If you follow Pediatricians’ recommendations, Tummy time (lying down in the prone position) will be the longest 3 minutes of your new baby’s life, too.

At about day three (postpartum for a baby carried to term), it’s time to give your infant the opportunity to develop even musculature in the neck, arms, and upper body.

If you’re like most new parents, you don’t even try to fight the urge to make it all better at the sound of the slightest whimper.    Well, tummy time will be one of your first tests of parenting resolve.  Babies don’t seem to like it much.  At first.  Expect mild protest.  That’s normal.

In my years of consulting experience (hundreds and hundreds of hours, sitting on living room floors, playing) the only babies who don’t mind tummy time are the ones who have mastered it.  There are ways of making the minutes move along.  Here’s a list.

What To Do During Tummy Time

• Tummy time is only for a few minutes.  A maximum of 3-5 minutes, a couple of times per day until your baby masters and enjoys this exercise;  then you can increase.
• Tummy time is for parents, too.  Your baby must be wide awake and you must supervise for the duration.
• Don’t practice tummy time in the crib — that’s where the research-endorsed position of back sleeping takes place.  Comfy blanket atop clean floor is perfect.  Pets behind closed doors — even better.
• Offer a toy.  It will distract your baby from the initial discomfort of this new activity.
• Offer a book.  A tiny, cardboard book with one well-defined image per page will help pass the tummy time.  Place book 8 inches from baby’s face, then tap a page and say the name of the item in the book to help baby learn to focus attention.
• Offer a sibling.  This new workout starts three days postpartum, remember?  All the way down to the floor and back up again?  You might need someone to spot you, Momma.  While parents supervise, older siblings can get acquainted with baby, and learn appropriate limits on play, personal space, and exuberance levels with your newborn.
• Use your judgment.  Your baby might complain bitterly about tummy time — and who knows the reason?  Just observe your baby, and respect those limits.  Try again tomorrow.

Really.  Try again.  Tomorrow would be a good time.  Due to important research leading to “Back to Sleep” recommendations for infants, parents will need to set aside time to create the tummy-only opportunities to build strength, sharpen depth perception, coordinate movements, and appreciate body awareness.  All of those abilities lead to the later milestones of crawling, cruising, walking, running, and playing sports.

Given the increasing rates of worrisome childhood obesity, it seems the responsible thing to do is to give a newborn bodies and brains the message that there is work to do in this life.  And that they can do it.

The baby-biz lingo, “toilet learning,” conjures images of skipped classes, Fonzie jackets and smokin’ in the boys’ room.

For toddlers and the bathrooms that await them, the key word is “readiness.”  Most children are not ready to learn this complex process until about halfway between their second and third birthdays.

There are plenty of parents who insist (hope?) otherwise. And sure, some tots will offload cargo if you help them pull up to the dock at just the right moment. But that doesn’t mean the kids are “trained” — it means their parents are.

Developmental milestones for learning to use the bathroom.

Children will reliably, independently, and hygienically use the room with a potty when they are ready in every developmental domain. The following questions will help you decide when to teach your child about using the bathroom.

Emotional development – Whose idea is this?

Starting at around 12-14 months of age, your child is in the throes of the normal stage of negativism. His strong feelings of independence and his love of saying “no” might embroil you in more power struggles than potty trips if you pressure him.  When your child starts to dislike the feeling of being wet or soiled, you’ll have yourself a partnership.

Social development – Does your child care about potty training as much as you do?

After negativism passes, and your child becomes more cooperative, he will want to comply with more of your requests. He will have discovered that he wants to grow up, have different clothing, and leave babyhood behind. Your toddler will want to be more like the bigger people who are his role models. It is healthy and normal for him to observe that older family members use the bathroom.

Cognitive development – How many details can your toddler manage at once?

Using the bathroom is quite a process. It involves recognizing the need, responding in a timely manner, asking for help at first, disrobing, and then relaxing one’s body while balancing on a chair with a hole in it. Let him practice as much as he wants to. Let him practice with clothes on, with clothes off.  Let him sit there and settle in while thumbing through a book. These activities will help him get more familiar with the details of going to the bathroom.

Language development – Does your child have the expressive language skills to ask for the help he needs?

It’s a good development when your child increasingly wants to stop wetting and soiling a diaper to that he can be clean and dry. It’s an even more promising development when he tells you so. Be sure to teach him the words that are acceptable to your family (and/or his caregivers) for these body functions. Alerting you to the fact that he is having a bowel movement is one of the first steps of taking responsibility for body functions. He’ll soon be ready for more complex responsibilities.

Motor development – Is your child’s body ready to “hold it” until he can get to the bathroom?

The sphincter muscles that allow for bladder and bowel control have some of the last nerves in the body to finish developing. Even if your child understands the process of going to the bathroom, is highly motivated to go, and desperately wants big boy underwear, if he cannot control his muscles yet, he will not have consistent success.  What he needs instead is non-shaming help in cleaning himself, along with encouragement for trying again next time.

Thick blankies will be today’s focus. The bumpy ones, the ones with fringes and mysteries stitched in.

While a versatile blanket will support your baby’s overall development, a blanket that offers interesting textures will specifically stimulate motor development, body self awareness, and intellectual development.

What an interesting blankie looks like.

Some of them are made of terry cloth.  Some double as bath towels.  Others look like a combination stuffed animal/soft blanket.  My favorites are safely constructed, boldly decorated, and have job descriptions.

One corner of the blankie might have a compelling (color-contrasting) appliqued animal or image (visual stimulation).  In another corner, perhaps there will be a soundmaker (rattle? squeaker?) embedded (auditory stimulation).  There might be corduroy patch or a fuzzy square sewn into the design so that when baby scoots around, his fingertips discover a new sensation as part of his reward for daring to explore (tactile stimulation). If the blanket is made of non-raveling felt, the edges might sport a fascinating fringe, perfect for fingering and flicking (self-soothing).  Like a good book, the blanket might offer (cloth) flaps for opening, tugging, crinkling, or closing. Again and again (object permanence stimulation).

More developmental benefits of a touchy feely baby blanket.

Settled babies (3-4 months) and older babies (6 months and up) are bringing together just the right combination of skills that help them make the most of a blanket that has stimulating features.

The following areas of development will grow as a result of tactile exploration:

• Intellectual – thinking skills first show up as curiosity.  New textures will spark new questions, finding out the answers will spark new brain connections.
• Gross motor (large muscles; arm, for example) – Each new day brings more practice at reaching out to grab items of interest.
• Fine motor (small muscles; hands/fingers, for example) – Each new grab brings an opportunity to touch, poke, squeeze the loot your baby hauls in.
• Emotional – your baby will develop his own preferences for textures.  Some children detest goopiness, some revel in it.

Tomorrow, in the finale of this series, we will see why sometimes a blankie is just a blanket.

to be continued…..

Twenty-one years ago, I discovered that my 5 month-old was ready to play hide and seek.

I didn’t mean to.  Really.

My teaching colleagues in Panama had gifted my new baby with an assortment of of hand-appliqued blankets (sheets, actually — this was a tropical birth).

Five months later, back in the US, and past her swaddling stage, my daughter used to enjoy looking at the brightly colored ducks and ginghams that bordered the sheets.  She also spent a lot of time on her tummy, reaching for and touching the embroidery stitches that illustrated the layette.

On a breezy morning, as my baby lay on the floor, kicking, making spit bubbles, and generally getting on with her day, I decided to offer her a covering.  As I spread it over her, I misjudged where it would land, and the blanket-sheet ended up covering Mariel’s face.  She gasped.  Loudly.

I quickly snatched the offending cloth away, while moving in close so that I could scoop up my first-born for a little reassurance or soothing, or whatever she might need after such a regrettable and shocking slip-up on my part.  But then she squealed.  Loudly.  Kicked, too.

I stared at her, confused.  She stared at me, bright-eyed.  Drooling.  So, I righted myself — back on my knees, at her feet, sheet in hands, like before.  Very carefully, and pretty slowly, I fanned the sheet in the air, and allowed it to drift again onto her face.  Another gasp, another snatch, and another squeal later, we had ourselves a game!   I wanted a turn!  I laid down on the floor beside my baby, and covered up — then whisked away own facial covering.  The gasping, squealing, and drooling carried on.  Baby seemed like she enjoyed it, too.

There is a more methodical, less risky way to introduce hide and seek or peekaboo games to your infant.

• Start by positioning yourself so that you and baby are making eye contact.
• Engage in a familiar activity like a simple conversation (with plenty of gentle tones and smiling).
• Then tell baby you are going to play peekaboo.
• Cover your eyes with your hands, then call baby’s name.
• When you think that baby has had enough time to notice what is different about your appearance, slowly open your hands and cheerily say, “I see you!”
• Take note of your baby’s reaction, then go with the flow.  If baby wants more, Yay!  If baby isn’t ready, try another time.

This game becomes mutually amusing when your baby enjoys hiding, then peeking at you.  Interacting this way (with words and body) is another great learning opportunity for social skills like turn-taking, knowing how to play a game, and learning that vocal intonations vary with meaning.

When you are certain that the game is all in good fun for your child, you can use a lightweight blanket to cover more and more of her body.  She’ll learn more words (arms, toes, feet, legs, face) when you make it fun to do so.

Thanks for walking (crawling?) down memory lane with me.  I loved those sheets, and used them every day.  They became burp cloths,  and even floor cloths on which Mariel practiced her rolling over skills. Then her rolling-back skills.  When I nursed her in public, they were my covers — for a moment, anyway.  Like I said, Mariel loved playing hide and seek, even when it gave others too much of a peek.

Some babies need constant hugs.

And sometimes Mommy just needs baby to sleep.  For a little longer then she did yesterday.  Please?

You and your baby want the same thing: contentment.  For baby, the ultimate contentment, the ultimate hug, was what she experienced when she lived in her own apartment, (aka “the womb”).  Since your newborn can’t go “home” again, her new neighbors (aka “family”) will just have to find ways to help her settle in until she learns how to comfort herself.

Swaddling a baby in a lightweight, preferably 100% natural-fiber blanket or sheet will help you both achieve your goals. Baby will feel safer and self-contained again.  Mom will be able to relax and trust the longer nap that baby drifts into.

As your baby adjusts to daily rhythms, relationships, and your cues (she’ll begin to react to the signals of meal time), she will also learn to associate comfort, then security, then a good sleep, with the very process of having you wrap her snugly.

Babies show up equipped with strategies and tools to help them survive.  Everything from way extra brain cells, to a willingness to suck the milk out a knuckle, to the Moro reflex, a mechanism that causes a new baby to flail her limbs (in search of balance? in an attempt to cling to a big person?) when startled by a feeling of falling or other sudden events.

Like I said, it’s a reflex — therefore, not entirely under your newborn’s control.  Babies have been known to wake themselves from an otherwise successful nap with twitches and involuntary movements.  Parents need to find that delicate balance between a snug swaddle and baby’s personal needs.  Some infants will find it tragically disruptive not to be able to access a hand or thumb for sucking (which is self-soothing, and should be encouraged).

The words “swaddle” and “swath” have the same Old English linguistic roots.  In agriculture, a swath is a strip of land that has been demarcated or cleared.  The ancients used strips of fabric to wrap around newborns, thereby binding babies’ arms to their torsos.  Modern updates of the swaddling method are obviously much safer than the possibilities of loosened fabrics strips and the potential dangers.

For an important list of how-to’s (AND how not-to’s) on swaddling, see the MommyGarten.com blogroll for a link to a site that is all about the swaddle.

to be continued…..

Even our baby’s blankets have to multitask these days.

In addition to providing warmth or comfort for baby, and a pink-blue gender clue for admiring strangers, a baby’s blanket ought to earn its keep.  It should make Mommy’s job easier, and baby’s life a little more interesting.

Like a good toy or book or nanny, a good blankie will meet more than just one of your baby’s developmental needs.

Job 1:  Transitional object

The first year of your child’s life brings rapid, sometimes startling changes.  First there’s that whole relocation thing. She liked her original home just fine, although things were getting a little cramped.  So, she moved out — got evicted, really.

Once unpacked, your newborn worked very hard to get accustomed to her new digs, and all those new faces peering at her.  Much to her dismay, baby discovered that big people like schedules, bright lights, sudden sounds, and removing diapers right after she gets ‘em get nice and warm.  Life-altering events awaited her — milestones like  finding her feet, finding out she could walk on them,  hearing the word “no” a lot, then realizing she could say it too, by golly.

Every transition takes your baby farther from … well, farther from you, Mommy.  A blanket or stuffed friend (or ritual, even) that she can hold onto, when she can’t be held by you, will help her to do some of her own consoling for herself.  An important life skill to learn.

The stability of the transitional object (I really mean “exclusivity” I suppose) is important.  Baby is no longer a part of Mommy, but her blankie or doll can be a part of her life that nobody else controls.  That is why you’ll see the sweetest of babies become lionesses when an unauthorized person (by that I mean anyone in the whole universe — you too, granny) touches, looks at too long, or threatens to wash her blankie.

A blankie with a good work ethic will be employed by your household for a long time, perhaps even longer than you think.  When my teenager recently had wisdom tooth surgery, her conscientious doctor sent her home with antibiotics.  I was particularly relieved to have germ-killers — not for the surgery or the stitches, but for the 16 year-old, too frail to machine-wash, see-through blankie waiting at home to companion her through a difficult day, just as it always had.

to be continued……

If the commercial promised: “Your toddler can paint!” you’d have probably wondered: that’s what she thinks I look like?…..

Why is it easy to see that it’s inappropriate to push some skills on our babies — but not others?

When it comes to reading, some parents place a big emphasis on how soon, how much, and how well their young children can decipher which ideas (aka “stories”) have been compressed into squiggles (aka “words”), and affixed to a two-dimensional surface (aka “page”).

Literacy, like every other life skill that your baby learns, will at first depend completely on the parents.  Start by reading age-appropriate books to your baby.  Use only cardboard books with sturdy pages.  Your smart baby’s innate curiosity will prompt her to reach out and grab (and taste) whatever you’re holding — make sure it’s non-choking.

Yes, your young child can read — someday.  Here’s what she will need to learn first:

How to explore a book: Expect her to want to hold the book.  Perhaps even upside down.  Let that go for now.  When she starts paying more attention to the pictures, she will also sort out the right way to hold the book.  Through her explorations, she will discover that books are fun. The pages flap around, they taste good (if it’s a cardboard book), and there’s a picture on every page!  Don’t expect her to start the book at the “beginning” for now.

How to pay attention to a book: Expect your child to hand you a book, then snuggle in, and get ready to listen to your voice.  The older she gets, the more your infant or toddler will react to the storylines in books.  Although she may even have favorite pages and pictures to look at, she’s also going to know that you like to begin the story at the beginning.  As her language skills grow, she will be able to use her words to name the elements of the page art, or to “read” along with you by making familiar sounds related to the story or characters.

How to book her own appointment with reading: Your child’s literacy will also mature into that very recognizable stage of independence.  You will know this has happened when she ”reads” her favorites to a captive audience: her dolls or stuffed friends.  Your young child might also offer to “read” to you — with a sometimes surprising accuracy.  That surprising accuracy thing means her books are important to her, so she has little patience for your reading flubs.  She can and will correct you, Mommy.

You don’t need a special system to teach your baby how to use (aka “love”) books.  You just need books and a lap.

Those two things are one and the same for young children.

Efficient little babies like to check things out with the most sensitive, high-precision tools they have: their mouths.

That’s why it is so important to choose durable toys that are not choking hazards, that are not painted with poison (toxic paints), and do not contain lead.

Your baby’s mouth is a versatile tool.

At first her mouth gulped a lungful of air for her first cry, then it gulped nourishment to fuel her first days outside the womb.   One of the first things she could do was search for, and learn the feel of, your nipple — using her mouth.  Before long she began using her mouth to coo with you, soothe herself (hooray for thumbsucking!), and practice an important life-long social skill, the smile.

Your baby’s mouth is an engineering marvel.

She even has extra tastebuds in that busy little mouth of hers.  The tastebuds are distributed in a way that allows your baby to taste more, and enjoy longer, the fluids she takes in she’s in the traditional breastfeeding positions.  Those facts mean that a young child’s mouth will be more sensitive to texture and temperature, as well as taste.

Mouth exploration is a developmental stage.

A valid one.  A necessary one.  The ability to bring hands to her mouth (2 months-ish) combines with the intense interest in bringing objects to her mouth (3 months-ish).  Once she gets the object to her mouth, she will explore it with her tongue and lips.  There is a lot of information that can be gleaned from the munching that babies naturally do to a new object.  At about 5 or 6 months of age, when she’s more mobile, she’s also in more danger.  A thorough saftey-proofing is necessary.  As your older baby learns to eat solids, emerging teeth get in on the action, too.

The Year of the Mouth culminates in indispensable life skills: learning how to pucker up to kiss loved ones, eating, brushing her teeth, and someday, applying lip gloss.

But somebody has to regulate his food.  For the rest of his life.  And if not him, then who?

Like every other life skill discussed on this blog, your child will develop this self-care skill of healthy food intake in stages. There are simple ways to tell when he’s ready for more responsibility.

Watch the way he uses his hands.

Even before baby officially discovers their usefulness as toys, he will suck his hands to comfort himself.  I advise parents to help a young baby find his hands, especially if he will be able to self-comfort as a result.  By 2 months old, he’ll be very good at bringing his empty hands to his mouth while lying on his back. The next skill that will be useful for self-feeding is his ability (at around 3 months of age) to bring an object (that he’s already holding) to his mouth.

Read his lips.

Baby will use his tongue to push out and reject food that doesn’t please him, starting at 5 or 6 months. If you offer a cracker to your 6 or 7 month-old, he will consume it by making a munching action with his mouth.  At 9 months, he will bite at a cookie, but not bite all the way through.  At 12 months, he will be able to complete the biting of a soft cookie.  Because your baby will be able to (and will want to) try out a variety of softer foods, it is crucial that you only offer foods that are not choking hazards.

How does he respond to food tools?

Your infant will recognize bottle or breast at around 3 months old.  By 4-6 months old, he will pat the bottle or breast during mealtimes.  Between the ages of 4 to 7 months, or depending on when you and your pediatrician decide to offer solids, your baby will begin to open his mouth when you present a spoon.   A couple of months after that (9-ish months old), he’ll reach for the spoon. He might want to imitate what you do (not for nutritional purposes, but for the joy of stirring), or he might just bang the spoon on his plate.  His impulse to control food tools (and therefore, what goes into his body) is crucial.  Honor this emerging preference.  Don’t insist on controlling the spoon once he reaches this stage.

Bottoms up!

I’m referring to your child’s use of a cup, not his resistance to early toilet training pressure. At the age of 6 months (ish), your baby will drink from a cup, if you hold it.  A few months later, he will be ready to hold it for himself.  By his first birthday, he will want to attempt holding the cup, and you should let him.  Please expect some spilling.  If you can wipe off those slippery, just-had-lunch hands before he tries, you’ll see more success and less frustration.

Young children’s ambitions often exceed their skills.  If you let your child practice the small skills and the small choices, he will grow more smoothly into the big ones.  And remember — nobody wins a food fight with a baby.

Your baby’s first word, like your baby’s first step, is a journey, instead of the finish line we sometimes think it is.

I’m not trying to spoil anybody’s fun.  Your child’s first independent step is such a thrill that it’s dizzying.  Not for baby — for parents, I mean.  And the first recognizable word? Nothing less than an event — hey, I know the date, time, and GPS coordinates for my first kid’s first word, okay?

I’m just saying…. while you await the first word, or the first step, why not enjoy the developmental signs that are posted along the route?

As regular readers of this blog know, the newborn first translates her communiques into the language of the cry.  Within weeks after her birth, baby will have organized her cries into different sounding requests.  At about 3 months old, your baby will discover the joy of laughing.  By 6 months of age, she’s beginning to babble for entertainment, but for a purpose, too.  Your child is practicing the way her utterances sound and feel in her mouth as she attempts them.

A big milestone in receptive language (what baby can comprehend or comply with) occurs around 6 months of age:  your infant will turn her head to the sound of her name, looking around to seek out the source.  Beautiful.

A milestone in expressive language (what baby can you know, express) occurs not long after:  at around 7 months old, baby starts making consonant-based sounds.  One-syllable sounds at first:  gah, bah, kah, dah, and mah — I know, I know! That “mah” thing is particularly exciting, but um…. it’s just a sound for now.  At around one-year old, your child will say “Mama” and “Dada” like she means it.  Because she will.

Within a month or two of producing the consonant-based sounds, your young talker will link the monosyllables together.  Then she’ll develop the ability to imitate on purpose the sounds you make.

A few more notes for the journey:

• Receptive language ability (figuring out what comes out of your mouth) is a much better indicator of language development than expressive ability (what baby can make her own mouth say), during the first three years.
• When your (approximately) 9-month old infant can follow your instruction to wave “bye-bye” while saying something that sounds like “bye-bye”, you will know that she has combined several developmental markers into one communication action.
• Multilingual households might see a shift in the timeline of language development.  But amazingly, developing twice (or thrice) as many languages doesn’t take twice or thrice as much time.  Just a little longer.  Sometimes.

Scientists have discovered that babies between the age of 6 and 12 months are also ruthless editors — they simply don’t bother with sounds that don’t occur in what will be their native languages. Although babies’ brains are born ready to hear, understand, and produce all sounds of all languages known to humankind, the brain makes choices based on exposure, experiences, and usage.

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