"Baby Talk Bonanza"

In the article "Baby Talk Bonanza" the author, Sara Neufeld, claims that intelligence stems from the amount of communication that a child is exposed to from birth on. She supports her argument by referencing pediatric surgeon Dana Suskind and her work with hearing-impaired children. After performing a cochlear implant in a young child, Suskind does follow up work regarding the child learning to talk. From her work, Suskind noticed a disturbing trend that children from low-income families were lagging far behind after surgery and saw that their success of speaking was not nearly as high. Neufeld writes, "Their landmark study in the 1990s found that a child born into poverty hears 30 million fewer words by age 3 than a child born to well-off parents, creating a gap n literacy preparation that has implications for a lifetime". These startling statistics were extremely concerning to Suskind and lead to her creation of The Thirty Million Words Project. This social movement deals with the issue that children are not simply born smart, but they are instead made smart by their parents talking with them, and The Thirty Million Words Project strives to promote communication. Although the parents may not have the best education or job, they can still tremendously influence the future of their children by simply having more conversation and asking questions. Even Aneish Newell, a participant of The Thirty Million Words Project, said that by increasing communication with her young children she saw dramatic results. Her four year old daughter was capable of spelling her full name, remembering her address and phone number, identifying and spelling colors, and even counting to high numbers which are many things that other four years olds cannot yet do. Even Newell herself, has found the encouragement to work on her education though this project. Overall, regardless of ones race, gender, economic condition, etc., we all have the power to influence the future of today's youth by simply promoting communication.