Submission Type: Research-Based
Final Rating: Well-Supported by Research
Date Submitted: Fall 2023
Focus Area: Child Development
Focus Population: Children, Teachers, Owners, Caregivers, Guardians, Administrators, Parents
Contact Information:
Dr. Steve Hannon
President and CEO
(303) 441-9085
LENA
361 Centennial Parkway Suite 100, Louisville, CO 80027
Goals and Outcomes:
LENA has conducted research showing significant variability in how much adults talk with children and that those who talk the least tend to overestimate how much they talk the most. LENA technology provides actionable data through clear reporting, indicating how much talk is happening. LENA Grow then delivers a single, straightforward, proven solution to boosting language development, supporting social-emotional development, increasing teacher satisfaction, and focusing on family engagement. It provides early childhood educators the tools to improve language environments equitably and connect with every child in their care. In just five weeks of LENA Grow curriculum and coaching, educators renew the energy, dedication, and pride with which they approach the profession, appreciating more than ever just how critical a role they play in children’s lives. The coaching and feedback loop increases interaction and a heightened sense of connectedness with the children. The children gain all the short- and long-term benefits of increased conversational turns. That’s according to a rapidly growing body of peer-reviewed research and independent evaluations. The main goal or proxy for measuring programmatic success is increased conversational turns measured by the LENA device. Educators participating in LENA Grow measurably increase conversational turns with the children in their care. On average, children who started out experiencing less talk than their peers in their classroom had an average increase of 40%. Children who started out experiencing less talk than the national median of 15 turns per hour had an average increase of 56%. LENA has worked to maintain these outcomes across all programs and partners since the program’s inception in 2018. Conversational turns are also a direct proxy for measuring the quality of an early childhood classroom environment. LENA has been shown to help teachers increase interaction, individualize their communication with each child, and build responsive caregiving skills, leading to improved teaching practice and measurable increases in scores on independent classroom- and child-level assessments. All these outcomes can ‘crosswalk’ with quality measurements of various quality rating and improvement tools used by early childhood systems across the country. LENA continues to see alignment with quality in the early childhood ecosystem as a primary goal or strategy for increasing LENA Grows impact and scale. We expect the following direct outcomes, measured by LENA:
1. At least a 40 percentile gain in conversational turns for children in the bottom third of the room.
2. At least a 56 percentile gain in conversational turns for children experiencing low talk.
A 10-year study by LENA researchers confirms that the amount of talk with adults that children experience in the first three years of life is related to their verbal abilities and IQ in adolescence. The adult words and especially the conversations the children experienced between 18 and 24 months correlated 10 years later with their IQ, verbal comprehension, vocabulary, and other language skills. While we do not expect to measure the cohort participating in this grant 10 years later, we think it is worth noting the evidence-based outcomes that can arise from LENA intervention.
Brief Summary:
LENA is a national nonprofit on a mission to transform children's futures through early talk technology and data-driven programs. To do this, we care deeply about conversational turns. The more conversational turns, or early talk, a child has, the better their outcomes will be. LENA technology, the only validated measure of conversational turns globally, powers the research discoveries proving conversational turns' importance. Increases in conversational turns in the first years of a child's life are directly linked to brain growth and function, reading skills, IQ scores, social emotional development, language and reasoning, and vocabulary skills.
LENA’s programs help caregivers across the globe tap into this power of conversational turns. LENA pairs our industry-leading ‘talk pedometer’, which measures a child’s language environment and generates easy-toready data reports, with personalized, actionable feedback crafted through research-based strategies, with the ultimate outcome being increasing the quantity of early talk in both home and classroom settings.
To accelerate the increase of conversational turns, we work in partnership with trusted community organizations and support replicating the conditions we know are best for children’s engagement with adults. Over the last 8 years of program implementation, we have worked with over 400 partners to serve over 35,000 children in classrooms and over 20,000 families through home settings. Our vision is a world where every child benefits from positive relationships and responsive interactions through increased early talk, and we hope to bring LENA to more children aged 0 -5 and their providers across the State of Oklahoma. More specifically, we hope to expand the impact of LENA Grow, our childcare job-embedded professional development program for early childhood teachers that aims to increase this early talk in the classroom. Early childhood educators play a vital role in children’s development, yet often lack training to interact and engage with infants and toddlers to stimulate their language development and brain growth. LENA Grow is a research and evidence-based solution that empowers these providers to talk more through data, support, and coaching.
LENA: Building Brains Through Early Talk