Time flies when you’re having fun, and our Brain Bag babies have been living it up!

The first babies to receive a Brain Bag are 1 year old now. The Brain Bag project was launched with a $106,000 grant from IMPACT 100 Pensacola Bay Area. Baptist and West Florida hospitals began giving moms the early literacy toolkits in April 2017. Sacred Heart began handing them out in May of that year.

As of the end of this April, 5,483 families have received the literacy kits, and a lesson in the important role that parent talk and interaction plays in healthy early brain development.

This year, we adjusted the Brain Bag survey to ask moms two questions: Rate your knowledge of how parent talk influences early brain development before the Brain Bag lesson, and then rate it after.

Here’s what the moms from the first quarter of this year have told us: 

— West Florida: 6.5 to 9.4.

— Baptist: 6.5 to 8.9.

— Sacred Heart: 6.7 to 9.75.

This tells us that the lessons given by nurses and the tools in the Brain Bag are giving parents more confidence to use the Three T’s to Tune In, Take Turns and Talk More with their babies.

And if you are one of those first Brain Bag babies — with a birthday in April or May — we have a birthday gift for you! Email [email protected] to get yours while supplies last!