Literacy news
Big plans for small talk
1 Sep 2004
Why do we need a Talk To Your Baby campaign? Why is early years communication a problem now? Why does it matter - and what can we do about it?
These are some of the questions that are addressed in a new Advocacy Kit available on the Talk To Your Baby website. Pulling together some of the facts and the arguments in one place, it will be helpful to anyone who wants to make a case for more attention or more staffing to support work in the early language field.
The National Literacy Trust created the Talk To Your Baby campaign to provide a forum to facilitate national debate on the issue of children's early communication skills. It also aims to advocate the vital role of parents as their child's first educators, encourage and support good practice, and engage the media in creating a cultural change.
After a development year, funded by the Sure Start Unit at the Department for Education and Skills, Talk To Your Baby is being funded by the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation. There is so much good work going on around the country; we want to capture the best of it and spread the messages widely. We are always keen to hear of more good work that we can showcase, and would especially like to hear from anyone who thinks they have some good case histories that would make interesting press stories.
One of the first focus areas for the campaign has been television, often blamed for the current problems with early language and communication. We commissioned a research review, and held a conference to discuss the findings with academics, programme makers and other early years professionals. This has generated a great deal of press interest, with print journalists and local radio producers (and even breakfast television) keen to discuss the issue and ultimately find ways to communicate good ideas to parents.
We know that television is not the only thing implicated in the worrying decline in children's early language and communication skills, although the distraction and the noise of it do not help adults play actively with their children. Dialogue in the home is also not fostered through the dominance of solitary activities, such as computer games. Central heating has even been highlighted as a contributory factor; there was a time when the whole family gathered in one room, as it was the only room that was warm.
Whatever the reasons, we need to address the issue and bring it to the top of people's agendas so that we somehow reach the state where everyone knows that talking to babies and young children is pleasurable, not difficult, and vitally important.
Interest in the campaign has been widespread, with new people visiting the website daily, and signing up for the quarterly email newsletter. With our Esmée Fairbairn funding we have been able to appoint an information and communications officer, who will be able to spend more time developing the information resource for the web pages, and finding new links and useful organisations for the campaign.
We are working on a 12-month PR and media strategy to help spread the messages, and the work to find a range of partners has accelerated. We are working out how best to focus on specific themes, such as grandparents' role in early communication, and the impact of buggies facing away from the pusher.
The stakes are high, so we cannot fail in our aims: "Language, without question, is the key to learning. Children who fail to develop adequate speech and language skills in the first years of life are up to six times more likely to experience reading problems in school than those who receive adequate stimulation . Helping young children should be viewed as an investment, not a cost, since failure to act surely will mean far higher payments later on in remedial education, in unemployment, in crime - in wasted lives and promises unfulfilled."*
We hope it won't be too long before people don't need to ask us why we need Talk To Your Baby, but are instead able to join with us in working towards changing the culture so that the campaign is not needed any more, because it will have achieved its aim. Everyone will be talking and listening with their children, singing songs and reading books together, and generally enjoying their babies to the full.
* Ernest L. Boyer (1991) Ready to Learn, The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
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