Natalie Skinner

Email: natalie.skinner@hdr.mq.edu.au

I am a PhD candidate at Macquarie University, and previously worked as a speech pathologist for over 15 years.

Until recently the focus of my project has been on families who speak a language in addition to English at home and have a child with a disability affecting their communication. We had hoped to gather home based data, recording everyday family interactions, but have had significant difficulties with recruitment. As a result, we have broadened our focus to school-based interactions. We have a special school that has agreed to help us with recruitment and supports  gathering data in their school.  At this point we are working on an ethics application, and collaborating with the school to develop a mutually beneficial project. All the students at this school have a disability affecting their communication.

As a starting point, I am interested in peer-peer interactions in the playground, and during transitions across classroom activities and between the classroom and playground. Given my original project, I am particularly interested in the children from families with an additional language, and how they navigate the English only school context.  Pending staff input, however, this may also include a focus on teacher-student interactions and aspects of teaching or supporting social interaction.