Trajectories of the Home Learning Environment Across the First 5 Years: Associations With Children's Vocabulary and Literacy Skills at Prekindergarten

A study that looked at the home environments of more than 1,850 children from households at or below the federal poverty line showed that factors such as levels of shared reading, exposure to frequent and varied adult speech, and access to children’s books had an impact on school readiness skills. “As a parent, it is never too early to engage your child in learning,” said Amber Story, a social psychologist and deputy director of the National Science Foundation’s Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences, which funded the study. “This research suggests that the degree to which parents read and talk to their infant; point and label objects in the environment; and provide engaging books and toys when their child is only 15 months old can have long-lasting effects on the infant’s language skills years later.”