ZUNGUMZA NA
MTOTO MCHANGA
Talk to Your Baby
Janet & David Townend
Improving early language development
leads to
 Bigger vocabulary
 Better sentence construction
 Earlier reading and writing readiness
 Readiness for learning other languages
 Enhanced cognitive potential
but, are babies in Tanzania getting a good enough
early language experience?
Encouragements and Challenges
 ‘Are you sure Tanzanian mothers don’t talk to
their babies?
 ‘Of course mothers interact with their babies…’
 ‘That makes complete sense to me…’
 ‘Go for it!’
and finally, from MoEVT “Let’s do it”
Many meetings followed.....
We went to the field
 We piloted the attitude questionnaire
 We taught a lesson to Standard 5, about
the importance of talking to babies
 We talked to groups of mothers in village
churches
Now the project looks like this
 Key activities (to be completed):
 Community-based research
 Focus on community reach for intervention
 Incorporation of learning into existing early
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childhood development (ECD) provision
Incorporation in curricula (primary, adult &
training of relevant professionals)
Training of trainers
Learning packs for self-study
Information campaign
Partner organisations (so far):
 Inter-ministerial Task Force (3 ministries)
 UDOM
 WAMA
 Children in Crossfire
 VSO
 TECDEN
 Monduli Pastoralist Development Initiative
+ UDSM, UWEZO, World Bank, Save the Children,
TAWREF, CSWD (Mafia) are getting involved
What the stakeholders are doing
now
 Shifting ownership from volunteers to Tanzanian
stakeholders.
 Expressing their strong desire to bring about
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behaviour change, starting now.
Distributing responsibilities between
stakeholders.
Following up their commitment to using existing
routes
Focusing on rural poor, as the most needy group
Making progress on the key activities
ZUNGUMZA NA
MTOTO MCHANGA
Research evidence
Nobel prize winning economist
and child development expert,
James Heckman, wrote
recently:
“Skill formation starts in the
womb. The early years of a child’s
life before the child enters school
lay the foundations for all that
follows”
Neural connections for
language (Harvard University)
 Are established mostly in the first
year
 Depend upon a good language
environment
 Question: How many words do you
think an infant in Tanzania
typically hears at home in one
hour?
Number of words heard
Literacy acquisition
depends on language
levels at 24 months
(Blanden, 2006)
Academic success
correlates very highly
with size of vocabulary
at age 5 (Roulstone et al.,
2011)
International researchers
agree that:
 Language skill is central to intellectual
and social development in children (Cain
& Oakhill, 2007)
 Some say it is the most important factor
(Harvard University)
 Language development is most active in
the first year of life (Ryan & Deci, 2000)
 Early language experience is the most
important experience for children to
achieve their potential (Sylva et al., 2008)
Why start early?
Cost to benefit ratio of
interventions in early education
 Is highest in the first three years
(Doyle et al., 2007)
 This is before the start of formal
education (Heckman, 2011)
What affects ECD?
What affects ECD?
Home environment is even
more important than length
of time at preschool
Conclusion
Parents must be their
child’s first teachers
Education starts at birth
Effects of socio-economic
status
The rich win on
 Better school readiness
 Larger vocabulary
 Fewer behaviour problems
 This is why Zungumza na Mtoto
Mchanga must target the
disadvantaged. In Tanzania,
that means the rural poor.
What do we already know in
Tanzania?
 Anecdotal & observation evidence so far:
 Little verbal interaction between parents and
babies
 Parents do not expect babies to need /
understand language
 Hardly anyone knows of the importance of
early language
There is now a need for:
 Baseline research to establish present
language experience of babies
 Attitude survey to establish current
beliefs & practice about language &
babies
 Investigation of the effectiveness of
capacity building among families
 Reporting of the findings
References
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Harvard University Centre on the Developing Child. ‘In Brief: the science of
early childhood development’. www.developingchild.harvard.edu . 2007.
Blanden, J. ‘Bucking the trend – what enables those who are disadvantaged in
childhood to succeed later in life?’. 2006. Cited in DfE/DoH ‘Supporting
families in the foundation years’. London, UK: HMSO, 2011.
Roulstone, S.et al. ‘The role of language in children’s early educational
outcomes’. London, UK: DfE, 2011.
Cain, K. And Oakhill, J. ‘Children’s comprehension problems in oral and written
language’. Guilford Press, 2007.
Harvard University Centre on the Developing Child. ‘In Brief: the science of
early childhood development’. www.developingchild.harvard.edu . 2007.
Ryan, R. and Deci, E. ‘Intrinsic and extrinsic motivations: classic definitions
and new directions’. Journal of Contemporary Educational Psychology, vol.
25, pp. 54-67. 2000.
Sylva, K. et al. ‘Effective pre-school and primary education 3-11 project: preschool, school and family influences on children’s development during Key
Stage 2 (age 7-11)’. 2008. Cited in DfE/DoH ‘Supporting families in the
foundation years’. London, UK: HMSO, 2011.
Taylor, M. ‘The politics of parenting’. In Brack, D. et al. ‘Re-inventing the state:
social liberalism for the 21st Century’. 2007.
Doyle, O. et al. ‘Early childhood intervention: rationale, timing and efficacy’.
2007.
Heckman, J. ‘The American family in black and white: a post-racial strategy
for improving skills to promote equality’, 2011.