ESOL Baby Steps

An innovative new English language teaching programme for migrant mums with bumps and babies 

Commissioned and funded by the NHS Cheshire and Merseyside Women's Health and Maternity Vanguard - Improving Me in 2025

Rationale

Women who do not speak English are 25 times more likely to die in pregnancy, birth and the post-natal period in the UK (Rowntree, 2025). This stark and unacceptable inequality represents one of the most urgent health communication challenges – and opportunities – of the 2020s. 

The ESOL* Baby Steps project has responded to this challenge by designing a targeted English language teaching programme for non-English speaking mothers for delivery in the community. Commissioned by Improving Me, NHS Cheshire and Merseyside Women's Health and Maternity Programme, the initiative focuses on migrant women with low English proficiency who are pregnant or caring for babies and young children.

The programme was developed through a cross-sector partnership involving Improving Me, a sociolinguist doctoral researcher from University of Leicester, midwifery students from Liverpool John Moores University and adult education specialists. It aims to develop the confidence, social integration and health literacy of migrant mums by reducing language barriers that can restrict access to informed maternity care, information and advocacy, ultimately improving outcomes for them and their families.

The need for this intervention is acute. Many migrant mothers are socially isolated, experience multiple forms of disadvantage and face limited access to ESOL provision, placing them at heightened risk of exclusion and poor maternal health outcomes. ESOL Baby Steps provides an opportunity to engage women with ‘bumps and babies’ to develop peer networks alongside the language, concepts and communicative practices needed to work in partnership with midwives and other health professionals.

Crucially, the programme is designed as a two-way learning process. While supporting mothers to navigate maternity and early years services, it also enables partner organisations and healthcare professionals, such as midwifery students on placement, to develop greater linguistic and cultural awareness. In doing so, ESOL Baby Steps contributes not only to improved maternal care, but also to wider cultural competence across community and healthcare partners.

*ESOL – English for Speakers of Other Languages

Rowntree, Maria (2025) Prioritising healthcare communication in maternity care, Open Access Government  https://www.openaccessgovernment.org/prioritising-healthcare-communication-in-maternity-care/189068/

Copyright: ESOL Baby Steps. All rights reserved. December 2025