With a National Campaign to Narrow the Word Gap, LAUP Attends Clinton Global Initiative America
Los Angeles, Calif. (PRWEB) June 09, 2015 -- At the Clinton Global Initiative America (CGI America) meeting, which kicked off today, the Los Angeles County early education nonprofit, LAUP, presented the progress of its Take Time. Talk! campaign, a CGI America Commitment to Action which aims to close the 30-million word gap that exists between young children of low- and high-income households.
LAUP is a nonprofit that has provided quality preschool services for more than 640 preschools and more than 105,000 children in Los Angeles County. As an organization that rates and coaches preschools and other early care and education sites, LAUP’s style of early education coaching includes training teachers how to listen to young children and speak to them using open-ended questions and observations. This field work was used to develop Take Time. Talk!, which includes a set of tools to help parents increase their verbal interactions with infants, toddlers and preschool-age children.
The “Take Time. Talk!” word-building tools come in two forms: a set of 5” by 9” tent cards, used to help educators train other teachers and parents, and a pocket-sized accordion that can be taken on the go. Using a variety of conversation prompts and colorful imagery, the tools model how to talk more in-depth with infants, toddlers and preschool-age children in a variety of settings.
“In families that talk more, they tend not to just repeat themselves. They tend to elaborate. They’re building up knowledge,” said Dr. Anne Fernald, Director of Infant Studies at Stanford University, and one of the advisors to LAUP’s CGI America commitment.
“Words enrich children’s lives from the time they are born, but sometimes parents do not know how to talk to their babies and young children,” said Dr. Celia C. Ayala, CEO of LAUP. “The supplemental tools that we created help parents—help all of us—think about ways to engage children more through words, helping them interact with the world around them and giving them the vocabulary skills they need to be successful in that world.”
In addition, LAUP has agreed to support the local Campaign for Grade-Level Reading (CLGR) in Los Angeles as it tests and validates enhanced strategies to address three challenges to early reading proficiency – school readiness, attendance and summer learning. The work also will emphasize supporting parents and addressing health issues that can impede early learning.
LAUP’s support will be crucial in preparing for the launch in 2017 of an initiative known as “More Hopeful Futures,” which was spotlighted today in Denver during the CGI America conference. More Hopeful Futures will be the next phase of the campaign’s effort to increase reading proficiency, building on the early progress and ongoing work of the more than 160 communities that are part of the campaign, which commits to helping at least 50,000 more children get on the path to becoming proficient readers in third grade by 2018. CGLR will use LAUP’s Take Time. Talk! tools as part of its outreach to children and families.
National tests show that two-thirds of U.S. fourth graders, and four-fifths of those from low-income families, are not reading proficiently. Reading proficiency by the end of third grade is a milestone on a child’s path to high school graduation and later success because it marks the transition from “learning to read” to “reading to learn.” Students who have not mastered reading by that time are more likely to drop out of school and struggle throughout their lives.
About LAUP
LAUP is a 10-year-old non-profit organization whose mission is to support the development of the whole child, grow a qualified and diverse workforce, and strengthen family engagement in order to promote access and program excellence. Since 2005, LAUP has prepared more than 100,000 children for kindergarten and beyond by funding, rating and raising the level of quality preschool programs throughout Los Angeles County. laup.net
ABOUT CGI AMERICA
The Clinton Global Initiative (CGI), an initiative of the Clinton Foundation, convenes global leaders to create and implement solutions to the world’s most pressing challenges. Established in June 2011 by President Bill Clinton, the Clinton Global Initiative America (CGI America) addresses economic recovery in the United States. CGI America brings together leaders in business, government, and civil society to generate and implement commitments to create jobs, stimulate economic growth, foster innovation, and support workforce development in the United States. Since its first meeting, CGI America participants have made more than 400 commitments, which have improved the lives of nearly 1.4 million people.
CGI also convenes an Annual Meeting, which brings together global leaders to take action and create positive social change, CGI University (CGI U), which brings together undergraduate and graduate students to address pressing challenges in their community or around the world, and, this year, CGI will also convene CGI Middle East & Africa, which will bring together leaders across sectors to take action on pressing social, economic, and environmental challenges. For more information, visit clintonglobalinitiative.org and follow us on Twitter @ClintonGlobal and Facebook at facebook.com/clintonglobalinitiative.
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Claudia Sarmiento, LAUP, http://www.laup.net, +1 213-458-4809, [email protected]
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