Nursery World - Health visitors to be trained to close the word gap

A thousand health visitors in the most deprived parts of England will be given specialist training to help close the language gap between disadvantaged children and their peers.

The plan was announced today by the children’s minister Nadhim Zahawi at a conference of early years professionals in Manchester.

Health visitors – who routinely do home visits to check on a child’s development at age two – will receive extra training to identify speech, language and communication needs early on, with a new assessment and support package.

The programme is a joint initiative between the Department for Education and Public Health England (PHE) and will focus on parents who may lack the time, resources, or confidence to support their children’s learning at home.

The first wave of training involves 400 health visitors in 49 areas identified as being in high need, based on deprivation factors including free school meal eligibility and the EYFS Profile results for speech, language and communication at the end of Reception.

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