As we approach Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) Day on 16 October 2026, we want to share updates from TICLD. It's been a busy month!

Professor Pauline Frizelle presented at the  International DLD virtual Conference (hosted in Australia), highlighting the project's international efforts to improve the description, delivery and reporting of language interventions for children with or at risk of DLD. Professor Frizelle's presentations titles were as follows: Labelling, defining and classifying the active ingredients in oral language interventions for children with or at risk of developmental language disorder: A systematic review and Qualitative synthesis and developing an internationally agreed comprehensive list of active ingredients, in oral language interventions for children with or at risk for DLD.

The TICLD team internationally is continuing its work with adults with DLD, children and young people, families, and educators to ensure that lived experience remains central to the development of the project. These contributions are helping to shape how language intervention research is conducted and reported.

Last week, TICLD was presented at the Language and Literacy in Young People (LaLYP) Symposium, by our Australian collaborator Professor Suze Leitao.  The symposium was attended by over 100 members of the DLD community - parents, family, clinicians, educators and researchers. Researchers shared updates on the project's progress and invited members of the DLD community to become involved in future phases of the research.  Please see the link for more details: https://languageandliteracyinyoungpeople.com/symposium

In September 2025, TICLD brought together international academics and knowledge users from seven countries to build consensus on the active ingredients of language therapy and how to organise them into a meaningful structure. This process has resulted in the development of a taxonomy, providing a common framework for describing and evaluating language interventions. The taxonomy is now being used to develop an online international training programme for Speech and Language Therapists/Pathologists (SLTs/Ps). This training will run in February 2027. The first phase of the training programme will train approximately 40 clinicians from each participating country. Following evaluation, the long-term goal is to embed this training within pre-registration Speech and Language Therapy programmes internationally, helping to ensure greater consistency in intervention delivery and reporting.

DLD Day on 16^th October is an important opportunity to recognise individuals with DLD, raise awareness of their experiences, and celebrate the collaborative research efforts that are helping to improve language intervention practice worldwide. We're delighted to share a blog post from our collaborators at the University of Oxford: "Together for Developmental Language Disorder" - https://www.education.ox.ac.uk/news/together-for-developmental-language-disorder/. Many thanks to Professor Cristina Mckean, Dr. Cecilia Zuniga-Montanez and Natalie Waters for this contribution.

Find out more about DLD Day on 16 October 2026 and the ongoing work of the TICLD research programme- The Intervention Consensus for Language Disorders Group | University College Cork and DLD Awareness Day - RADLD

We thank all the individuals, families, clinicians, educators and researchers who continue to support and contribute to the TICLD programme of research.