“We know that right now during the first three years of life, a child born into a low-income family hears 30 million fewer words than a child born into a well-off family. By giving more of our kids access to high-quality pre-school and other early learning programs, and by helping parents get the tools they need to help their kids succeed, we can give those kids a better shot at the career they are capable of, and a life that will make us all better off.” – President Barack Obama

Research has proven time and again that talking to children, especially when they’re still too young to speak, gives them a leg up when they reach school age and beyond.

Talking to children and encouraging them to engage in discussion using the words they do know will help them grow their vocabulary and set the pace for their educational development moving forward.

Health and Human Services, Department of Education, and Too Small to Fail have just launched a new toolkit for families, providers and health professionals to help them engage children in speech: Talking is Teaching: TALK, READ, SING TOGETHER EVERY DAY!

The materials come in English and Spanish and were completed in partnership with Sesame Workshop and the American Academy of Pediatrics, and they include a roadmap of speech milestones for children birth to age five so parents and caregivers know what to look for in speech development.

Check out their milestone road map online, and then download these amazing tools to start engaging the children in your care in language growth – then share these resources with the parents and providers in your community!

It’s that time of year again – when temperatures start to rise all over the country and life altering accidents have the potential to occur when we’re least expecting it.

Heatstroke is the leading cause of non-crash, vehicle-related deaths of children now according to SafeKids.org. On average, one child dies every 8 days from heatstroke in a vehicle – and it’s an event that can happen to any family at any time. Responsible parents can have a bad morning or a change in routine that allows them to forget their child in the backseat of their car for hours, or even an entire day.

The nationwide Day of Summer Learning is Friday, June 19, 2015! This is a national advocacy day led by the National Summer Learning Association (NSLA) and meant to show the importance of continuing learning, safety and wellness for children during the summer months.

Washington, D.C. – Child Care Aware® of America (CCAoA) is proud to announce the recognition of a silver ‘Power of A’ award from ASAE and the Center for Association Leadership.

Awareness of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) has been in the news recently, with more and more advocates and celebrities sharing their stories – whether it’s helpful to the diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder or not.

Yesterday Child Care Aware® of America joined the White House Office of Science & Technology Policy to highlight early literacy challenges and successes in communities across the country and share best practices and lessons learned. The word gap refers to children in low income communities starting school with 30 million less words  than their peers of higher socioeconomic status. The day consisted of advocates, led by Too Small to Fail, alongside top researchers and scientists, as well as federal and local policymakers, discussing the importance of creating a strong literacy foundation for all children.