I work full time as a consultant, developing communities of practice around Intensive Interaction and Musical interaction in collaboration with education and care settings. I am an expert trainer and social learning leader and I can deliver enjoyable, thought provoking training to organisations involved in the care of people living with autism, learning disabilities, dementia and mental health problems.
To learn more about the training I can offer please go to the Intensive Interaction Training page.
Recent Blog Post
The Fruits of Reflective Practice
The main reason I promote the use of the 7 levels engagement is so staff have a shared language with which they can describe and analyse their practice. In a recent consultancy I did for the Sheffield learning disability charity The Burton Street Foundation, one... read moreMusical Interaction vs Intensive Interaction
Every Tuesday I work at Wilsic Hall School in Wadworth, Doncaster. The service is a residential secondary school for people with complex needs mainly arising from autism and learning disabilities. My role is to offer Intensive Interaction and Musical Interaction... read moreA post a day for II week – Monday – Woolley Wood School
Every Monday I visit Woolley Wood School in Parsons Cross, Sheffield. I have worked at the school for one day per week since 2013 and, according to our evaluation of the community of practice, the Intensive Interaction provision and skill base has steadily developed... read moreWhat’s in it for you?
Once up on a time I believed that all practitioners (and potential practitioners of intensive interaction) would share the same motivations – to help the person they are supporting to develop fundamental communication skills or to offer experiences of social... read moreIntensive Interaction Recording PDF
The completed summary of all the level descriptions plus the recording sheets, baseline sheet and methodology is now available to download using the link below or on the front page of the website. Recording Intensive... read moreAnalysing and Recording – PDF Summary
The completed summary of all the level descriptions plus the recording sheets, baseline sheet and methodology is now available to download using the link below or on the front page of the website. Recording Intensive... read moreWorking for the eye contact
Communities of practice can operate at various levels in a care setting. When I began working in the capacity of Social Learning Mentor at the Hesley Group, the most obvious communities of practice involved the members of staff in a particular area or on a particular... read moreThree Pieces of Advice – Part 3
As I explained in the other parts of this series, the first two pieces of advice to people starting an interaction with a person with a communication disability is first ask “What are the offers here?” and then join in with the offers and Do What You See. The purpose... read moreThree Pieces of Advice – Part 2
In the first part of this series I explained my first piece of advice to new support workers – to observe a person’s behaviour and ask “What are the offer’s here?”. The purpose is to open the practitioner’s eye’s to new behaviours that could be a starting point for... read moreThree Pieces of Advice – Part 1
Part of my role for the Hesley Group is deliver induction training to new support workers. The autistic people they will soon be caring for have a reputation for being challenging to support and so the new starters are anxious to develop a good relationship as quickly... read moreDownload the PDF Document:
Recording Intensive Interaction
Includes how to take a baseline, classroom/session record sheet and key indicators summary.
Your talk on communities of practice was superb – and changed how I did my work yesterday!
Mark HarmerAbout Me
My name is Matthew Laurie and I work in collaboration with care settings and school to develop responsive communication and intensive interaction services. I studied social learning with Etienne Wenger and Bev Wenger-Trayner I specialise in developing sustainable communities of practice in order to effect genuine changes in staff practice. I also offer musical interaction and responsive communications for service users in schools, mental health care and residential settings for the elderly. I am a Director of Understanding Arts CIC and I am co-developing the approach of person centred arts.