Early education programs do not supplant parents, but support them as their childs first and most important teacher. The sad reality is that many low-income parents grew up in poverty and may not have the tools to support their childs education. Evidence-based programs coach low-income parents on how to best support their childs education at school and at home starting before the child is born. Only by supporting the family can we narrow the achievement gap and break the cycle of poverty.

One of the most essential experiences in shaping the architecture of the developing brain is “serve and return” interaction between children and significant adults in their lives. Young children naturally reach out for interaction through babbling, facial expressions, and gestures, and adults respond with the same kind of vocalizing and gesturing back at them. This back-and-forth process is fundamental to the wiring of the brain, especially in the earliest years. This video is part two of a three-part series titled “Three Core Concepts in Early Development” from the Center and the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child. The series depicts how advances in neuroscience, molecular biology, and genomics now give us a much better understanding of how early experiences are built into our bodies and brains, for better or for worse. Healthy development in the early years provides the building blocks for educational achievement, economic productivity, responsible citizenship, lifelong health, strong communities, and successful parenting of the next generation. For more information, please visit: https://developingchild.harvard.edu