Better Health Start for Life Home Learning Environment

On 6 October 2022, the Department for Education, in conjunction with the Department of Health and Social Care’s Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID), will launch the new home learning environment (HLE) campaign. The campaign has been designed to encourage parents and carers to chat, play and read more with their children, developing their communication, language and literacy skills before starting school.

Some of the poorest children in the UK start school months behind their peers and the gap can grow through their school years. As a result, children with poor vocabulary skills at age 5 are likely to do less well academically and may be up to twice as likely to be unemployed in their 30s.

The COVID-19 pandemic has made things worse: there has been a rise in the number of children starting school with language skills poorer than would have been expected before.

We want to encourage parents and carers to chat, play and read more with their children to develop their communication, language and literacy skills before starting school. We want to support and empower parents to do more learning and play activities with their children and help overcome the key barriers we know they face, such as lack of time, confidence and not knowing the types of activities that are beneficial. The reality is that these activities take little time, can happen anywhere and can easily be interwoven with daily tasks. And, ultimately, it is as rewarding for parents and carers as it is for their children.

The main objective of the campaign will be to direct parents to our HLE online hub, where they can find ideas of activities to do with their children and explore where to find further support in their local area.

We know that what happens during the first few years of life (starting in the womb) has lifelong effects on many aspects of health and wellbeing – from obesity, heart disease and mental wellbeing, to educational achievement and economic status. We also know that parental behaviours impact heavily on their child’s behaviours. Parents’ health can act as an enabler or barrier to nurturing their children’s development.

Research shows that becoming a parent presents an opportunity to provide information to support behaviour change, and that when looking for information and advice people want validated sources of authority, such as the NHS. This puts the Start for Life Information Service for Parents in a unique position within a very crowded market of pregnancy and parenting advice.

Start for Life Information Service for Parents is a universal offering, for all parents-to-be and parents of children up to four and a half years old. The service provides regular emails to the audience as their child reaches key milestones.

Start for Life has a particular focus on those from less socioeconomically privileged backgrounds, as we know that they are much less likely to be searching for and accessing reliable information on pregnancy and parenting. Healthcare professionals are also a target audience as they are a key channel for driving people to Start for Life services.

A free bite-sized e-learning introduction to the best start in life including key evidence, data and signposting.