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Talking Mats Conversation Sets

A conversation is an informal interaction, between two or more people, in which news and ideas are exchanged. Having a conversation can be an enjoyable activity for people and is an important part of socialisation but is often hard for people with communication difficulties to take part and hard for families, friends and staff to support these informal conversations as well as finding topics to talk about. We have developed a range of Talking Mats symbol sets called Conversation Topics which can be used by people of all ages and abilities to take part in conversations and have a chat.

These are now available to anyone who has completed a Talking Mats training course.

Each Conversation Set is made up of 3 topics with specially designed symbols. Click on the image to enlarge.

Conversation sets

Examples of how this resource has been used during our pilot phase:

Gardens: A resident in a Care Home chatted about what she liked and didn’t like about the Care Home gardens and made some suggestions for changes.

Trips Out: A group of people at a Day Centre planned where they wanted to go for their weekly outings.

Holidays: A young man with a learning disability talked to his social worker about where he had gone on holiday and what he had enjoyed.

Indoor Sports: A woman with a stroke chatted with her friend about the sports she wanted to try at the local Sports Centre.

Outdoor Sports: A man with dementia talked about the sports he used to do when he was younger.

Football: A group of people with learning disability chatted about what they liked and did not like about a football game they watched on TV. This set provoked lots of lively discussion.

Keep a lookout for further sets in the future.

If you have completed a Talking Mats training course and would like to order these sets please contact info@talkingmats.com or phone 01786 479511

Other resources to expand your use of Talking Mats can be found on our website – www.talkingmats.com.

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