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Program II. A Parent Guide: The Games Babies Play
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Infants and toddlers are my favorite people. They are born with many abilities they are smart and confident right from birth. This program is an adult guide to infant development and games babies play see for yourself how play activities and every day routines are used by infants to develop thinking skills and abilities.
It's amazing how very young children use looking, listening and grasping at objects to show mental ability. Babies and toddlers use their bodies and their brains to think. Watch these infants show how they actually think then match the age of your baby with the activities you think he will like.
Group Songs and Games for Toddlers
I am Doctor Susan Turben and this program begins right here at a program called "Mother's Exchange" these parents get together regularly in an effort to support each other in learning more about their children's development. And they've asked me here today to teach them a few songs and games.
Lets start with: "head shoulders knees and toes knees and toes head and shoulder knees and toes knees and toes and head and eyes and ears and nose, head and shoulders knees and toes knees and toes."
A great series of songs has to do with actions so lets get are hands up and where gonna pretend that where holding a baby in are arms and this songs called "Ms. Polly had a dolly who was sick sick sick so she called for the doctor to come quick quick quick the doctor came with his hat and his bag and he knocked on the door with a rap tap tap. He looked at the dolly and he shook his head he said Ms. Polly put her straight to bed he rolled on a paper for a pill pill pill. I'll be back in the morning with my bill bill bill."
"Open shut them open shut them, give a little clap open shut them open shut them put them in your lap. Creep them creep them right up to your chin open up your little mouth and do not let them in."
Let's get up on our knees and do a jack in the box this is a perfect game for toddlers and babies. Alright are you ready "Jack is hiding down in his box until somebody opens the lid pop." Yeah that's perfect. Very good.
Let's sit down lets go visit a 2 month-old baby at home after all home is where all this good early learning begins.
Infant Activities at Home
Establish a normal routine that your infant or toddler likes. Play games and talk a lot during every day routine activities. Encourage babies to locate sources of sound and work with bright colorful objects to stimulate visual search and good looking. Hand off toys to infants form the middle of his body and offer two objects at once. Even babies can learn to make choices and should have some control over their activities. Parents can fit exercise and mental activity right into diaper changing. Talk, talk, talk. Brandon is learning how to take turns listening and talking through social play and exercise. Repeat back sounds and words babies make when adults reproduce infant vocalizations babies engage in thought provoking actions and reactions.
Even the youngest baby is in constant motion. Turney repeats movements that feel good to her and these pleasant actions help her to feel secure. Even babies as young as 12 weeks are capable of using their reflexes to pay attention to objects and to figure out how to control their movements voluntarily. Watch Matthew repeatedly look at his out stretched hand. He is concentrating on eye and hand movement in order to obtain an object like the bell that interests him. He stares and sucks and moves all of his extremities at the same time. Babies like to use many positions and all their extremities in order to help them remember the people and objects in their world.
Babies Do Think
The Lamaze Class
"I thought babies just laid around cried and got fed, I can't really believe they think about anything."
Yes they do babies experience a lot through their senses they experience touch, smell, sound, sight. Babies know if their warm if their cold if their hungry they try to let you know if their uncomfortable babies really do think.
"I even read that babies can follow moving objects and that they can respond differently to different shapes and different colors."
If you hold an object out to 12 inches from the babies eyes and bring it in the baby can follow this in the baby can track it from side to side. Some of the protective things babies do protective reflexes one is called the tonic neck and when you go to lye her down on her tummy her head automatically turns to one side the hand comes up to her mouth and this hand goes back.
Another protective thing the baby will do is if you go to lye the baby prone, again on her stomach, and you put her down to suddenly her arms will go out in a parachute effect to protect herself.
These parents will soon find out that there babies are not dependent little persons but active organizers of their own environment. In fact, within a few days these babies will have their parents very well organized. And in the future parents will understand that they are the first and most appropriate teachers of their baby.
Relaxation and Exercise for Good Health
All parents are teachers but don't push. These adults who care for babies want to know exactly what to teach. Which exercises are just right for their babies. Coordination exercises may be appropriate for babies and toddlers as long as the baby gets to do the work no the adult. Even babies enjoy aerobic conditioning, flexibility and strength training. A very pleasurable activity for infants is gentle massage. Moms and Dads who start massaging their babies right after birth say this provides a loving way to get to know their baby. These hands on massages soothe a child's skin hunger, a need to feel good. Food and warmth and sleep also feel good changes in light and temperature air all of these things feel good to babies and toddlers. They produce pleasurable secure feelings. Water play is fun but adults should remember to choice activities because of the child's interest not the adults. The best activities and exercises are the ones that both adults and children like to do together.
Songs and Games
Here are more songs and games that exercise metal as well as physical muscles. First alternate slow and fast actions sing songs like:
"Row, row, row your boat gently down the stream merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily life is but a dream."
Or use toys that make sounds and use sounds that vary in tone and pitch that go up and down such as:
"Put your hands up high, put your hands down low, up, down, high, low."
Three play games that change position lay your baby on her back and sing:
"ride, ride, ride on the bicycle, ride, ride, ride on the bicycle, ride, ride, ride on the bicycle ride on the bicycle, ride, ride, ride."
Language talking games are very important to do such as:
"Open, shut them, open, shut them, give a little clap, open shut them, open shut them put them in your lap."
All of these games stress language interaction and talk.
Developmental Skills in the First Years
There lots of activities and competencies that child under a year have. Were going to look at some babies and show you some of the skills and abilities of infants that help them to concentrate and actually to think better. Beth's here and Beth's going to play with our toy telephone. Now one of the things about Beth's stage of development which is nine-months and if I were to say Beth let's just leave and mom and just come over here with me. Beth would look at me as if to say "no no no I want mom I want to get right back with my mom." Because this is an age of great attachment and dependency on the primary care giver who's usually the mom or the dad. So in this case Beth is tolerating me but not all that well. So I am gonna give her back to mom and then say "Beth here's the telephone" let's see what Beth does with the telephone. Now what you will do is put everything in her mouth, and she'll reach out for it, say hi mom. Mom you can talk on the telephone with her. And at this stage Beth has all of the sounds of all the cooing and vocal sounds necessary for full and complete speech. She's talking and will do more and more of that she'll start making words is she saying ma or pa? "She says she says mama, dada, bye bye." Now lets see what she does if I give her some nesting cups like this. Now lets Beth one, two, three what's that you get it. What are those are those for you now lets try hiding them and see if Beth will show us where they are. All gone all gone I don't know where they went. Where did they go? There not there. Where are they? Are they under here? Where are they? This age there's a lot of reservation built into there behavior which is normal development. A lot of looking, searching exploring with there eyes with there hands and with there mouth. What does Beth see when she looks in the mirror? Is she a pretty baby? Point to your eye. See there's your eye, there's your eye. See yeah there you are, look. A nine-month old will creep after something very very quickly how about this orange, where'd it go Beth? Go get that orange. Go get that. Go. There's a certain interest in all the toys. Now will she like that? Did you like that orange? You go right ahead. Go get that orange. You can have it, yeah. You can have it, go head. You have my permission, go head go get it. Go get it. Now again the reservation comes right as well. Do I really wanna do that, or would I rather stay put. But here she goes she's gonna start to creep, go ahead get going, there she goes up on all fours, she's get a little security, a little loving from mom first, and what she'd really like mom to do go get the orange herself. But in this case she's gonna get a hug then mom will put her down and she can go get the orange. Go head put her on all fours and let her go. Whoa now she says what do you think that is? Nine month olds use all four extremities very well and very coordinated fashion.
To summarize Beth's development at nine months Beth's language is coming along very quickly as well as her intellectual skills, she intellectually able to uncover hidden objects which reminds her that there is permanent seat to her world. That is, moms and dads and other people don't really disappear forever when they disappear temporally. Her language is that she can use one or two words in a full range of normal sounds. So in terms of her mobility and her language, there developing very quickly at the same time, She's about ready to get up on all fours and cruise and begin to get some upward mobility in her behavior.
Now where going to look at some children who are a little bit younger. These are 6-7 month olds and they have a range of developmental skills that have a lot to do with learning language also. Let's look at Jason and let's put you all down right here on the map and see if we can find some things for you to go cruising after. Maybe we'll put you down on your stomachs first. Seven month-olds are very very posturally nice they can sit, they can crawl. Six to 7 months old are just beginning to bat at objects and to reach out in front of them to search for things and watch how we can get those babies to go for small objects as well as big ones. See Brandon go after those nice clothes pins. And watch him look at the way they he scans his environment from left to right. Watch the way they use all one hundred and eighty degrees as they rotate their heads to find things, and flip from top to bottom and over we go. Brandon let's go get that. And also babies at this age are very interested in each other. Who's that, who's is that baby? Who is that? And they can fixate they'll get right in on each other they'll get hooked into each other's faces. And look how nicely grasping things. At this age infants transfer objects very easily form one hand to another as well. Watch the eye tracking and the eye movements Brandon likes to do things with his eyes he's a big visual learner. Watch him stare at and go after that pie tin. Then watch him go for the ball inside the pie tin. And they'll use two hands to grasp and they'll use two hands together and they'll bring there hands together very nicely very good.
To summarize the development of children from 5-7 months is that of a child learning to sit. Intellectually a child of this age is learning to categorize and sort objects and that is done by one attribute or one part of the object being recognized at a time. For example a child will select color or size or shape and by that means even as young as 7 months their beginning to discriminate and sort them in their minds. This age is also very beginning to be very verbal their beginning to have lots of sounds and all of the normal sounds of development are occurring by this time. And so children will begin to make some high and low and some ordinary pitch sounds that will turn into mama or dada later on. Children at this age are mobile, verbal and organized. Even this young, babies actually do produce and organize their own development.
Now let's move to a younger baby, let's look at Katie. Katie is 5 months old and Katie is doing some very different kinds of activities that will lead her into some sitting behaviors later on. Katie will hold objects in one hand. Katie will use her eyes and her mouth and her hands together. Katie is very a pleasant and her mood is reflected in her behavior. Anything that goes on she's very adjusted to. She'll put something on her foot, or she'll hold something in her hand, or she'll cuddle or she'll stare. And I can get her to do all these things at the same time. This is called place holding, that means a child as young as 5 months can do more than one thing at a time. She really likes that rattle, but watch what I can do. I can get her to look at this, and grab for it and pull it up, pull it to her mouth. And one of the interesting things about this is, that they will then look down and follow and track the object all the way to the ground. That shows that there beginning to get depth reception and a good visual acuity. Now let's see what would happen if I offer Katie to things at once. Let's see what she'll do. She'll look at one, then she'll look at the other then she looks back at one she'll grab one. But she'll get rid of another object before she picks up to things. There's the second one Katie, what do you think. What will you do now? What do you think you would like that one too? Notice how Katie is a rounded a little bit forward so she isn't ready to sit yet. But she's very good on her stomach, in the prone position, let's put her down on her stomach and see what she does. She really is a big looker, and she loves the mirror. She sees herself in there. Look at objects, scans the environment. She's a real good horizontal scanner, side to side, all the way. Then she sees me, then she sees herself and there's recognition. Now what are we going to do here. Do you like things with sounds? Babies this age are very tuned to sound oriented objects. And yet there still a little trapped by their mobility because once she's lying on her stomach and get's one arm caught underneath she really can't move forward that easily. Maybe Chris can get her to scoot forward a little bit, can she do a little bit of crawling? this is really her nap time too, she's not doing much forward motion yet. But she's flipping over front to back and back to forward. Watch how nicely her fingers spread apart and how she goes after object with a coraling motion.
To summarize 5 month olds have all kinds of capabilities and the social and affect of areas. They are really becoming human beings and enjoying the process of having other people do what they want them to do notice how Katie was able to change her position and when she did we all changed all of are activities to suit Katie's position. She was doing some very nice handing off of objects and a lot of eye hand coordination and mouthing. Much of a five month old is activities are spent in mouthing objects. This is a way to become familiar and recognize them. Katie would really much prefer a human face to any kind of inanimate object
Activities to Show How Smart Babies Are
The positive lasting affects of physical and mental stimulation in the early years can be seen in the lives of these children who are creating life long habits of health and fitness. They are developing social relationships as well as good posture they feel secure. And are developing a sense of belonging and well being they are happily practicing eye hand and eye foot coordination in order to gain smooth and balance movements. Motor development specialist tell us that children who do these activities at an early age, think faster or at least think faster on their feet. Watch the coordinated and smooth movements of this ten month old. He is a concrete thinker who understands that objects can move and occupy space and do not disappear when the location of objects changes.
Can you see infants and toddlers sitting at the table doing table tasks? They are doing intellectual activities, just the way the children who are singing and doing the songs and games where also engaged in learning intellectual skills. At table children use there manipulative skills and there hand function to sort, to categorize objects, to place things that are similar together. Infants and toddlers match similar objects together and then later learn to discriminate among different concepts of objects. So for now these toddlers are learning to sort by color, size, and shape. They are learning to internalize and take pictures mental pictures of the objects in their world. They will use those to solve problems and think.
Other brain games for babies involve language and object activities. Touch and talk back to babies imitating the babbling sounds and extending the sounds babies make into whole or complete words.
Show an object to an infant, then ask a question like "do you want do that again?" Then wait, do nothing until the baby makes a motion or a sign. When he makes any sign quickly give him back the object. Give it to him again and talk back to him, using the same tone and inflections that he makes. Watch Blake's activity level increase his body language says: "yes yes do it again" see how eager he is to continue the game.
So enjoy your babies performance remember that the social and language games that you do with your infant help the infant to develop positive behaviors. Research tells us that easy access to home materials is the best way to encourage and reinforce good behavior. So go ahead use home made or home available materials with your baby. There are some other ways in which you can help your infant to cope and develop positive behavior. Let us show you some of those now.
Creating Positive Experience With Babies
At home or at child care settings, there are many easy ways to encourage positive behavior in young babies. It's a fact that infants like to roam and explore they definitely do not like to sit and do what there told. So parents need to set up toys and materials and equipment that are clean safe and interesting. Toys that very in shape and size. Arrange to turn older babies loose in a specific area of a room where untouchables and unsafe objects have been removed. Arrange pieces of equipment away from corners of sharp edges. Give your baby freedom and do not over protect them let him do the work. Never do for a baby what he can do for himself. Watch this baby figure out how to use the push toy and string as a means to get a heavy object into a large container. He uses his depths perception and visual sharpness in order to fit the push toy and the container together. Toddlers need to have a measure of control over there own actions. Use low sets of open shelves for infants which contain lots of clean objects so that the creepers and crawlers can choose there own play toys. Babies who have these positive experiences are resourceful and happy and less irritable.
Indoors or Outdoors children need the freedom and permission to get messy. It's really ok if young children play in the mud, with sand and the water it helps them to test there environment and to learn to different problem solving skills. Parents can get a lot of information about there own child's temperament by taking them to different places. Taking trips to the stores and to the malls. Even in the supermarket there's a lot to learn about a child's behavior. A supermarket is a good place for parents to practice giving children positive attention. No nagging or criticizing. There is so much to learn in this familiar environment. It is a time and place for talking, for choosing and practicing good behavior. Watch Jen help her mom interact with the baby. Point to and name objects, and even read labels. Each of the girl's personality is so different, there could be behavioral problems if mom weren't aware of each child's temperament and personality.
During the day when your with your toddler, notice his special learning style. How active is he? What is his mood/ Personality is a matter of being an individual human being with a unique set of actions. Even toddlers can safely use blunt and rounded utensils to help prepare food. Brian's personality can be described as having a long attention span, not distractible, pleasant ,with a high energy level. He is very attached to his mom, but wants to work independently alongside her. The kitchen provides a perfect place for him to test his small muscle skills. Watch Brian as he cuts and chops and measures and counts and pours and tests how the food is looking. A balanced diet to a toddler this age means small amounts variety and choice and lots of self feeding. Parents should let toddlers do as much as the preparation as well as the eating themselves. Infants who are reasonably hungry eat well but they do take small amounts in each feeding. They enjoy the texture and the taste and the social interaction with their care givers. Force feeding doesn't work. So talk and relax with your infant while your feeding and make meal time a social time. Because research tells us that infants and toddlers develop good eating habits when parents make these times social and pleasant. Whether babies are eating, sleeping, thinking, or playing, they see only one view of reality their own. It seems important for us that adults to learn how infants think. This knowledge can ease the stress of parenting and making child rearing more satisfying and rewarding for parents. In and adult centered society children deserve to be understood according to how they think not how adults think. Make your children top priority. We live in a time where children are vulnerable and at risk. When children abused and neglected. We live in an adult centered society. Yet one of the basic task of being human is to develop healthy relationships with each other. So go ahead and teach your child teach your child to be self confident, self assured, self controlled, spend part of everyday in child centered activities as well as adult centered ones.
I am Doctor Susan Turben take care of yourself and take care of your children.
Most of us cannot do this job without support and help. Your community has the resources to help you make that job easier. All cities have educational, social, and health human services. Preschools, nursery schools, church schools, head start, home start, parent education programs, mental health centers, well baby clinics, associations for education of young children, public library's, community colleges, counseling services, domestic relations court, cooperative extensions services, home health care services, information and referral hotlines. Contact your child's librarian for resources that you might need.