Your Baby's use of the Sensory System to Learn

We learn and experience our world through our senses. What we taste, touch, hear, see, and smell teach us about the world we are living in ( sensory experiences help build neural connections). We need to create an environment for our child that is rich with experience through the senses. 
Here are some examples of sensory experiences.

Music in a variety of different beats, volumes, tones, voices, and tempo.
Providing the opportunity to play with toys and environmental objects of varied texture.
Providing books and pictures of varied colored and patterns to look at.
Providing a variety of things for our children to taste, sweet and sour foods, and so on.

Your baby will go through a stage form 4 months to about a year when everything will go into her mouth.  This is normal, your baby is learning about objects by how they taste and feel in their mouths.  As a matter a fact your baby will need to learn every item individually through each one of her senses.

Your 8 month old might crawl to a ball she sees on the floor, and notice it is round and green.  She might try to pick it up and feel its fuzzy surface. She might bring it toward her face and notice a scent to the ball as she places it in her mouth. While in her mouth she will learn that it is not and edible object but the experience will further reinforce what she has already learned by touching the ball, that it is a fuzzy texture.  She might then try to shake or drop the ball and will learn if this object does or does not make a sound. Your baby will need to do this with every new object she encounters in her world until she is satisfied that she has learned everythin there is to know about that object.

We can even help encourage the sense of smell by pointing out, naming, and expressing the different smells in food and in her world.  This is true for all of our experiences through our senses. Go ahead and label what your child is learning, aid her on her exploration and journey by telling her things like " That feels bumpy" or "We smell flowers they smell nice."

Most importantly, we must understand that new and varied sensory experiences provide our children with experiences that will help them grow.  So encourage safe exploration as much as possible.

How Your Baby Develops Hearing

Babies begin to hear sounds in the last few months of pregnancy. They are well equipped for hearing when they are born.

1-3 Months - Studies have shown that a newborn will choose to listen to their parents voice by turning their head to that sound rather then the voice of a stranger. Your baby will love to listen to your voice. Your voice is associated with comfort and food.  At this age your baby will enjoy music and listening to familiar sound in her world. Infants will respond well to high pitched, rhythmic, and singsong, vocalizations. You will notice that your baby can often be consoled by your voice. This response is setting the stage for future communication.

4-7 Months- Your baby will begin to understand the different parts of speech. Your baby will begin to differentiate various sounds and is beginning to learn that words make sentences.  By seven months she will respond to her name. There will be more babbling at this age as your baby experiments with speech and sounds.

8-12 Months- Your baby's first sounds should be GA, BA, and DA. Now you know your baby has been listening to you. Around this age your baby will begin to respond to simple verbal requests such as " Wave by, by". Your baby should begin trying to use the sounds she can make to communicate with you and play.  Keep talking and encouraging your baby!

1-2 Years- Your baby will begin using words at this stage. A lot of progress is being made with building word vocabulary in this year. Your baby is sure to understand even more then she can say. Your baby should begin to follow simple commands and instructions. Your baby will begin to learn to identify and label items in her environment. Your baby will begin to love to listen and participate in baby songs such as " Open Shut Them" and " Eensy Beensy Spider". Your baby will begin to enjoy really listening to stories and talking about the story book's pictures. Your baby will begin to point to pictures that you name for her. Speaking, singing, and laughing are now a part of your baby's routine.

How amazing is your baby's development in just 2 short years!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

Your Baby's First Expereinces Effect On Brain Development

  The brain is the most immature of all organs at birth. How it grows was thought to be determined by genetics, scientists now believe that it is highly dependent on the child's experiences. The belief is that the "plasticity" of the brain (it's ability to grow and develop in different and changing ways) will cause the brain to adopt to it's experiences, environment and needs.
   The brain consists of many areas. Each area has millions of neurons ( nerve cells) that speak to each other by sending messages through synapses.  These synapses are your brains wiring system.  The areas of the brain communicate to each other in this manner. Neurons (nerve cells) have branches on them called dendrites and axons. Dendrites bring information to the nerve cells and axons take information away from the nerve cell. Information is passed from one nerve cell to another through a synapse.
   The number of connections will influence how the brain functions.  For the most part we do not develop new nerve cells but rather we develop new synapses. In early childhood the brain is programmed to create new synapses. This is our window of opportunity.  By facilitating varied and new experiences for our children, particularly before three years old, we facilitate the creation of new synapses.  We now understand that what a child experiences in the first years of life will effect how his brain will develop and how he will interact with the world throughout his life.
  So get creative with your baby and enjoy the variety of experiences that life has to offer.

Language and Communication

 You can make a big difference when it comes to your child's language and vocabulary development!!! How? Actively engage your baby socially by fostering eye contact, facial expressions, and lots of conversation.
Respond to your babies sounds and cooing noises.  Babbling is your baby's first attempt to speak.  Verbal responses from you will not only encourage your baby but will help her develop attention, listening, and language recognition. Holding and talking to your baby is one of the most important things you can do to help encourage her cognitive and language skills.  Use the opportunities of visual alertness in your baby to foster eye contact or "Face Time".  Face time will help to establish communication with your baby that will enhance your bond and stimulate interaction.
Talk through all your routines such as feeding, changing, and bathing.  Tell your baby what is going on,  where she is going and label items in her environment. Repeated words form your will help build her comprehension as well as her expressive language.  Reward your baby with animated expressions and conversation and in a short time you can be sure that she will reciprocate.

Calming your Infant and Nightime Routines

The best way to calm your infant is by mimicking his environment in the womb. Mothers have been doing this instinctively for years by rocking their babies, while holding them tightly next to their bodies saying "sh sh" in a rhythmic fashion.  Others ways to mimic the womb include swaddling your baby, an infant swing, rhythmic and gentle rocking and bouncing, dim lights, limited inconsistent sounds, and your soothing voice.
Keeping these ideas in mind lets address night time routines.  Getting your newborn to sleep for longer stretches of time at night is a parents dream and actually a necessity for sanity sake.  Don't wait for your baby to do this on his own but rather help facilitate this happening. When your baby is about 4 to 6 weeks and older try to help him stay up in the evening.  You do this by keeping your baby in a brightly lit noisy room and changing his position frequently.  If your baby doses off don't transfer him  to a his quiet  crib or basinet keep him in the busy environment you set him up in so his snooze will be a short one.
When you decide it is time for you baby to go to bed for the night start his routine. The routine should begin apporoximately 30 minutes to 1 hour before his next feeding is expected.  The routine should consist of a physical activity, cognitive activity, massage, and music.  An example of the routine I used with my babies is starts off with tummy time while listening to the music of the mobile.  When the baby tires roll him onto his back and do some toy tracking activities.  Use a black and white or bright object,  rattles that make gentle sounds are recommended. Have your baby track the object, about 8 inches from his face,  to the right and left, up and down, in circular and diagonal directions, slowly and carefully.  Follow this up with a nice full body massage.  Make eye contact and sing to your baby through out the massage. A consistent song or two at this time is recommended.  Your baby will begin to relax and calm down from the massage, the expected song, and sound of your voice.  Following the massage you can do some gentle moving of your babies arms and legs such as bicycle feet riding and arm lifting and clapping.  Your baby will have worked hard and will be ready for his nice warm bath. Encourage your baby to kick his feet and splash his hands in the tub and just enjoy the warmth and feeling of the warm water surrounding his body before you wash him.  Following the bath and pajama time your baby will be ready for his bedtime feeding.  This feeding is the most important feeding of the day since you will be wanting your baby to fuel up for his long sleep stretch.  Swaddle your baby dim the lights and get ready to settle in for the last feeding of the day. Your baby should be tired and might have difficulty finishing the full feeding at this point.  Wiggle, jostle and talk to your baby as necessary to ensure that he eats as much as possible before he falls into a deep delicious sleep.
Feel free to mix this routine up to fit your baby's needs.
After you do this with your baby for a few nights he should begin to sleep for longer and longer periods of time. 
Good luck, and let me know how it goes!

Teaching Very Young Children to Share

This topic really hits home for me since getting my 2 and 3 year old to share is challenging.   As we hit the holiday season this topic is relevant since it can be hard to share new and very desired items.  Here are some tips to help deal with this important issue.

First of all we really need to understand and respect our child's difficulty with sharing.  Very small children are just learning about themselves and the world around them.  They can become very territorial  about their own items as they view there things as extensions of themselves.  They are also organizing their world and can become stuck on this is "mine" as well as this is "yours". My 3 year old becomes agitated when one of her older sisters uses the item of another sibling. This difficulty under standing that an item can "belong" to someone when someone else uses it will come with time and patience.

Some ways to facilitate sharing are:

Introduce the concept of turn taking.  Use a simple game that does not require a long wait for each turn to come.  You can use block stacking, doll feeding, or a similar simple task to talk about "your turn, my turn". Once this topic has been taught you can then use it for when it counts and your young child can understand that it will the her turn very soon.

When your child is having trouble sharing verbalizing and labeling their emotions around this challenge can be helpful. Letting them know that you understand how they feel and giving their feelings words will go a long way toward helping them through the process.

Provide a lot of positive feed back every time your young child shares something or takes turns nicely. She might not mind sharing her snack but might have hard time sharing a toy.  The positive encouragement she received from the "easier" sharing experience will help to reinforce her sharing with the "harder" expereince

Be prepared for play dates and neighbor and family visitors.  If you know that your child is attached to one or two particular items  respect that.  Remove highly desired items from the scene.  This will make sharing less challenging and easier to do.

Good luck to everyone and HAPPY SHARING!!!!

Communication and Mirror Neurons

Communication and language is not just about words and building your child's vocabulary it is also about gestures and expressions.  The development of your baby's communication skills are aided by tiny brain cells that fire not only when they complete an action but also by seeing an action, gesture or expression. This concept is known as mirror neurons. This means that a baby's development is not just influenced by personal experiences we help the babies to engage in but also by the many experiences they view other human beings completing. In fact a newborn as young as two weeks old can imitate and adult opening their mouth or sticking their tongue out. Our babies are learning by observing. We can now prove how significant it is for us to engage with our infants in face to face dialogue with much facial expression. They will learn how to move their mouth and lips to make words, how to use their bodies to gesture reinforcing their needs, and the difference between an angry, sad, tired, or happy face. When helping children learn a new skill watching the task completed will aid in the learning process.