Pre-school children need proper medical care to develop healthy minds and bodies. Good parents and pediatricians realize school readiness starts way before a child ever steps foot in a school. Early parent-child interaction has a tremendous impact on a child’s future success in and out of the classroom, but healthcare professionals also have a role to play. Pediatricians can ensure a child is ready for school during a well-child check-up (a visit to the doctor) long before kindergarten.
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Maternal-Child Health Bureau’s Bright Futures health initiative, a comprehensive well-child visit includes: nutrition, safety, immunizations, development, oral health, behavior, sleep, and the actual physical exam. This comprehensive checklist grows as parents often come to check-ups with other concerns.
A pediatrician’s role in school readiness and improved child outcomes starts with coaching. Some parents need to be coached on how to care for their children as it relates to nutrition, development, and parenting techniques. Parents receive written material on proper childcare during the well-child visit so the doctor can review it with them and answer questions. Written material supplements coaching and conversation; doctors can provide real-world examples to further illustrate good parenting’s effect on early childhood development and future school success.
In my practice, we serve an extremely diverse population of all types of families ranging from the homeless to middle class and military families. Health care professionals, when considering how to address school readiness or educational outcomes, must consider a child’s home environment and daily routine in addition to a child’s physical condition. It does no good to send a perfectly physically healthy child to school unprepared to participate in the educational process.
Good pediatricians should encourage parents to talk with their children. This may seem simplistic, but research shows talking to your baby during the first two years of life makes them strong readers; a strong reader is measured by reading on or above grade level by third grade. This is especially important when you consider approximately a third of our children today are not reading proficiently by the third grade. Even more sobering, children who do not read on grade level by third grade are a greater risk of dropping out of high school.
In my practice, we encourage parents to talk to their babies face-to-face as much as possible and remind them that talking stops when the TV is on. We let families know that children hear 10 times as many words during a face-to-face conversation when there’s no distraction like TV. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no TV for children under the age of two years. Building a strong vocabulary means children will be ready to learn and receptive to instruction when they begin school.
There are 13 Bright Futures’ well-child visits between birth and kindergarten, so a primary care health professional has numerous opportunities to stress the importance of talking. One way parents can make talking even more educational is by reading to the child. During the six-month well-child check-up, I provide age appropriate, culturally relevant books. This continues through the remainder of visits through our partnership with Reach Out and Read.
It’s always rewarding to see the look on the faces of a child and parent when we come into the exam room with a shiny, new book for them to take home. It also gives us another opportunity to show the connections among talking, reading and school readiness.
Pediatricians across the U.S. owe it to our children to address more than physical development. A whole-child approach in which healthcare professionals coach parents and inspire families to talk and read together will undoubtedly prepare our children for a bright future.
Dr. David Tayloe is the former president of the American Academy of Pediatrics and is a pediatrician in Goldsboro, NC. He has given presentations about brain development and school readiness sponsored by AchieveGuilford and Reach Out and Read. He can be reached at DTayloe@GOLDSBOROPEDS.COM.
