Early literacy promotion in pediatric primary care supports parents and caregivers in reading with their children from birth, offering counseling in interactive, developmentally appropriate strategies and providing developmentally and culturally appropriate and appealing children's books. This technical report reviews the evidence that reading with young children supports language, cognitive, and social-emotional development. Promoting early literacy in pediatric primary care offers a strengths-based strategy to support families in creating positive childhood experiences, which strengthen early relational health.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAim: Media use in children has exploded in the past several decades, most recently fuelled by portable electronic devices. This study aims to explore differences in functional brain connectivity in children during a story-listening functional MRI (fMRI) task using data collected before (1998) and after (2013) the widespread adoption of media.
Methods: Cross-sectional data were collected from English-speaking 5- to 7-year-old children at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, USA, of a functional MRI narrative comprehension task completed in 1998 (n = 22) or 2013 (n = 25).
Rhyming is a phonological skill that typically emerges in the preschool-age range. Prosody/rhythm processing involves right-lateralized temporal cortex, yet the neural basis of rhyming ability in young children is unclear. The study objective was to use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to quantify neural correlates of rhyming abilities in preschool-age children.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: Parent-child "shared" reading is a catalyst for development of language and other emergent literacy skills. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that parents initiate shared reading as soon as possible after birth. Persistent disparities exist in reading resources, routines, and subsequent literacy outcomes, disproportionately impacting low-income households.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEnvironmental factors such as Home Literacy Environment (HLE), screen time, and parental executive functions (EF) may influence the development of the child's EF. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of these factors on behavioral and neurobiological measures of EF in 4-year-old children. Electroencephalogram (EEG) data were collected while children performed the Attention Network Task (ANT), showing a smaller difference between incongruent and congruent conditions is related to better EF abilities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPremature children are at high risk for delays in language and reading, which can lead to poor school achievement. Neuroimaging studies have assessed structural and functional connectivity by diffusion MRI, functional MRI, and magnetoencephalography, in order to better define the "reading network" in children born preterm. Findings point to differences in structural and functional connectivity compared to children born at term.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe American Academy of Pediatrics recommends limits on digital media use ("screen time"), citing cognitive-behavioral risks. Media use in early childhood is ubiquitous, though few imaging-based studies have been conducted to quantify impacts on brain development. Cortical morphology changes dynamically from infancy through adulthood and is associated with cognitive-behavioral abilities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFScreen-based media has become a prevailing part of children's lives. Different technologies provide limitless access to a wide range of content. This accessibility has immensely increased screen exposure among children, showing that this exposure is associated with decreased cognitive abilities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: The AAP recommends "shared" reading from early infancy for healthy development. However, many families are uncertain how to read most enjoyably and effectively with infants, especially from underserved backgrounds. Shared reading quality (interactivity) moderates benefits yet is challenging to measure.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAim: Digital media use is prevalent among children and linked to potential developmental and health risks, but validated measures of children's digital media use are lacking. The aim of this study was to validate the Portuguese version of the ScreenQ with three distinct children's age groups.
Methods: Parents of children living in Portugal completed an online survey including the 16-item version of the ScreenQ and items related to home activities and digital media use.
Parent-child "shared" reading can be a rich source of language exposure. Clinic-based programs, notably Reach Out and Read (ROR), are intended to enhance this. However, ROR has been traditionally introduced at 6 months and only recently expanded to younger ages.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFLiteracy is a major social determinant of health, rooted in skills that develop during early childhood. Children arriving at kindergarten unprepared to learn to read are more likely to have low reading proficiency thereafter. General and health literacy are highly correlated, affecting understanding of health conditions, treatment adherence, and transition to self-care and adult healthcare services.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground And Objectives: The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends literacy promotion as well as routine developmental surveillance during well-child visits to improve academic, relational, and health outcomes. In this study, we examined the possible association between shared reading and social-emotional problems among young children.
Methods: We conducted a retrospective review of longitudinal records for children aged 30 to 66 months presenting for visits to an academic pediatric primary care center between July 1, 2013, and February 1, 2019.
Ten to 15% of school-age children have reading difficulties (RD, or dyslexia), defined by deficits in phonological processing, fluency, and executive functions (EFs). Although RD is referred to as a genetic disorder, reading ability may also be affected by environmental factors such as inadequate exposure to literacy and a lack of parental involvement. These environmental components are a part of the socioeconomic status (SES) measure, which is defined by parental occupation, educational attainment, and household income and are positively correlated to reading ability.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: To estimate feasibility, usability and efficacy of a mobile parenting app (Rx for Success; RxS) to enhance reading guidance provided to parents of young children during well-visits.
Methods: This trial was conducted at a clinic serving primarily families of Hispanic ethnicity and low-socioeconomic status (SES) where Reach Out and Read (ROR) is standard practice. It involved 252 parent-child dyads in 2 age groups (~6-months old, ~18-months old) randomized during well-visits to receive RxS or a children's book modeling alternatives to screen time (Control) by research coordinators.
Introduction: Maternal depression is characterized by a lack of emotional responsiveness and engagement with their child, which may lead to the child's decreased cognitive, and language outcomes all related to the child's future reading outcomes. The relations between maternal depression and functional connectivity in neural circuits supporting language in the child was explored.
Methods: Eleven 4-year-old girls completed language abilities assessment and resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging scan.
Importance: Literacy has been described as an important social determinant of health. Its components emerge in infancy and are dependent on genetic, medical, and environmental factors. The American Academy of Pediatrics advocates a substantial role for pediatricians in literacy promotion, developmental surveillance, and school readiness to promote cognitive, relational, and brain development.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMedEdPublish (2016)
February 2021
This article was migrated. The article was marked as recommended. Multi-campus medical schools can differ in medical curriculum delivery due to location specific factors, creating different learning contexts.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground And Objectives: The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends literacy and school readiness promotion during well visits. (TRH) is a children's book-based screener of emergent literacy skills in preschool-aged children. Vocabulary, rhyming, and rapid naming are core emergent skills, and reading abilities are associated with thicker cortex in the left hemisphere.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: To assess whether a citywide structured book-sharing program (NICU Bookworms) designed to promote reading to infants while admitted in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) would increase parental reading behaviors (≥3-4 days/week) in the NICU and after discharge home, including high-risk parents who do not themselves enjoy reading.
Study Design: The NICU Bookworms program comprised staff training, parent education, and building a literacy-rich environment. In this quasi-experimental intervention study, parents of medically high-risk NICU graduates <6 months of age were administered a questionnaire at their first NICU follow-up clinic visit.
An adverse relationship between screen exposure time and brain functional/structural connectivity was reported in typically developing children, specifically related to neurobiological correlates of reading ability. As children with reading difficulties (RD) suffer from impairments in reading and executive functions (EF), we sought to determine the association between the ratio of screen time duration to reading time duration and functional connectivity of EF networks to the entire brain in children with RD compared to typical readers (TRs) using resting state data. Screen/reading time ratio was related to reduced reading and EF abilities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF