Not Just a Day of Play

News | Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Intensive, individualized home visitation is the foundation upon which Any Baby Can is built. The agency offers children and families a range of services in their natural environment, including case management, physical and speech therapy, parenting education, mental health counseling and more. Study after study reports the positive, long-term impact of working with families in their home environment. However, to provide socialization experiences and to break the isolation so many of our families face, in addition to intensive home visitation Any Baby Can coordinates events for clients. These activities may seem like just an extra perk, but the benefits are quite substantial.

Pictured right: HFS mom, Violeta, and baby, Rodrigo, enjoy Music Day at Symphony Square.
Photo credit: Lauren Hammonds for United Way Capital Area

For example, this summer, the Any Baby Can Healthy and Fair Start (HFS) Program arranged for families to attend Music Day at Symphony Square. The event, which was open to the public, was one of several ABC initiatives to introduce families to fun, free local resources that are appropriate and accessible for young children. Music provides excellent stimulation for a child’s language, intellectual and social development. When it’s live and interactive, it’s even better. Parents attending the concert were encouraged to share rhymes and songs with their infants and children on a daily basis. The evidence-based Parents as Teachers curriculum, used in HFS, teaches parents that repetition, rhythm and rhyme have a neurological impact on the brain’s ability to organize sounds and stimuli into logical patterns, self-soothe, calm emotions and focus attention; leading to greater success speaking, reading and interacting with others in the present and later on in life. To kids, Music Day was nothing more than a fun morning of singing and dancing. Little did they know, that lively version of “Head and Shoulders, Knees and Toes” got their minds moving, too.

Photo credit: Lauren Hammonds for United Way Capital Area