Nursery World - Reading scheme boosts children's language skills

An early years literacy scheme has helped pre-school children that were falling behind to catch up with their peers.

An independent study of the two-year pilot programme Early Words Together found that children who took part improved their language comprehension.

The scheme helps to develop young children’s communication and language skills through a six-week programme bringing practitioners and volunteers together to improve the home learning environment for children aged two to five in target families.

The two-year pilot programme run by the National Literacy Trust was funded by the Department for Education.

It involved children in 120 early years settings and children’s centres and nearly 1,000 volunteers and 2,000 parents.

An evaluation of the scheme's impact was carried out by Coventry University’s Centre for Research in Psychology, Behaviour and Achievement.

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