“Use Your Words” gets conversations started between caregivers and young children

By Margi Shrum

Much attention has been paid recently to the importance of adults talking early and often to babies and young children.  Pediatricians, parents, caregivers and educators increasingly are promoting the significant impact that simple talking–face-to-face–can have in child development.

The Allegheny County Department of Human Services (DHS), stewards of the county’s most vulnerable populations (including children), recognizes that fact. So last year it undertook an educational campaign to get the word out. Called Use Your Words: Your Baby is Listening and Learning, the web-based campaign offers materials that educators, parents and caregivers can use with children ages birth to 5.

The campaign is based on the conclusions of research conducted in 1995 by Betty Hart and Todd R. Risley at the University of Kansas. Their study found that the more babies—even newborns — heard from their parents and caregivers, no matter the topic, the better children could communicate when they began to use their own words.

Use Your Words was also prompted by a study completed by the Lena Research Foundation of Boulder, Colorado. The study demonstrated that parents and caregivers often overestimate the amount they talk to their babies and young children and concluded that the message of talking early and often to them bears reinforcing.

Members of the DHS Office of Community Relations Communications Team also discussed the proliferation of mobile communication devices – smartphones and tablets – among young parents and caregivers as they developed informational materials for  Use Your Words. Those devices potentially detract from time parents and caregivers spend doing important talking with their children.

And although many TV programs, apps and other software can be useful devices in entertaining children, nothing has more impact on children’s development than close verbal interaction with adults. That message is emphasized throughout Use Your Words. Coincidentally, the DHS campaign launched only a few months after the American Academy of Pediatricians endorsed a policy that promotes reading aloud (more verbal interaction) to babies and children to encourage development.

The OCR Communications Team organized focus groups at DHS’s Mt. Oliver and Latino Family Support Centers while developing materials to ensure messages resonated with parents. The latter center included participation by Spanish-speaking parents. Use Your Words materials are available in Spanish.

Visit the “Use Your Words” website to learn more and to find tipsheets on how adults can easily incorporate talking to their babies and young children into their daily activities. Materials on the website also include curriculum suggestions for early childhood educators and caregivers to assist adults in understanding and practicing conversation with babies and children.

Margi Shrum is a Communications Specialist with the Allegheny County Department of Human Services. She can be reached at margi.shrum@alleghenycounty.us or 412-350-5482.