Talking Mats and Autism- Have you sometimes tried it and it didn’t work?

There is a growing interest in teaching TM to people with ASD. We know that some important adaptations might be required to make this a meaningful experience, and are keen to share our learning so far.

Being asked for thoughts or views can be difficult for some people with communication difficulties.  In particular, there is a group of people with autism where some of the core principles of Talking Mats have to be taught in stages.   Some thinkers will just ‘get it’ and find it a valuable tool for sharing their thoughts and for supporting decision making.  For others there may have to be adaptations and /or  specific teaching e.g. the vocabulary of the top scale.  We heard recently of a student in a specialist centre who couldn’t use Talking Mats.  However the staff would include him in groups where it was used and make sure he was around others doing Mats.  After a few years, he did learn the principles and go on to use it effectively.

We have gathered ideas and knowledge from practitioners working in the field of autism and included these on our web-site under Free Stuff on Communication Disability.  ASD guidelines  It’s important that these guidelines grow and adapt as we learn more about using TM with an even wider range of people.

We’ve arranged a twilight session here at Stirling on the 1st of February 2018  to bring together practitioners working in the field of autism to extend our knowledge and encourage a staged approach to effective use of Talking Mats.
We’re delighted that Ruth Chalmers, Principal Teacher for Autism Spectrum Info and Support Team (ASIST) in Fife will be joining us to talk about developing social communication skills using Talking Mats. There will be time for small group chat so bring along a case you want to discuss.
Please share the attached flier 201802 AsD seminar with your network and we hope you can join us

Please come along and   If you are interested in attending this twilight session 4.00pm to 6.00 pm (cost £20.00),  please notify us at info@talkingmats.com

Thanks to the Action Group  in Edinburgh for their great blog about their co-trainer Lynnette Linton .

In 2016, a number of people with learning disabilities attended a Talking Mats training  designed to build their communication skills and confidence so they could  use  to interview others about their community participation, in regard to Charter for Involvement goals. One of those trained was Lynnette Linton, the National Involvement Network Chairperson, and a Service User of The Action Group in Edinburgh.

Lynnette interviewed several fellow service users using Talking Mats, and was supporting in the role of ‘Listener’ by Liz Taylor, an Action Group Training Officer, who as a consequence of this work requested to become an Accredited TM Trainer. The Charter highlights that support organisations should involve Service Users in training their staff, so it then seemed natural for Liz and Lynnette to deliver TM training to Action Group staff together, with Lynnette in the role of volunteer co-trainer.

Lynnette has since been a core part of training over 50 employees (including those at Senior levels) in Foundation Talking Mats training with the Keeping Safe add-on. Liz says, it helps that Lynnette is “naturally gifted at speaking to people, and ably demonstrates the significance of TM as a means of having your say on the service you wish to receive”.

Lynnette and Liz do a demonstration Mat together, and then when trainees are doing their own Mat or showing their videos, Lynnette points out where they are applying the key TM principles (Lynnette enjoys issuing certificates to those who successfully complete the course). She also shares anonymised stories from her experience of interviewing ‘Thinkers’, which help get across what Action Group Users “want to change and improve about their service”.

Liz says, “Our first experience of demonstrating a Mat together didn’t quite go to plan, as Lynnette became unexpectedly upset when discussing her views of a football team, when she was reminded of a close friend who had died who had been a fan”. As difficult as this was for both Lynnette and Liz at the time, it was a powerful example of how TM helps us express emotions we may not even have been ourselves aware are ‘under the surface’, and sparked real interest in TM as a communicative tool.

The Action Group started gathering feedback specifically for Lynnette in her role as co-trainer, as part of the training evaluation and trainees have said that “she is exceptionally welcoming and puts everyone at ease; her passion for the topic is very evident, and it is very beneficial to hear real life examples, and how TM helps in her own life”. This includes how Lynnette benefits from the Keeping Safe pack, as a means of raising more ‘difficult’ issues.

Lynnette says, “As a service user, I also now see myself as an important, valued co-trainer. [Training] is something I see myself doing more of in the future. My confidence has shot right up. It makes me feel proud, and my parents get to hear about it at my Review”.

Staff also see the real importance of acting on the actions from each person’s Mat. Lynnette acknowledges that co-delivering has sometimes “been difficult, because I know some of the people we’re training. But I’ve been able to speak up about what I want from my support, my environment.”  Recently she trained her own Service Development Manager and Team Manager, and although she felt it was harder to be honest, she had a captive audience, and her Managers then followed through on actions from her demonstration mats:  “It’s made a difference to me, after doing a Mat with my DM about my home. I put ‘safety’ in the ‘Thumbs Down’, because I get frightened, and now I’ve got a security chain and a peephole on the door”. 

“I never thought I would be training the staff.  Now we’re booked up!”

Click for  information  about the Accredited training and or the Keeping Safe resource mentioned in the blog

This story, which highlights the importance of finding out what really matters to people, was shared by one of the staff attending the second day of an enhanced Talking Mats training course. She works in a NHS facility for people assessed as needing hospital-based continuing care.

I was working with Bill (not his real name) who is a man with severe cognitive impairment resulting from a head injury and stroke. He was very angry and agitated and we couldn’t work out what was wrong. At times he was physically aggressive when we couldn’t understand him.

One day he drew a picture of a rabbit and was very insistent about it but we didn’t know what it meant. We contacted his sister about him being angry about a rabbit. She asked around to other family members and friends but no one could think what it meant.

Bill continued to draw a rabbit and then other pictures including money and TV  so I made an improvised Talking Mat using his drawings as the options and began trying to find out what really mattered to him. I gradually connected that the TV was about about programme called Dickinson’s Real Deal (a TV programme about antiques) and that in the past Bill had had an ornament of a rabbit which he thought was worth a lot of money.

We phoned his sister again about a possible rabbit ornament and she then remembered that he had collected figurines in the past. She finally discovered the rabbit in her garage.

Once we were able to reassure Bill that his rabbit was safe his frustration lessened,he was much less angry and became more settled.

This lovely story shows us how important it is to never assume that someone is just ‘being difficult’  but that if we can try to find out what really matters to them we can make a huge difference to their lives and ours.

Huge thanks to all the practitioners who have sent us guest blogs. We selected our 10 favourite guest blogs…in no particular order!

1.  Talking Mats to support children who stammer Kirsten Taylor, Speech and Language Therapist tells a moving story about how finding out what was upsetting a boy with a stammer helped to implement change.
2. Hearing the voice of the child Emma Atkiss, Senior Educational Psychologist, shares her findings from the Wigan Pathfinder project reporting that using a Talking Mat helps to meet the 5 criteria of Shier’s model of participation.
3. Talking Mats for capacity assessments in people with ASD/LD Ruth Spilman, Senior SLT from The Cambian Group, shares practical tips on assessing capacity.
4. Castle hill school supports pupil voice Jenna McCammon, SLT and Rebecca Highton, SLT Assistant, tell 3 inspiring stories using TMs in: selective mutism; safeguarding and motivational interviewing.
5. Supporting Looked After Children to have their say Karen Wilson, Principal Teacher for children with additional support needs in a mainstream secondary school  shares her experience of using TMs to give young people a stronger voice in making decisions affecting them.
6. Hearing the voices of Looked After Children Rachel Clemow, Head Teacher and Donna Wood, Education Support Worker, report that Talking Mats has enabled children to express their thoughts and views in a safe, neutral environment.
7. Talking Mats and Mental Health  Carla Innes, Clinical Psychologist for learning disability from Healthy Young minds Stockport talks about the impact of TM training on the whole team.
8. Mummy I don’t want to go to nursery today read about how using a Talking Mat might shed some light on why a 4 year old was upset at the thought of going to nursery.
9. How do you feel about starting school? The story of 4 year old twins and their thoughts about starting school.
10. Sibling Attitudes Prof Juan Bornman from Pretoria in South Africa publishes a report on a study carried out with 27 typically developing children who have a younger sibling with a severe speech and language disability.

If you have been inspired and are not yet trained to use Talking Mats – come along to one of our training courses.

Thanks to Natalie Leader, one of our Accredited Trainers from Hobart, Australia for this blog reflecting on her experience of doing the online Foundation training.

The beauty of online training is that no matter where you are or what time zone you’re in, there are options. This is really brought to bear when living in a rural or remote area, such as here in Southern Tasmania.No matter how much those of us here in beautiful Tassie brag about what an awesome place it is to visit, there are limits as to which training organisations will provide professional development sessions here, and how often.

I missed an opportunity to attend Talking Mats Foundation training by a few months so registered to do the online training instead.

My experience with the Talking Mats online training platform was that the organisers were responsive and positive, and the content offered variety, with steady monitoring of progress. Amongst the easy navigation and helpful resources you also participate in discussion forums. As one who doesn’t often participate on line, I found them encouraging and helpful, It was also interesting to read people’s descriptions of different ways that Talking Mats can be used.
Doing the modules in sequence (and with some time in between) worked well for me, as I reflected more deeply on the role of the listener and the qualities I needed to foster in my practice, such as observation, pacing and neutrality.Fostering those qualities and being guided by principles such as self-determination is now an ongoing goal for me.

I have now introduced Talking Mats into my practice and have taken the next step of becoming an Accredited Trainer.

Becoming an accredited trainer involved attending a 2-day workshop in Melbourne for face-to-face training and assessment from Lois and Nicki from Talking Mats Ltd, Stirling, Scotland. As if having excellent trainers was not enough, there was the added bonus of a roomful of like-minded practitioners, all sharing their skills and experiences with Talking Mats. Because each person’s work setting was unique, our group had a rich and diverse array of perspectives on implementation of Talking Mats training and techniques.
So, now I’m making preparations for delivering my first training workshop, sharing Talking Mats with my colleagues. I actually don’t have the jitters (except regarding the IT!) And, I’m confident that Talking Mats will speak for itself. Perhaps I may have appeased the IT deities by taking a giant leap from my former self and participating in a blog, so that side of things will run smoothly!

Good luck with the training Natalie!

This month we have online course participants from Singapore, Canada, Ireland and the UK. Register now for our next online training starting on the 5th of September.

Laura’s 4 year old twin boys are just about to start school and she was finding it difficult to have  a proper chat with them about how they are feeling. She wanted to think about how best to help them prepare for the transition from nursery so used Talking Mats.

We have done lots of ‘practice mats’ over the past few months – focusing on topics such as ‘food’, ‘animals, and ‘toys/games’, so I knew that the boys were both familiar with Talking Mats  before I introduced the more emotive topic of ‘School’.
P was first to have a go at being a ‘Thinker’, with me as the ‘Listener’. We used the Top Scale ‘Happy about/ Not Sure/ Not Happy About’. P thought very hard about placing each option. It helped to have the pictures and mat to focus on rather than just me firing questions at him.

My use of open questions such as ‘How do you feel about playing at your school?’ meant that he often made additional comments such as going on to talk about the toys he had played with during his settling-in session. Some options did need more explanation, for example with ‘eating’ we talked about eating snack at playtime and having a school dinner at lunchtime. Abstract concepts such as ‘trying new things’ also required further explanation. This included relating the concept to real-life situations such as trying to ride a bike and starting swimming lessons.
P’s finished mat gives us a clear indication of his feelings about school. The ‘check and change’ stage was very useful as P changed his mind about ‘uniform’ which he had originally placed under ‘Not Happy About’ – he said that actually he is happy because he will look smart in his new uniform!

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We are currently working to develop a Talking Mats resource to support conversations relating to Advance Care Planning (ACP) with staff and patients from Strathcarron Hospice. People who use hospices often have specific difficulties communicating their thoughts and feelings because of advanced illness and emotional factors.

Sixteen staff from the multidisciplinary team at Strathcarron Hospice were trained to use Talking Mats by Sally Boa who is Head of Education, Research and Practice Development at Strathcarron Hospice and also one of our accredited trainers.The staff trained used it successfully with patients in the hospice and found that they could use it with a range of patients for a variety of purposes: getting to know someone; identifying goals; discharge planning.

A sub-group of staff attended a workshop with members of the Talking Mats team to discuss the potential use of Talking Mats to support conversations relating to ACP. Topics and options were agreed. These were then presented to a wider forum of staff from Highland Hospice for validation and checking. Three main topics to support ACP conversations were identified: Affairs; Care and Personal Values. New symbols are being developed and the resource will be trialled with a range of patients in the hospice setting.

Our hope is that Talking Mats can be used by trained staff in a hospice setting to support people to express their views and help them plan for the end of life and that it will also be helpful for many other people to consider future options in their lives.

We will write an update once the new resource has been completed.

Laura Holmes was pleased to meet up with Rachel Clemow, Head Teacher and Donna Wood, Education Support Worker who work for the Virtual Schools Team in Wigan to find out about the impact of Talking Mats training.
Donna accessed a Talking Mats Training last year delivered by a Talking Mats  accredited Trainer in Wigan Educational Psychology service and quickly put her training into practice with the children that she works with, using the Consulting Children and Young People – Primary resource pack. Other members of the team soon recognised the potential benefits of introducing this approach themselves, and so, in April 2017, a further 15 members of the Virtual Schools Team received Talking Mats training.
Looked After Children can often struggle to express their thoughts and feelings, often as a result of their situation/ circumstances. This can be further compounded if they also present with speech, language and communication difficulties. There is a higher risk of such difficulties within the LAC population (Cross 1999 ).
Often there are many professionals involved with a Looked After Child, all asking a wide variety of questions, some of which can be highly personal and/or emotive in nature. The team have observed that children will sometimes end up giving answers which they think the listener wants to hear, rather than answers which reflect their true feelings/views – or the child may withdraw from the process entirely. Consequently, it can be very difficult to ensure that the true ‘voice of the child’ is being heard. Sometimes the children themselves struggle to understand what their own feelings are – often the topics and questions can be complex and involve abstract concepts.
Rachel and Donna report that the Talking Mats approach has had a big impact on their communication style when working with the children on their caseloads, and has enabled children to express their thoughts and views in a safe, neutral environment. Some of the comments they made about Talking Mats were that it:
– Enables the listener to get to know a child quicker and more easily as there is no pressure/expectation of the ‘thinker’ – it is a child/’thinker’ led approach.
– Provides way of supporting the child to open up to express their views and feelings, even if they have previously been hard to engage – and for the child to develop better insight into their own feelings.
– Helps to avoid the possibility of adult/listener misinterpretation of what the child is trying to communicate.
– Enables the child to focus on pictures – which appears to result in the child being more comfortable in expressing their own views and feelings – as opposed to what the child thinks the listener wants to hear.
– Provides a holistic view of the child – which can support target setting and planning at key stages for that child, for example, transition to High School.
– Gives the child something they can be successful at – there are no ‘wrong’ answers.

Donna shared a great example of how Talking Mats helped a young girl to describe an issue at home which she had not shared with any carers or school staff previously. The child placed the ‘home’ option symbol on the ‘not happy’ section of the mat then began to whisper to Donna explaining the reason why. This resulted in Donna being able to share the information with school staff and social care, consequently, the issue was resolved.
Services, organisations and schools in Wigan are already using the Talking Mats approach as a result of widespread training delivered by our Accredited trainers in the Educational Psychology Team. This provides a great example of how using Talking Mats across agencies can really help a whole area to become more child/ young person led.
The Virtual Schools team are now recommending the Talking Mats approach to other agencies working with the Looked After Children on their caseloads, such as adoption and fostering services.

If want to access the training then there are  Talking Mats foundation  courses run regularly in London, Stirling , Manchester and Newcastle . Once you have attended a foundation training  and gained experience you can apply to become an accredited trainer .

This is the second blog about Lois and Nicki’s amazing visit to Australasia – this time theirTalking Mats trip to New Zealand.
The view flying into New Zealand was dramatic. We looked down on a beautiful range of snow topped mountains glistening in the clear blue sky as our plane flew towards Christchurch. Our first stop was the South island for a foundation training organised by Talk Link. Our second foundation training was in Auckland in the North Island. At both places we had a fantastic group of interested practitioners who really engaged with how Talking Mats could be used and began thinking creatively about how they would apply in their work place .This included:
• Involving thinkers in decisions about the their alternative and augmentative communication and getting feedback on what works for them
• Exploring its value for young people in the youth justice system to support them to express their views and be a tool for increasing engagement
• Exploring how Talking Mats could be adapted to make them more accessible and culturally accepted to the Maori community
• Involving children in their education planning
We were really pleased that Talk Link also sent 3 staff to the accredited training course in Australia. This means that there will be increased access to Talking Mats Foundation training in New Zealand for the future. Our experience is that accredited trainers provide leadership that helps organisations embed Talking Mats into practice. Thanks to Ann Smaill for all her organising and support for both our Foundation and Accredited courses.

And our leisure times were special too. We had a trip on the Christchurch Gondola to see the stunning Banks peninsula; we experienced the hope and resilience of Christchurch following the earthquakes in 2010 and 2011. In Auckland we saw a thought provoking Maori exhibition and last but not least we loved our weekend of rest and relaxation on the very special island of Waiheke. The locals thought us mad to swim in the sea their autumn but we loved it!

More information

Click for more information if you want to find out about

• Online Course
• Buying the digital resource
• Keeping Safe Resource

Five short stories from our recent accredited training course in Stirling.

1. A looked after child was unhappy but no one knew specifically why. Using the Talking Mats, she indicated that she was upset by the weekly phone call with her mother because it always happened when it was her playing time. The time of the call was moved to just before her bedtime but this resulted in bad dreams. The time of the call was finally moved to Saturday afternoon which helped her settle and reduced her distress.
2. Talking Mats was used with an Iraqi boy who had come to England via Libya, Italy and the jungle camp at Calais. When he picked the symbol of a waiting room he indicated that despite all she had been through he really liked this because it reminded him of all the children in his family and made him happy.
3. A 76-year-old man with a learning disability disclosed that he had been attacked and suffocated by his upstairs neighbour one week previously. It was only when he used the Talking Mats that he disclosed to anyone what had happened.
4. A lecturer usually used quantifying measuring with her students to find out how they were managing their studies. Instead she used Talking Mats to find out how they were coping with their work life balance. One student told her that she was managing fine except that her pet rabbits always escape under the bed and it takes her a long time to get them back out so she does not let them out very often!
5. Talking Mats was used with a man who had had a stroke and had to go into residential care because his family could no longer look after him. They were very worried that he was unhappy with the new care set up. He was able to show with the Talking Mats that he was happy about everything except that he was not given enough time when he went to the toilet. Once the staff realised this they then gave him more time which resolved the situation and reassured his family.

Please send us your Talking Mats stories – we love hearing them.