A look at how to encourage
families to adopt positive, responsive parenting practices using
the framework proposed in Switch: How to Change Things When
Change is Hard
It is
widely accepted that our experience in the first 1,000 days of
life sets the stage for later success and that America's growing
achievement gap is best attacked by targeting the development of
children from infancy. Given that parents or caregivers are the
main influence in young children's lives, programs like Reach Out
and Read that effectively provide parents with the information and
tools they need to give their children the best start in life have
a powerful effect on our communities and society.
The success of any intervention
depends on getting people to embrace change, and this is a
particular challenge for programs that aim to promote a difference
in parenting styles. Encouraging families, whose parenting is a
deeply engrained response to their own childhood, to adopt new
practices is an aspect of any early childhood intervention that
needs to be carefully considered.
I
recently read the book Switch, subtitled How to Change
Things When Change is Hard by brothers Chip and Dan Heath. I'm
a little late to the table, as Switch was published to
great acclaim in 2010, and was on the New York Times bestseller
list for 47 weeks. On the Heath brothers'
website, Switch is described, accurately, as "a
compelling, story-driven narrative [that brings] together decades
of counterintuitive research in psychology, sociology and other
fields to shed new light on how we can effect transformative
change."
Using the analogy of a rider on an
elephant, the authors propose a three-part framework to bring about
change - direct the rider (the rational mind), motivate the
elephant (the emotional mind), and shape the path (the
environment). They describe how, to elicit change, it's essential
to articulate crystal clear instructions that enable the rider to
direct the elephant, to make an emotional appeal that will give the
elephant energy to move in the right direction, and to provide an
environment conducive to change. Considering Reach Out and Read
from this perspective, I am impressed that, despite predating the
publication of Switch by 21 years, our model follows their
framework!
First, let's look at directing the
rider. With the aim of encouraging families to develop positive,
responsive parenting, Reach Out and Read doctors promote reading
aloud every day. In recent years, it has become clear that healthy
early brain development is dependent on positive family
interactions in which parents engage with their young children
right from the start. And yet an instruction to "engage with your
young children every day" is difficult to put into practice. A
simple message to read aloud every day, given with details as to
how best to do this at each developmental stage, is a great way of
helping parents spend some time each day connecting with their
infants and toddlers. Even when it seems strange to suggest that
parents read aloud to a baby, it can be easier for many parents to
cuddle a young child and let them hear the sound of their voice as
they read aloud than to think of what to say.
Secondly, motivating the elephant. The emotional
instinct for all parents in wanting to do the best for their
children is huge; they often just want to be shown how. Knowing
that spending time with their children and connecting with them
will help prepare their children for school and for all that
follows, and having an easily manageable way to do this, parents
are motivated to make change. As Rosa, one of our Reach Out and
Read parents said "Reading to my son will make a difference in how
he does in school. I want to do that for him."
Finally, shaping the path. Many of
the families that Reach Out and Read serves do not have any books
at home. By giving each child a new developmentally-appropriate
book to take home with them at each of 10 medical checkups from
infancy, we provide the tools necessary to implement the change.
For those parents, whose first language is not English, we offer
books in 12 different languages, and books can even be useful for
parents who don't read - we encourage them to talk about the story
that the pictures tell. We are also partnering with the Institute
of Museum and Library Services to encourage partnerships between
Reach Out and Read sites and their local libraries, to expand the
selection of books available for families to read aloud.
It is encouraging to read a book
that has received accolades for its proposal of a framework that is
powerful in creating transformative change, and to see that the
Reach Out and Read model has all of the characteristics required.
This is substantiated by research showing that parents served by
Reach Out and Read are up to four times more likely to read aloud
to their children. By continuing to promote parental engagement
through reading aloud, and expanding our program to reach more
children, Reach Out and Read can bring about the change in
parenting practice that will have a powerful impact on their
children's, and our society's future.
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