Le Roux, Elizabeth WilhelminaEccles, RenataAbdoola, Shabnam SalimGraham, Marien AletVan der Linde, Jeannie2023-02-172023-02-172022-03-02Le Roux, E.W., Eccles, R., Abdoola, S., Graham, M. & Van der Linde, J., 2022, ‘The effect of a parental mHealth resource on language outcomes in 4- to 5-year-old children’, South African Journal of Childhood Education 12(1), a1026. https://DOI.org/10.4102/sajce.v12i1.1026.2223-7674 (print)2223-7682 (online)10.4102/sajce.v12i1.1026https://repository.up.ac.za/handle/2263/89689BACKGROUND : The use of mobile health (mHealth) technology is rapidly expanding in healthcare worldwide. mHealth tools may provide parents with access to resources essential for promoting language development. AIM : The current study aimed to determine how an mHealth parental resource influenced 42 preschool children's (4.0-5.11 months old) language abilities after a 17-week intervention period. SETTING : Participants were identified from six early childhood development (ECD) centres from a low-income community in Tshwane, South Africa. METHOD : A randomised controlled trial (RCT), pre-test post-test research design was employed to determine whether an mHealth parental resource influenced 42 preschool children's (4.0-5.11 months old) language abilities after a 17-week intervention period. Data were collected using the language subtests of a South African standardised protocol, the Emergent Literacy and Language Assessment Protocol (ELLA). RESULTS : The parental mHealth application targeting language stimulation did not significantly improve the experimental group's language outcomes when compared with the control group because most of the parents (n = 27) used the application for less than 20% of the active days. CONCLUSION : Providing parents with more support with mobile resources may lead to improved usage of the application.en© 2022. The Authors. Licensee: AOSIS. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License.Parental resourceLanguage developmentPreschool childrenMobile health (mHealth)Early childhood development (ECD)Article