland is a requirement to ensure that all practicable steps are taken to support the communication of an individual. Talking Mats is well suited to do this as, it supports people to understand, process and weigh up information and then helps them express their views. 

Talking Mats has a research base that provides evidence that using this visual framework improves the quality and quantity of information people can give. This has been shown for people with learning disability, dementia and aphasia.  

Capacity; enabling supported decision-making. 

The Resource. 

This resource has been developed with several teams working in different parts of UK. Capacity is decision specific and must be tailored to fit the requirements of the decision. In developing this resource we have focused on the most common decisions people face; what you do in your free time, where you live, your safety, and your support plan. This resource will not cover all capacity decisions but will be a helpful starting point to support you and your clients.  

Why use Talking Mats to support decision making ? 

• Decisions are broken down into manageable chunks that reduce cognitive load
• The use of visuals reduces the pressure on spoken language and assists the expression of views.
• It allows people time to reflect on their decisions and change their min
• It demonstrates areas that require more information and knowledge to help make a decision

The Advanced Online Course 

This course has been jointly developed by practitioners from social work, occupational therapy and speech and language therapy. Course attendees will;

• Think about and extend their practice within the provisions of the Capacity Act relevant to them
• Think about how decisions are made and what affects the way they are made
• Learn how to extend the resource to cover specific decisions that are not covered
• Explore and reflect on their own use of Talking Mats in this context
• Share their experience and learn from others

Learning will be through short talks, interactive activities, case examples and small group discussion. There will be a mid- session screen break. 

To join this Advanced Online Course you need to; 

• Have completed the Talking Mats Foundation Training
• Attend with a system that allows you to join in the Teams chat during the session and go into small breakout rooms
• Book onto our Advanced Course via the website shop before the 7th of April

The cost is £95 and this covers the resource and the online session. Places are limited to make sure to book on soon. Resources will be posted out the week before training. Bookings close on the 7^th of April. 

Not yet Foundation Trained?

Our final resource in our January Sale, the Social Care Resource, in its original form was one of our first.  It will be reduced by 30% for the whole of January 2025!

“ it’s an amazing thing; that something so simple could be so useful to people”

James, Talking Mats user

This resource can help build an understanding of who someone is and what is important to them.

It has 3 topics:

You – how is your general health, emotional well being, appetite going at the moment?                        

Activities – what interests do you have?

Where you live – what works well in your home / where you live and what doesn’t?

Margo MacKay, now our Managing Director, tells a story of her early days using the Social Care Resource in a care home for people with dementia:

When I went back to the Care Home where I was piloting our new Social Care symbols the staff told me this story about  Ann.  Apparently she usually is very quiet and never joins in with activities or with other residents. However when we used Talking Mats with the Activities symbols, she told me that she really likes singing and had started singing to me. Later that day, one of the care staff had suggested that she sing again and Ann started a song with him. Gradually other residents joined in and they had a lovely sing-song with Ann leading it!

Joan Murphy, Founder of Talking Mats, recently published a report; Reducing the Burden of Dementia by Using the Talking Mats Framework to Help People with Dementia and their Carers Communicate More Effectively. ¹   One study described in the report looked at the use of Talking Mats to support people with dementia and their carers to make decisions together.  Here are some quotes from people with dementia in the study:

I found it (Talking Mats) a big help, sometimes I get the words muddled and can’t get out what I am trying to say.

The mat shows that I am able to do much more than I thought.  I didn’t realise how much she is doing in the house.

Read the full report here.

The Social Care resource is available to anyone already trained in Talking Mats and between the 1st and 31st of January it will be reduced by 30%.

If becoming trained in Talking Mats is something you’d like to achieve in 2025 find out more here.

References

1. Reducing the Burden of Dementia by Using the Talking Mats Framework to Help People with Dementia and their Carers Communicate More Effectively.European Society of Medicine Medical Research Archives, [S.l.]. Vol 12 No 9.

Available at: https://esmed.org/MRA/mra/article/view/5716

Talking Mats don’t do Pink Friday, Black Friday or Cyber Monday but we can tell you about our January Sale.

Starting on the 1^st of January 2025 and running until the 31^st of January 2025 we are offering; 

• 30% discount on our Health and Well Being Bundle 

• 30% discount on our Social Care Resource * 

• 50% discount on our Eating and Drinking Resource * 

*available if Foundation Trained 

These are popular resources and over the next couple of weeks I will signpost you to some of our top blogs that showcase how they can be used.  

This week:  

Health and Well Being Resource Bundle  

This comprehensive resource can support conversations around general health, a person’s environment, ability to look after themselves and their communication across different areas. Find out more about it’s development and use. 

• What’s in the Health and Well Being Resource? 

Read about the development and background to the resource and its use with Duncan who had had a stroke. 

• How can you help someone express how they feel about their communication using the Health and Well Being resource?  

Kate was a woman with severe communication difficulties following a stroke.  This blog describes how using the 4 communication topics Kate and her therapist were able to identify specific challenges that could be worked on to help her overcome her difficulties. 

The Health and Well Being Resource complete with bag and mat will be reduced by 30% from the 1^st of January and will be available to buy in the website shop from that date. 

‘Communication requires more than just an exchange of words. When done correctly, it builds bonds and improves trust. The training has allowed me to not make assumptions about what somebody is thinking. I feel I am now more able to listen to what someone is telling me and summarise and feedback this information accurately.’ 

(Particpant Manchester training) 

‘I was a very skeptical convert to Talking Mats now Talking Mats is our team’s second language’ 

(Team leader Perth and Kinross Council) 

These are just 2 quotes from participants who have completed our Foundation Training, but the page could have been filled with testimonials. We get such enthusiastic feedback that it would be wrong not to share it!  We are very pleased to confirm that 

• we have 2 new venues for our Face to Face Foundation Training for 2025,  

• and we have increased the number of delegates we can support on our Online Foundation Training,  

This will allow us to welcome more participants into the Talking Mats community.

Foundation Training 

Face to Face: 

We have 2 new venues for our ever-popular face to face training; 

Glasgow – Robertson House, Bath Street.  February 25^th  

London – Royal College of Speech and Language Therapy Headquarters, April 8^th  

This is in addition to our course in Manchester at the St Thomas Centre, February 6^th. 

Courses run from 9.30am to 4.30pm and with lunch and refreshments provided.

Jess Lane will deliver the training in Glasgow and London. 

Laura Holmes will deliver the training in Manchester.

To find out more about what is involved in the one day course and the venues . 

Online: 

We have increased the number of participants able to take part in our online Foundation Training and as always support is provided by a Talking Mats Tutor to guide you through the modules to gain your certificate.  These courses have a start date every month: 

• January 6^th 

• February 4^th 

• March 4^th  

• April 1^st  

There are various options to choose from when booking training, from training only to training with resource pack.  Our website shop shows all the options in one place.   

Finally, let’s have one more quote about the impact of Talking Mats from a young person who worked with his clinician to help him in school; 

“when I see my mat I understand myself more” 

This week’s guest blog, the first of 2 from the authors (Lois Cameron, Nikky Steiner and Luccia Tullio), describes the development process of a set of symbols aimed at supporting practitioners to reflect on the role of identity within their practice. 

Every person has their own unique identity, just like they have their own unique fingerprint.

Identity is about how we see ourselves and how the world sees us.

Background

The Royal College of Speech and Language conference 2021 was titled ‘breaking barriers and building better.’  Professor Harsha Kathard from the University of Cape Town gave the keynote presentation and reflected on the key role understanding identity has in clinical practise, stating that ‘understanding identity is key to inclusion’.  Secondly, she stressed that if we want to develop  better services  and support then ‘Turning the gaze to reflect on our positionality is central to change’ .Ash R et al (2023) in their editorial for the British Medical Journal  highlight how interventions normally focus on single categories of social identity and ‘fail to account for the combinations of, or intersections between, the multiple social characteristic that define an individual’s place in society.’ They argue that ‘systems of care may consequently overlook overlapping systems of discrimination and disadvantage and exacerbate and conceal health inequities.’

The Development group

Following feedback from clinicians and people who use Alternative and Augmentative Communication (AAC) a working group was formed in March 2021 to explore the role of identity, diversity, equality and inclusion with in AAC practice. 

Communication Matters and AAC networks within the UK advertised the group and 12 people responded.  These people came from a range of organisations and had a range of lived experiences of diversity including people who use a communication aid to help them communicate. The work was funded by the Central London Community Health Trust and Talking Mats Ltd facilitated the meetings and the work

The group worked shaped the resource by reaching a consensus about the components of life that contributed to identity. In the end the group agreed on gender, sexuality, disability, race, neurodiversity, culture, family structure, voice, bilingualism, religion, mental health, personality, politics, intimacy, connecting with others and occupation. The process of developing the symbols was hugely helpful in unpicking what was actually meant by the various aspects e.g. voice. The original image for voice represented accents but the group discussion shaped the image to represent much more so the final image included a rainbow flag, a more general sound wave to represent tone, a Spanish word and an image to represent disability. As one group member said ‘my cerebral palsy is part of my identity. If I am having a voice I want to reflect that identity – I want a cerebral palsy voice’. Identity and the issues surrounding it can be emotive but the focus on the symbols helped contain the emotion and supported group members to listen to the perspective of others.

The whole iterative process of developing the resource and clarifying what the symbols should look like allowed the group to be clear about the individual meanings of abstract topics. This wider understanding was captured in a glossary to go alongside the symbols. For example, Identity has the following definition: Every person has their own unique identity, just like they have their own unique fingerprint. Lots of different characteristics make up our identity. This is what makes us different from other people. Sometimes we may share some of these characteristics with other groups of people, which can also be part of our identity.  Identity is about how we see ourselves and how the world sees us.

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: a visual framework to support the exploration of Identity within practice.

The resource is seen as a support for constructive reflection by practitioners on identity and allows them to consider the different aspects of their patients’ lives that may impact on their interventions. The final Talking Mats symbols have the suggested top scale of ‘I considered a lot’, ‘I considered a bit’, ‘I have not considered yet ‘. It could be used individually or by a team as a group discussion tool. 

The glossary is included to allow practitioners to reflect on the wider meaning of the symbols and what the options capture.

As the resource uses the Talking Mats framework, it is recommended that practitioners have completed their Talking Mats foundation level training

If you are interested in completing Talking Mats Foundation Training, you can see the training options in our shop here.

References

Kashard H 2021 Keynote breaking barriers and building better The Royal College of Speech and Language conference.

Ash Routen, 1 Helen-Maria Lekas, 2 Julian Harrison, 3 Kamlesh Khunti1,2023 Interesectionality in health equity research BMJ 2003 https://www.bmj.com/content/383/bmj.p2953

Our thanks for this blog go to Olivia Ince, Talking Mats Licenced Trainer and Speech & Language Therapist. This blog post reflects on the use of a Talking Mat with a Thinker called M who speaks English as an additional language. The Listener in this Talking Mat is Jono Thorne who is a colleague of Olivia. Jono did this Talking Mat for his video as part of a Foundation Training course run by Olivia.

M is a young adult who came to the UK as an unaccompanied asylum-seeking child. M is from a country in Central Africa and speaks a language which is not widely spoken outside of the region. Accessing interpreting and translation services in the UK for their native language is very difficult and M has therefore had difficulties learning English. This means the people around M often have difficulties finding out M’s views, which is why Jono thought a Talking Mat could be an invaluable communication tool for M.

M already uses some visual support, for example hand gestures and using objects such as food items when having a conversation in the kitchen. The people around M are unsure what M’s level of comprehension is in English and therefore they make adaptions such as simplifying their language. M’s expressive language in English is typically the use of one- or two-word utterances and yes/no responses. 

To see if M would be able to engage with the Talking Mat process, Jono chose a simple topic to start with and one which he knew would interest M: food. The Top Scale used was like/unsure/ don’t like. Jono noted that M quickly understood the concept of the Talking Mat and the visual element seemed to support M’s understanding. The Talking Mat process including the side-by-side listening also facilitated rapport building.

Jono noticed that M was decisive and seemed certain about their placement of the option cards. The Talking Mat helped M to share their views on a larger number of items than would likely have been possible via a verbal conversation. M also joined in with the recap of their Talking Mat as part of the review and reflect by reading out the Option cards with Jono, which meant M was even more involved with the process.

There were a couple of difficulties for M during the Talking Mat process: the blanks and the option to change where the Option cards were placed. Jono tried to explain these steps using simple language but M did not appear to understand these concepts due to their level of comprehension of English. As M had seemed sure of their initial placement of the Option cards and they joined in with the recap, Jono felt that the Talking Mat was an accurate reflection of M’s views that day. Continuing to model these steps to M will likely help them to develop their understanding of these parts of the Talking Mats process over time.

Jono reflected on how useful it was to now know which foods M likes and doesn’t like. He also reflected on the potential future use of Talking Mats with M on more complex topics and to facilitate participation in decision-making now that it’s clear M understands how a Talking Mat works.

If you are interested in completing Talking Mat Foundation Training, you can read more about it here.