I love it when interesting sociological studies are used to create public policy. There has been a lot of discussion on this blog about the research about parents talking to children. In short, the research finds that a child’s vocabulary and IQ grows in proportion to the rate their parents talk to him/her. And there is a difference between the classes in terms of how much people talk to their kids.

An article in the New Yorker looks at an effort by the Mayor of Province to implement a program to increase the parent-child speech patterns in needy families. Caseworkers would talk to young parents about the value of talking with young children.

Taveras named his proposed project Providence Talks, and decided that technology would be supported with counselling. During home visits with low-income parents, caseworkers would discuss the science of early brain development. They’d advise parents to try to understand better what their kids were feeling, instead of simply saying no. Parents would be told that, even when they were bathing a child or cooking dinner, they could be narrating what was going on, as well as singing, counting, and asking questions. The caseworkers would bring books and demonstrate how to read them: asking children questions about what was going to happen next and livening up the dialogue with funny, high-pitched voices and enthusiastic mooing and woofing.

Because I had a kid with a speech delay, I have seen the benefits of constant chatter. But the critics of these policies make some good points, too. This policy is certainly not a silver bullet. Worth a read.