SLT-10003 - Module Specification
School of Allied Health Professions and Pharmacy
Faculty of Medicine & Health Sciences

Programme/Approved Electives for 2025/26

Available as a Free Standing Elective

Co-requisites

None

Prerequisites

None

Barred Combinations

None

Description for 2025/26

The ability to make an accurate detailed description of service users’ communication is a fundamental skill for Speech and Language Therapists. This module enables you to explore morphology, syntax, semantics, pragmatics and sociolinguistics allowing you to recognise the possible contribution of social and cultural factors to communication. The module aims to facilitate your understanding of all levels of typical processing and the differences for individuals whose home language is not English.
You will develop your transcription skills using the International Phonetic Alphabet and consider natural phonology and phonological processes. This module will also introduce you to psycholinguistic frameworks which will be revisited and applied to clinical population in later modules.

This module aims to enable students to describe, analyse and interpret typical speech and language data. The main concepts in linguistics, including articulatory phonetics and phonology, relevant to speech and language therapy are considered. Students are provided with the opportunity to consider sociolinguistics and its relationship with speech and language therapy. Psycholinguistics and levels of typical processing are introduced. The module further aims to provide learning opportunities for students to be able to describe natural phonology and identify phonological processes. Additionally syntactic structures with a discourse function, Gricean pragmatics, relevance theory and inference are also explored. Students are also given the opportunity to gain knowledge of bilingual populations and the centrality of the home language.

Intended Learning Outcomes

Describe and transcribe typical linguistic and phonetic data.: 1
Describe the production of sounds found in human languages using appropriate terminology.: 1
Explain natural phonology and the phonological processes from transcribed lexical items.: 1
Outline the importance of key psycholinguistic models relevant to speech, language and communication and speech and language therapy practice.: 2
Determine the differences in psycholinguistics, sociolinguistics and all levels of typical processing for individuals including those whose home language is not English.: 2

Study hours

50 tutor led hours includes,
~ 34 hours lectures,
~ 7 hours workshops
~ 5 hours seminars,
~ 2 hours assessment preparation
~ 2 hours formative assessment
~180 hours independent study
~ 70 hours of assessment study and preparation

School Rules

None

Description of Module Assessment