Congratulations to Dr Kate Margetson and Fiona Baybrooks who are working so well on the implementation science research for the Speech Assessments in Children's Home Languages (SACHL). Last week, Kate applied the SACHL to the assessment of a child who spoke English, Swahili, French and two other languages - and it worked!
Today I attended the CSU Vice Chancellor's All-staff Session on the Bathurst. It was advertised as "This is a chance for me to update you on the university’s direction and priorities and to hear directly from you with any questions or views." The VC asked for news and updates, so I was able to provide a shout out to A/Prof Kathy Cologon, Dr Belinda Downey, Dr Goutam Roy, Dr Shukla Siker, their children and the Communications Team (Kevin Ng and Dom Lindsay) for their research that lead to the World Health Organization profiling our CVC children's advisory group 7-minute video in their presentation at the United Nations in June.
There is a significant moment in writing a PhD - and that is when you print what you have written for the first time and start to read it as a book. Congratulations Holly McAlister for ticking off this important milestone.
Child Language Teaching and Therapy Special Issue (2026)
Listening to Children with Diverse Communication Abilities
Guest editors: Sharynne McLeod and Holly McAlister, Children’s Voices Centre, Charles Sturt University, Australia
CLTT Editors: Judy Clegg and Victoria Joffe
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| Holly and Sharynne celebrating the achievement |
We calculated today that the CVC2026 papers cover all Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) apart from 2, 6, and 7. What a comprehensive program!
Screening was attempted with the 1203 Kinder student cohort using the Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS), a parent and educator (ICSE) report tool. Speech pathologists also screened speech using the International Speech Screener (ISS). The Diagnostic Evaluation of Articulation and Phonology (DEAP) was administered as a benchmark. Speech Pathology contractors completed diagnostic assessments as usual practice. Data collection was embedded within existing school processes, modified collaboratively with teaching colleagues. Ethics approval was granted by Charles Sturt University (CSU) Human Research Ethics Committee (approval 25025).
Speech was screened with the ICS with 929 students and with 895 of these using the ISS also. Some students were identified for additional assessment using ICS and/or teacher “worry” about students’ ability to pronounce speech sounds (n = 526). The DEAP Diagnostic Screen was completed on 219 students and the Phonology subtest on 119 students. Diagnostic speech assessments were completed on 497 students who did not pass screening.
Emma Scanlon has entered 529 ISS forms into Phon still a few hundred to go - but this is a big number. Thanks Emma and Felicity
The following article has just been accepted for publication after peer review:
McLeod, S. (2026, in press). Large listening ears are not enough: How can we mature in our practices to listen to children? Child Language Teaching and Therapy.
Here is the abstract:
Communication is a human right for all; including children with speech, language, and communication needs and those who speak/sign non-dominant languages. Communication specialists enhance the “voice” of children in two ways. We support children’s physical and cognitive abilities to talk as well as enabling children the “right to freedom of expression… regardless of frontiers” (Article 13 Convention on the Rights of the Child, United Nations, 1989). We have creatively engaged in child-friendly methods to provide children space and voice – and children frequently depict their supportive communicative partners with “large listening ears”. As communication specialists, we also have the power to assist others to listen, giving children audience and influence (Lundy, 2007). This paper provides examples of listening to children with diverse communication abilities, is based on the Child Language Teaching and Therapy (CLTT) 2024 Summer Lecture, and has been updated by integrating papers from the CLTT special issue published in 2026. As we become accustomed to including children’s perspectives in our professional practice, this paper encourages us to reflect on whether we listen to children superficially or use our large listening ears to provide children the opportunity for action based on their insights. How can we mature in our practices to enhance all children’s participation within democratic processes in their families, schools, communities, and society? Our challenge is to have large listening ears; employ a variety of sources (Mosaic approach); involve children’s participation throughout the research process, and facilitate their capacity to influence the world.
The manuscript was written based on my invited lecture and forms the first article of the special issue of CLTT titled "Listening to Children with Diverse Communication Abilities".
You can watch the Child Language Teaching and Therapy Summer Lecture 2024 here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iajSaUyEuOw
Summer Lecture Abstract:
Communication is a human right for all; and ALL includes children with speech, language, and communication needs, including those who speak/sign non-dominant languages (McLeod, 2018). Aligning with the Convention on the Rights of the Child (United Nations, 1989) we have given attention to the “voice” of children. For example, we have creatively engaged in child-friendly arts-based methods to provide children with the “right to freedom of expression… regardless of frontiers” as outlined in Article 13. However, do we REALLY listen to children? As we become more accustomed to including children’s perspectives in our professional practices, it is time to reflect on whether some of our inclusion of children’s voices could be perceived as “tokenistic” (Hart, 1992). As communication specialists, we have the power to support children’s voice and to assist others to listen. How can we mature in our practices to enhance children’s participation within democratic processes in their families, schools, communities, and society?
Two Emmas worked with me at the Children's Voices Centre today :)
Emma Hayes: CVC Senior Adminstration Officer
Emma Scanlon: CeTasSSD Research Assistant
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| Sharynne, Emma H and Emma S |
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| Emma S working in The Nest |
Thanks to everyone who has supported me to get my latest grant application completed including DVC-R Neena Mitter, PVCI Michael Friend/Jason White, Lisa Limbrick, Sharon Geltch, Annette Harris, Lee Williamson, Helen L. Blake, Stefania Graham (who clicked submit) and Emma Hayes and Emma Scanlon who celebrated submission
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| Learning from Lee on Sunday evening! |
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| Support from Helen on Wednesday |
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| CSU Research Office - Stefania Graham |
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| Celebrating submission with Emma S at The Treehouse |
This morning we held a short meeting of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia Panel D Committee (Education, Psychology & Public Health)
I am currently co-editing two special issues:
I have been guest editor of some other special issues that have had a lot of international interest:
The International Speech Screener (ISS, McLeod, 2013) is a 50-item picture-naming task that samples all English consonants and six English consonant clusters on two occasions in word-initial position. Words vary in length and stress. The ISS was designed to ensure that there were two examples of each word-initial consonant. Most pairs of words for each word-initial consonant contained a monosyllabic word and a bisyllabic or polysyllabic word (e.g., dog, dinosaur). Within these words most English vowels, within-word consonants, word-final consonants, and some word-final consonant clusters are sampled. The ISS is presented via PowerpointTM with one picture per slide. An audio-voice recording of the target word is available on each slide and played during the imitation condition.
More information about its development:
McLeod, S., & Masso, S. (2019). Screening children's speech: The impact of imitated elicitation and word position. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 50(1), 71–82. https://doi.org/10.1044/2018_LSHSS-17-0141
Today Sarah Bartlett, Holly McAlister and I spent an hour looking at the formula for writing their final PhD chapters (then they write their first PhD chapter).
I always ask my students to print the work they have written and read it in hard copy before summarizing it in their final chapter. We were very impressed with Sarah's large pile of double-sided printing!
CSU's Foundation Day social media includes a photo of my son and I in 2001 advertising the new speech pathology course at CSU! (Thanks Holly for finding this).
What an honour!
https://academy.pubs.asha.org/2026/07/2026-asha-journals-awards/
July 17, 2026
We’re pleased to announce the 2026 ASHA Journals Awards! As we have in the past, we’re announcing awardees in two categories: (1) The Alfred K. Kawana Award for Lifetime Achievement in Publications and (2) the Editor’s Awards. You can find more information on the ASHA Journals Awards, including present and past recipients, on the ASHA Journals Awards page on ASHAWire.
The Alfred K. Kawana Award for Lifetime Achievement in Publications
This award, named in memory of former Director of ASHA Publications Alfred K. Kawana, recognizes an ongoing history of exemplary publications. Awardees have authored articles in ASHA Journals with significant educational, scientific, or clinical value over a period of at least 10 years. For information on the Kawana Award, including present and past recipients, see the Kawana Award page on ASHAWire.
2026 Kawana Awardee: Sharynne McLeod, PhD
Dr. Sharynne McLeod is a Distinguished Professor of Speech and Language Acquisition at Charles Sturt University in Australia. She has received honors from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) and served six times on the ASHA Convention Program Committee. She served as an editorial board member ASHA Journals, was the lead author on articles that received ASHA Journals Editor’s Awards in 2018 and 2019, and has received worldwide acclaim for transformative research on communication rights.
She has authored or co-authored 50 articles in ASHA Journals, dating back to 1994. Together, these articles have amassed more than 2,800 citations and have been read more than 700,000 times.
One article, “Children’s English Consonant Acquisition in the United States: A Review,” which she co-authored with Dr. Kathryn Crowe and published in American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology (AJSLP) in 2020, has recently surpassed 300,000 downloads, and “Children’s Consonant Acquisition in 27 Languages: A Cross-Linguistic Review,” co-authored with Dr. Kathryn Crowe and published in the November 2018 issue of AJSLP) has surpassed the 200,000-download mark. These are two of the most downloaded papers from ASHA journals.
Alfred K. Kawana Award for Lifetime Achievement in Publications
https://pubs.asha.org/journals/Alfred_K_Kawana_Award_for_Lifetime_Achievement_in_Publications
About the Award
Alfred K. KawanaThe Alfred K. Kawana Award for Lifetime Achievement in Publications is reserved for outstanding researchers/scholars who have a sustained history of exemplary publications in ASHA journals. Over a period of at least 10 years, recipients shall have authored ASHA journal articles that are meritorious in terms of educational, scientific, or clinical value, and thus contributed significantly to the discipline. This award is named in memory of the late Alfred K. Kawana (pictured), former director of ASHA publications.
Candidates for this award may be nominated by any member of the Journals Board, which discusses and selects recipients annually. This award is presented at the Researcher-Academic Town Meeting (RATM) of the ASHA Convention, and awardees are acknowledged during the Awards Ceremony.
There have been 25 Awardees (1989–2024) including Ray Kent, Laurence B. Leonard, Lawrence D. Shriberg, Mabel L. Rice, J. Bruce Tomblin, Marc E. Fey, Mark Onslow and Ann Packman, Karla K. McGregor
Congratulations to the team from Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, Waisman Center, University of Wisconsin–Madison who have won the Journal of Speech, Language, Hearing - Speech Editor's Award for the following paper:
Soriano, J. U., Mahr, T. J., Rathouz, P. J., & Hustad, K. C. (2025). Characterizing the relationship between the Intelligibility in Context Scale and transcription intelligibility in typically developing English-speaking children between ages 2;6 and 9;11. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 34(5), 2877-2892. https://doi.org/doi:10.1044/2025_AJSLP-24-00530
The award was announced here: https://academy.pubs.asha.org/2026/07/2026-asha-journals-awards/
We are thrilled to see the rigor of our Intelligibility in Context Scale (ICS) being applied in such a robust way.
Today Felicity and I worked out the first version of the 2026 CeTasSSD CONSORT diagram
https://cdn-links.lww.com/permalink/phm/a/phm_00_00_2018_03_14_wu_ajpmr-d-17-00294_sdc1.pdf
I am excited to share that we have accepted 145 submissions to present at CVC2026 from 35 countries: Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Egypt, Fiji, Greece, Hong Kong, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Lithuania, Malaysia, Malta, Mongolia, Morocco, Nepal, New Zealand, Nigeria, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Viet Nam
The final number may change as 8 authors are still yet to revise their abstract. It is going to be an awesome conference.
Dr Carolyn Gregoric Research Manager, CVC2026 Conference Secretary
Children’s Voices Centre
Our visiting scholar Dr Zinnia Mevawalla, joined A/Prof Kathy Cologon and myself to meet the CSU kangaroos and enjoy the sunset over Bathurst. It was a perfect rural Australian moment during her visit.
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| There were too many kangaroos to count! |
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| We saw the rare albino kangaroo on Mt Panorama! |
CVC is honoured to have adjunct researchers and professors join us from across the world. Today we welcomed some of our new adjuncts this morning:
Welcome to Prof Karla Washington (Canada/Jamaica), Dr Jinjin (Helen) Lu (China), Dr Josephine Bampoe (Ghana), Matthew Stapleton, Dr Amanda Niland, Dr Olivia Karaolis
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| Dr Zinnia Mevawalla, Prof Sharynne McLeod, A/Prof Kathy Cologon and some of our new CVC adjuncts |
We are delighted to welcome Dr Zinnia Mevawalla to the Children's Voices Centre as our visiting scholar. Dr Mevawalla is a Senior Lecturer in Early Years Education at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland, UK. https://www.strath.ac.uk/staff/mevawallazinniadr/
Leadership is essential to actualising the inclusive cause, however access to professional learning opportunities, especially in the Scottish early years workforce have been limited.People are very welcome to attend either in person at The Treehouse, Building 1451, Bathurst Campus, or online via Zoom: https://charlessturt.zoom.us/j/66761820743
The perceived divide between theory and practice related to inclusion has also highlighted discourses such as those echoed in Scottish newspapers - “if inclusion only works in theory, it doesn’t work at all” (McEnaney, 2025). This perceived divide emphasises the importance of grounding any professional learning in a deep understanding of the local intricacies and nuances of “real world” leadership and education practices.
The changing hearts and minds programme (CHAMP) was rooted in the bringing together of leaders from within one local authority, and researches in Scottish and Australian universities. In this paper we report on the “how”, “what” and “so what?” of the CHAMP project, emphasising how we (leaders, parents, practitioners, and researchers) came together, what happened (the key findings and significance) and where we plan to go from here.
This presentation offers a wonderful opportunity to engage with Dr Mevawalla’s work, hear about her current research, and connect with colleagues across the Children’s Voices Centre and wider affiliate network.
This week members of our CVC Children's Advisory Group came to The Treehouse to create artwork representing their ideal hospital for our advice to the World Health Organization.
Next, they went to the CSU TV studio and recorded their insights about the Disability Discrimination Act and Children Draw Health that will be presented at the CVC2026 conference in September.
It's such a joy to have the children visiting.
Welcome to our newest staff member, Amy Whitfield who is our CVC Online Content Creator. Amy has a communications degree from Charles Sturt University and has spent time in Building 1451 before it was The Treehouse. Her main role is to support the CVC2026 conference, but she also will support CVC to profile its impactful work. We are so excited to have you join us Amy.
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| Carolyn Gregoric, Sharynne McLeod, Amy Whitfield |
We have just calculated the most recent analytics for the IJSLP communication rights special issue (International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 20(1) https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/iasl20/20/1) from the publisher's website:
My lead article has had 72,615 views, 133 citations, 180 Altmetric score.
McLeod, S. (2018). Communication rights: Fundamental human rights for all. International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 20(1), 3–11. https://doi.org/10.1080/17549507.2018.1428687
This is amazing reach.
The Multilingual Children's Speech website is popular: 303,488 views by 194,058 active users (1 Jan 2023 - 13 July2026) with the following pages being the most popular
Felicity Laurence and Emma Scanlon are working on entering all of the 2026 data from just over 900 students into Phon. We appreciate the input from Prof Yvan Rose to tweak some of the program for our Australian context.
It has been a very special week with my young friends who have had such an influence on my research and how I listen to children. In the past, this group of children have initiated and shaped our research projects: Children Draw Talking, Children Draw Playing and Children Draw Health. Today they participated in the Children Draw Belonging research. This is the first project that they have not initiated (this time another group of children initiated it). They had some good insights. I love learning from these children.
I have just received an invitation to speak in Vietnam later this year at the Ha Noi National University of Education 25 year celebration in conjunction with UNICEF. Congratulations to my colleagues as they celebrate this significant achievement.
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| A/Prof Ben Pham with Sharynne |
This morning our team analysed the Children Draw Playing journal about "How is playing good for the world". We had 67 children answer this question.
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| Dr Jo Grimmond, Prof Sharynne McLeod, Dr Belinda Downey, Dr Katrina Gersbach, Dr Van H. Tran, Dr Kate Freire |
Playing:
We discussed the following theories
Classical theories of play
Contemporary or modern theories of play:
This morning Dr Carolyn Gregoric (conference secretary) and I met to discuss CVC2026. The ducks are all in a row! We have really enjoyed using EasyChair as the conference platform to manage all of the papers and reviews. Thanks Carolyn for your fastidious and wise oversight of CVC2026.
CVC2026 Abstract Outcomes and Invitation to Share Children Draw, Create, Share Belonging
We are pleased to advise that decisions have now been made in relation to all CVC2026 abstract submissions.
Notification emails have been sent to corresponding authors via EasyChair. If you have not received a notification, please log in to EasyChair and check the status of your submission before contacting us, as some notifications may have been filtered into junk or spam folders.
We also wanted to share with you details of a new Children’s Voices Centre research project, Children Draw, Create, Share Belonging. The project invites children to share their perspectives on belonging through posters, podcasts, and postcards and provides an important opportunity to centre children’s voices in research.
Further information, including the submission link, is available on the Children’s Voices Centre research page: https://www.csu.edu.au/research/childrens-voices-centre/research.
Please feel free to share this opportunity with your networks, colleagues, families, schools, early childhood settings, services or communities who may be interested in participating or helping to promote the project more widely. These works will be displayed via a global online gallery during the conference.
With thanks
Emma Hayes (she/her)
Senior Administration Officer
Children's Voices Centre
Charles Sturt University, Bathurst, NSW
Today Felicity, Sarah V and I met to continue discussing Felicity's PhD based within our Catholic Education Tasmania Speech Sound Disorder (CeTasSSD) grant. We have now counted the number of children in 2026 who were assessed using the Diagnostic Evaluation of Articulation and Phonology (DEAP).
Today I provided the CVC Thursday Research Presentation. My topic was "Tips and Tricks for Writing Research CVs to Assist with Grant Writing"
Curriculum vitae (CV) is a Latin word meaning the course of one’s life. An academic’s CV is a comprehensive tool that enables a researcher to collect and analyse data about themselves to support their research endeavours. This workshop will encourage researchers to use their CV to document work that is:
Important
- Changes lives: “Will this make a difference?”
- Generates new knowledge
- Is of national and international significance
The best you can do
- Collaborate when you don’t have the knowledge and methodological expertise
Targeted to specific audiences
- Reviewers, FOR codes, government
McLeod, S. (2014). Undertaking and writing research that is important, targeted, and the best you can do. International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 16(2), 95-97. https://doi.org/10.3109/17549507.2014.896106
We had a fantastic meeting with Addison Stewart to discuss the opportunity for the Children's Voices Centre to host one or two Indigenous Cadetships through CSU. We look forward to progressing this opportunity.
Tonight (7:30-9:00) I was online with Dr Kate Margetson and a group of speech pathologists who speak Cantonese and/or Mandarin/Putonghua. They were advising us about how to adapt the SACHL for children who speak Cantonese and/or Mandarin/Putonghua. What a useful conversation - great insights were shared.
One participant mentioned https://www.evalubox.com/language-sample for language sampling - but none were aware of a similar tool for speech sampling.
Tonight (9-10pm) was the 5th meeting of the World Health Organization Disability Health Equity Network Workstream 4. Tonight our international working group discussed updates from the sub-committees and possible cross-workstream opportunities.
There are four domains of this Workstream 4:
