The program Les aventures de Mimi et ses amis is an innovative, research-based approach to early intervention by improving the french vocabulary of preschoolers at risk of potential difficulties. This program has been tested with 300 4-year-old children attending daycare or kindergarten. Results show that this approach is effective at reducing the vocabulary gap of children from different backgrounds.

 

Reading skills are key to integrating successfully into our society. When children start kindergarten, they normally have the skills to learn to read. However, these skills vary according to previously acquired language skills, and even more so according to the child’s socioeconomic background. In fact, we note an alarming imbalance in the richness of vocabulary between children of different backgrounds. The 30 books Les aventures de Mimi et ses amis were written and illustrated from a corpus of words known by children from privileged backgrounds, but unknown to children from disadvantaged backgrounds. Each book introduces 5 to 6 words followed by exercises aimed at recalling, discriminating and generalizing new words.