Children from poorer backgrounds over a year behind in language skills, study finds [IrishTimes]
- Published: 29 September 2010
CHILDREN FROM low-income families are 1½ years behind their middle-class peers in language ability when they start school, according to a US literacy expert.
Dr Timothy Shanahan, who was appointed by former US president George Bush to advise on literacy, said these research findings from the University of Chicago were shocking.
“That’s a big difference when you think of a five- or six-year-old child who’s already a year and a half behind his peers,” he said.
“One of the things they found was that the average middle-class first grader [aged five or six] had been read to for more than 1,200 hours.
“There were children in a lot of low-income families who would have been only read to 25 hours in their entire life. Think about that difference in terms of the amount of language experience.”
Full Story: www.irishtimes.com
