Topics when talking to people

Speech and language therapy

﻿Hello, everybody, my name's Emma and welcome to today's lesson. I'm looking forward to today's session and I hope you are too. I can't wait to get started. But before we do, just a quick reminder. We here at Oak are here to support any approaches you might already be using and any work you might have already been set. We know this lesson is going out to so many different children and families, so if you're not sure or have any questions, please do contact your child's school or use your speech and language therapy team. In today's session we'll be focusing on understanding what a topic is. And we'll be thinking about ways that we can stay on topic when we're talking to people in conversations. We're going to have lots of opportunities to give it a go and then through these activities, I'll be sharing some hints and tips on how you can continue to work on your conversation skills when you're at home and out and about in the community. So for today's session, you'll need some scissors, some colouring pencils, some writing equipment and a downloadable resource that's available on the Oak website with this lesson. So before we begin, please make sure that you're in a quiet place where you won't be disturbed for the lesson. Turn off any distractions or notifications that you might have running on your device and then make sure that both you and your talking partner are seated comfortably. When you're ready let's begin. Okay, let's start by doing some talking and thinking about topics. When people talk to each other, it's called a conversation. A topic is what we talk about in our conversation. When starting a conversation, one person may say something about a topic of their choosing. The other person, the listener, is expected to stay on that topic by either asking a question or making a comment about that same topic. In order to be good talking partners and good conversation partners, we need to think carefully about how we listen to topics. Good listeners listen to topics and remember what the person has said or is talking about. This helps them to stay on topic. They take turns to talk and listen and it's important that we let other people have their say and try not to interrupt when others are talking. For our first activity, I'd like you to pause and have a bit more of a think about why being a good listener really helps in conversation. When you've talked about this with your adult, come back to the video and press Play and we'll continue with the lesson. To help us stay on topic, we can do a couple of things. When we're listening to a person talking about their topic, we can identify the keywords that tell us what that topic is. As soon as we've worked that out, we can begin to think about followup questions, finding-out questions or we can make a comment about the same topic to add into that conversation. This will help to grow the conversation and keep it on track. We're going to play a game now called Comment and Question Time. One person in the group is required to make a comment to start the conversation such as I like going to Pizza Hut. The other people in the talking group then take it in turns to make a related comment. For example, I like pizza, but pepperoni pizza is horrid. Or they might say, I like the ice cream machine at Pizza Hut. This would be making a related comment about the initial topic of going to Pizza Hut. You and your adult can take turns to make a comment to start the conversation and then the other person has to try and make a related comment or ask a question to keep it going. Once you've had a go at this on a couple of different topics, come back to the video and press Play and we'll continue with the lesson. As we know, it can be really helpful to think about finding out questions to help us keep our conversation going. We can ask questions about who, what doing, where, when, how or why something has happened based on what our conversation partner is telling us. It's important that we listen to what our conversation partner is telling us and then think about that information. This will help us to be able to ask a finding-out question or make a comment that will grow the conversation based on what they've said. In the downloadable resource I've included a task called Topic Tower Sorting. You'll need this for the next activity. You need to choose one of the topics in the task and then cut the conversation out. The conversation is a little bit muddled though, so you'll need to read each piece of the conversation and the have a think about what order it would go in. When you've had a go sorting some of these topics of conversation into the right order, come back to the video and press Play and we'll continue with the lesson. In the downloadable resource I've included lots of ideas for activities that will help you to work on your topics and conversation skills. Most of the activities will include the opportunity for you to work on using finding-out questions to help you stay on topic. Try some of these games and activities with you, with your family and your friends. Well, that brings us to the end of today's lesson. A really big well done on all the fantastic learning you've achieved today about how you can stay on topic. Before you go, I'd like to ask one thing. When you've completed your topic tower sorting, as your parent or carer to take a picture of this and share it with your school so that they can see the fantastic progress that you're making with your communication and conversation skills. And if you'd like you could ask your parent or carer to send a copy of this picture to @OakNational on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook so I can see your lovely progress and hard work too. Well, all that's left for me to say is thank you, but take care and enjoy the rest of your learning, buh-bye.

Topics when talking to people

Topics when talking to people

These resources will be removed by the end of the Spring Term 2026.

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