The Tiny Happy People text messaging programme offers free, digital parenting support by sending parents short, evidence-informed videos about activities they can do with their children. This provides a low cost and universal, preventative solution to reach parents at scale, including those unable to access in-person support due to various barriers. Parents of children aged 6-24 months are eligible to sign up and receive text messages once a week for up to 18 months.

Nesta worked with BBC Education and the University of Sheffield to test and evaluate a text messaging service which shares Tiny Happy People video content with parents and caregivers. We wanted to leverage the large body of free Tiny Happy People videos and package this into a comprehensive, engaging experience for parents that boosts their children’s outcomes, particularly their early language and communication and socio-emotional development. We also wanted to explore how we can effectively work to reach lower-income parents and encourage them to sign up and engage with the programme.