TalkReadPlay has gained momentum between 2022 and 2024 with a 6 percentage point increase during that time in the percent of caregivers telling stories and singing songs to children ages 0-4 at least 4 times per week. 

Contributing factors: 

• Partnerships throughout the community began in 2022, forming collaboration and consistency of messaging about the benefits of TalkReadPlay. 

Limiting factors:

• Data is gained from community survey which might limit broad community participation. 
• Communication on benefits of TalkReadPlay is done only via TalkReadPlay partner organization locations, and thus limits potential exposure to full spectrum of community. 

Empowering caregivers* to be their child’s first and most important teacher helps create strong, positive and nurturing relationships. 90% of brain development happens in the first 5 years of life. Caring, responsive interactions between children and the adults in their lives are the building blocks for early brain development.  

TalkReadPlay (TRP) is a community movement designed  to strengthen families by promoting Early Relational Health, or the emotional wellbeing that grows from the positive connection between children and their caregivers.

*The Foundation uses the shorthand term caregivers to refer to any individual who may be involved in raising a child.

• Birth to Three
• Early Care & Education (AKA Childcare)
• Faith-Based Organizations
• Head Start
• Human Services
• Libraries
• Medical Providers (Health Care)
• Nonprofits
• Parents, Caregivers, Families
• Pre-K Education
• Public Health
• State Policymakers
• Women, Infants, and Children Nutrition Program (WIC)

BUILD KNOWLEDGE of Early Relational Health and child development 

BUILD CONNECTIONS

• Trusted Messengers support families in building protective factors, screening for needed supports and connecting to resources 

• Create environments that spark caregiver-child interaction: TRP Play Spaces, including TRP Center and park installations, Born Learning Trails, etc.

• Foster intergenerational learning, strengthening connections and pre-literacy: Dolly Parton Imagination Library

• Provide programming to increase caregiver/child  interaction and quality time spent together:  Daily Vroom App, Playgroups, Storytime, Dolly Parton Imagination Library

• Increase access to proven strategies: Pyramid Model, ASQ Developmental Screener, Triple P (Positive Parenting Program), Home Visitation (Parents as Teachers), Reach Out and Read, Parents Interacting with Infants

TRANSFORM SYSTEMS

• Center caregivers as their child’s first and most important teacher in alignment with their cultures and traditions

• Ensure providers serving families are trained in Early Relational Health

​​​​​​​ADVANCE POLICY

• Support 2-generation family economic security and mobility: Paid family leave, child tax credit, and assistance with food, housing, income, and other concrete needs

• Increase access to perinatal mental health supports

Raise awareness:

• Reinforce messages via marketing and promotion.

• Conduct population level survey to assess awareness of TRP and frequency of reading, singing and telling stories.

Build connections: 

• Build capacity of community partners (i.e. Trusted Messengers) to provide quality programming that promotes early positive relationships.

• Promote Dolly Parton Imagination Library.

Transform systems: 

• Train new and existing Trusted Messengers on importance of early brain development, Early Relational Health and core components of TalkReadPlay.

Data included = TRP community survey conduscted in the spring. Survey is sent to community members through various foundation partnership family lists including Dolly Parton Imagination Library participants. 

**Methodology Change**  as of 2023, Data from Watertown Public Library survey (June 2022) and Watertown Family Connections survey (Sept 2022), Lake Mills Clinic patient survey (2022) no longer included.