Course description

This course helps you use clear, kind and confident English at work in UK health and social care: with the residents and people you support, with their families, and with your colleagues. It's written for adults whose first language isn't English and who work, or want to work, as a carer, care assistant, healthcare assistant or support worker, with English at about B1 level.

You'll learn the English for real moments on a care shift: greeting people by their preferred name, offering choices and asking for consent, talking about personal care with dignity, communicating with people living with dementia or with hearing, sight or speech difficulties, answering the phone, giving a clear handover and writing care records that are factual, timed and easy to read.

There are 10 sections and 50 written lessons, each with useful words, useful phrases, a dialogue, a worked example and a practical task. You follow Kuda, a new care assistant in a care home in Essex whose first languages are Shona and English, her mentor Fliss, and her friend Jincy, a home care worker. Every section has a practice pack with a worksheet, example answers, a phrase bank, dialogues to read aloud, extra practice with listening scripts written as text, and a vocabulary spreadsheet, plus a self-review, a handover template, a records worksheet with model answers and the forms for the final portfolio.

What you'll learn

• Getting started: care settings and job titles, the words for the people you support, a self-review and habits for learning English on the job.
• Talking with residents with dignity: greetings and preferred names, person-centred language, choices and consent, polite softeners and conversation.
• Everyday care, said respectfully: personal care, toilet and continence words, mealtimes, drinks and fluid charts, and the vocabulary of mobility and moving and handling.
• Communication needs: talking with people living with dementia, with hearing loss, sight loss or speech difficulties, and calm words for distress.
• Listening, accents and the phone: local phrases such as love and cuppa, phone messages, calls with families and GP surgeries, and listening for detail.
• Handovers and working in a team: following a handover, giving one with SBAR, asking for help, rotas and supervision, and teamwork language.
• Writing care notes and daily records: why records matter, verb forms and times, facts not opinions, charts, describing skin, and correcting records.
• Safety, health and reporting: safeguarding language, falls and incident accounts, medicines vocabulary, infection prevention words, and what to say on 999.
• Sensitive conversations and your career: gentle end of life language, pain and feelings, care job adverts, interviews and your development at work.
• Final project: a care-shift communication portfolio with a handover script, sample care records, your own phrase bank and a second self-review.

Who it's for

Adults who speak English as an additional language at about B1 level and who work, or are applying to work, in care homes, home care, hospital wards or supported living in the UK. It suits people who feel confident chatting but want help with care words, fast local speech, the phone, handovers and writing records.

What this course is, and isn't

This is self-study English practice, with no audio or video. It doesn't award a qualification, and it isn't an ESOL course or exam, the Care Certificate or any part of an employer's induction. It teaches the language around care, not care skills: moving and handling, medicines, first aid, infection control and safeguarding are covered as vocabulary and communication only, and your employer's training, policies and procedures always come first. It gives no immigration advice and doesn't recommend any apps, books or brands. The people and places in the story are fictional.

What will I learn?

• Greet residents, use their preferred names and talk about care in person-centred, respectful language
• Offer real choices, ask for consent and respond kindly when someone says no
• Talk about personal care, the toilet, mealtimes and drinks politely, and understand moving and handling words
• Adapt your English for people living with dementia, and for people with hearing loss, sight loss or speech difficulties
• Understand local phrases and fast speech, and answer the phone, take messages and talk with families and GP surgeries
• Follow a handover, give a clear one using SBAR, and ask for help and check instructions
• Write daily care records that are factual, objective and timed, fill in charts and correct mistakes properly
• Use the language of safeguarding, falls and incidents, medicines, infection prevention and 999 calls
• Speak gently about end of life, pain and feelings, and read care job adverts and answer interview questions
• Build a care-shift communication portfolio with a handover script, sample records and your own phrase bank

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