130 career pathways spotlight: Norlander Naomi discusses her varied career
6 December 2022
For our 130th anniversary, we’re celebrating the variety and diversity of careers that Norlanders go on to enjoy after graduating from Norland.
Naomi (Set 10) discusses one of the many roles she had and why the skills she learned at Norland are so highly sought after.
“My name is Naomi and I trained at Denford Park between 1992 and 1993 as part of Set 10. Mrs Davis (then Principal) told me at my interview that I’d never be without a job after training at Norland and she was quite right. Norlanders are sought after in all kinds of roles within children’s services. Over the past 30 years I’ve enjoyed many different careers, all working with children.
One particular job I thoroughly enjoyed for seven years was as a Speech and Language Therapy Assistant. Working across two specialist school educational settings, I supported the Speech and Language Therapist working with guidance from the therapist.
Working as a Speech and Language Therapy Assistant
In this role, I facilitated small group, whole class and one-to-one sessions supporting children’s language development. Activities focused on developing the children’s phonology, social communication, language/narrative/literacy groups, pre-verbal language skills, sensory curriculum, supporting children to learn how to use Alternative Augmentative Communication (AAC) devices (such as gestures and sign language) and emotional awareness development among many other activities.
It was wonderful to help the children develop and learn how to improve their communication. The skills they learned helped them develop friendships, engage in learning, and increase their wellbeing. Skills that will support them throughout their lives.
Training at Norland has helped me to develop my professionalism, to put the children first and to build positive relationships with other members of the team. Within each school, my knowledge of child development has helped me to promote next steps in learning and contribute to reviews. Norland’s training helped me to think outside of the box and provided a vast array of activities at my fingertips, meaning I could easily adapt sessions to encourage children who struggled.
I’d highly recommend working as a Speech and Language Therapy Assistant to anyone who is considering a different path, other than nannying. The skills, knowledge and experience you get from training at Norland are widely sought-after and adaptable to so many different roles.”
