The City of Providence has just been awarded a $5 million grant from Michael Bloomberg’s foundation. They are going have small children carry recording devices that are attached to specially designed clothing and record all conversations they have during the day. They’ll then analyze the content of the conversations and use them to counsel parents on how they can increase the vocabulary knowledge of their kids.

I know that a big issue for low-income children is exposure to higher-level vocabulary, but I have to say that this project also sounds a little creepy to me. I also wonder what kind of role parents have had in developing the program.

I couldn’t find out much about the program other than in the following two articles, so I’d love to hear from others who are more knowledgeable.

Providence Is Top City in Contest of Ideas is from The New York Times.

Providence, RI, wins $5M Bloomberg contest with plan to boost poor children’s language skills is from The Washington Post.