PUEBLO, Colorado — Standing in her living room, Isabel Valencia sets up her makeshift tennis serve with the materials on hand: a green balloon for a ball and a ruler affixed to a paper plate for a racket.

She bats the balloon to her home visitor, Mayra Ocampo, and they pass it back and forth, counting each return, offering encouragement and laughing at their mistakes.

The moment is light and playful, as it likely will be later in the week, when Valencia tries the same activity with her 4-year-old daughter Celeste. But Ocampo takes care to explain what’s happening beneath the surface: They’re not just playing tennis. They’re building social skills. They’re working on hand-eye coordination. And they’re practicing numeracy.

Home visitor and parent play makeshift tennis game — Home visitor Mayra Ocampo, left, and parent Isabel Valencia practice social and motor skills during a makeshift game of tennis. Photo by Eric Lars Bakke for AP.

Valencia, who came to the U.S. from Colombia a few years ago, found Ocampo through a free home visiting program that supports families with their children's early learning and development.

The model — and others like it — has provided a lifeline for families, especially those for whom access to quality early education is scarce or out of reach financially. These programs, which are set to expand with new federal support, are proven to help prepare children for school but have reached relatively few families.

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“As parents, it’s hard to balance everything — work, kids, house,” says Ocampo, noting that many families in her caseload face language barriers and economic challenges such as food insecurity. “But you want to give the best to [your kids].”

Home visiting gives parents the tools to do it, she says.

Home visitors supply books and materials for parents to carry out activities, as well as diapers and wipes and referrals to food pantries, public assistance programs, early intervention services and mental health professionals. They also explain the developmental importance of talking, reading and singing with young children, asking them questions, and praising them.

They communicate a simple but potent message to parents: Everything they need to help their children flourish is probably already at home.

A math lesson can be found among a bag of beans or a pocketful of loose change. Baking soda and vinegar, both common household items, can produce a chemical reaction. Kids can practice literacy skills by searching for items around the house that start with a particular letter.

Home visitor and parent do a science experiment using household items — Ocampo, left, conducts a science experiment using common household items. Valencia will recreate the experiment with her 4-year-old daughter a few days later. Photo by Eric Lars Bakke for AP.

“Not only does it help the child, it helps the parents,” says Avis Stallworth-Ellis, the HIPPY coordinator for Montgomery Public Schools in Alabama, which is among the handful of public school districts that use Title I funds to offer home visiting programs. “It gives them a different way to think.”

The most valuable outcome, families and home visitors say, is the bond forged between parent and child.

“It’s good for them and good for you,” says Ocampo. “They’re thinking you are playing, but they’re really learning.”

Parents also become better advocates for themselves and their children, and research has shown that kids are better prepared for school.

Isabel Valencia holds up a photo of her family — Valencia holds a photo of her family in her home in Pueblo, Colorado. Photo by Eric Lars Bakke for AP.

Last fall, when Valencia’s daughter started preschool, the teacher told her that Celeste was more advanced than many of her classmates — evidence, Valencia says, of the cognitive and social-emotional skills they’ve worked on during daily activities.

Although Celeste is now enrolled in an early education program, Valencia has continued with the home visiting. “It’s a complement” to preschool, says Valencia, who recently became a HIPPY home visitor herself.

While home visiting is not intended to be a replacement for other early learning experiences, it can help to establish a strong foundation, especially for the many families who find early education programs inaccessible or unaffordable.

Throughout Pueblo, a city of 112,000, kindergarten teachers have noted students who receive home visiting services have longer attention spans, follow instructions better and have more developed motor skills, according to Maria Chavez Contreras, home visiting program manager at the community-based organization that hosts HIPPY in Pueblo.

“When they get to school, it's nothing new for them,” says Chavez Contreras. “They're carrying it over from home.”

Fatema Zamani, a Denver-based home visitor, says she hears from parents in her caseload — all recent arrivals from Afghanistan, where Zamani emigrated from in 2016 — about how impressed their children’s kindergarten teachers are.