In Kentucky, “School readiness means that each child enters school ready to engage in and benefit from early learning experiences that best promote the child’s success”. Kentucky has broken school readiness down in five domains: physical and motor development; social and emotional development; approaches to learning; language development; and cognitive development. A child's readiness score is determined by measuring a student’s cognitive, physical and language development. Fulton County Percentage of children Not Ready for Kindergarten was 65.5% with 34.5% being ready.

Parents have identified the need to have positive child development activities for age’s birth through five years in past events specifically for children under the age of 5 in Fulton County. Currently, there are no other regularly scheduled programs (outside of full-time enrollment in limited Early Care Centers) available for young children resulting in limited opportunities to develop social-emotional skills. To combat the issue, the Fulton County Family and Consumer Sciences Program hosts a monthly Laugh and Learn Playdate for youth 5 and under and their caregivers. During each session, parents/caregivers and children have interactive activities to reinforce positive child development related to the five domains of school readiness and the children are allowed to interact with other participants to enhance social development. The program focuses on literacy and better nutrition through literacy activities. Science, math art, music, and physical activity will be included. The Kentucky Early Childhood Standards are used to develop lesson plans and stations. Parents are provided with parenting literature to encourage reinforcement of the concepts at home.

More than 10 children consistently have participated each month and sixty-nine individuals overall since the program has begun in February.  

More than 80% reported an increase in social skills since attending Laugh and Learn.

The mother of 4 year old twins made the following statement about Laugh & Learn, “I think it gives parents a visual of the hands on experiences that our little ones can learn by. It has been a great conversation starter with my kids that we can continue to talk about what they learned and build on for several days after the various activities. We look forward to them!”