Your baby’s brain is changing and developing at incredible speed in the first year of life. During this time it is very important that you interact with your baby and expose her to appropriate levels of stimulation.
Your baby learns from observing and interacting with his environment. You can support her developmentwith appropriate activities like playing games & playing with toys, singing songs & rhymes, talking to your baby and encouraging her to play and discover the world around her.
BaiBoo in cooperation with Playskool will provide you in the coming month with information, tips and age appropriate activities and games that you can play with your little one to help her to learn and develop.
This month we focus on the development of 4 to 6 month old babies and what games you can play with your little one.
4th month: Your baby is interested in people and recognizes familiar faces. Her hands are mostly open and clasping about everything within reach. She squirms with excitement, squeals and laughs, watches her hands. Coordinating looking and reaching is still difficult and this is where you can help her.
Activity:
- As grabbing and touching is the name of the game, choose toys with different textures, buttons to push with bright colors and a variety of sounds.
- Move a toy up and down in front of your baby and see if she follows it with her eyes, then encourage her to reach out and grab it.
- Try hide-and-seek with the toy. If it is small you can hide it under a blanket but let part of the toy stick out from under the blanked and ask your baby: “Where did it go?” Make it peek out and show your baby telling her: “There it is!”
- Play with your baby imitating sounds of few animals (cats, chicken, dog, and cow). You can make a silly face that goes with it. You will see how delighted and entertained your baby can get and you will see how much fun it is to make your baby laugh.
Toys:
Toys with a variety of sounds, bright colours and lights, dolls with friendly faces, soft storybook, play blankets
5th month: At this age your baby should be rolling from her tummy to her back. She smiles at other babies, especially if she sees herself in the mirror. Her hands are open and she reaches out to touch and grasp. If you put her on her tummy she will push with her hands and flex her feet’s. It is also the time that she will start to explore objects with her mouth. If you offer her a toy, she will look back and forth between the toy and her hand, laboriously adjusting the position of her hand.
Activity:
- Playing peek a boo with a child from about 5 months old teaches her that things have permanence – that is that they don’t disappear altogether when she can’t see them.
- To encourage your baby to move and to develop her muscle, place a toy within her view at arm’s length away. Your baby will want to move toward it to get a closer look.
- Place a roly-poly toy on the floor close to your baby so she can look at it and bat at it to make it roll and move. First make the action happen so your baby can see what the toy is all about then watch as your baby try it our herself.
Toys:
Bat-at toys, baby safety mirrors, musical toys, surprise boxes.
6th month: When your child is 6 month old she starts to have the ability to control her body. If you watch your baby carefully you will see that her shoulders, neck and back are getting stronger. When she sits up, she will need just slightly support and for a few seconds she may even sit unaided. She has the strength, but not always the balance. She begins to look for toys that she drops.
Activities:
- Start playing active games like crawling on the floor. This will teach and help your baby to develop her motor skills.
- Use toys to encourage crawling, like balls. Show your baby how to push a toy across the floor and to chase after it. At the beginning you may have to demonstrate the object of the game. But soon your baby will know how it goes and will love it.
- Get a toy that teaches your baby the concept of action and reaction. This will help your child the eye-hand coordination and also that she can influence some things around her.
Toys:
Stacking toys, action and reaction toys, toys that encourage crawling like balls, dolls or toys that change faces.
Always remember that playing should be fun – for you and your baby! If your baby doesn’t like a game or toy today, maybe she is still not ready for it, try it out in a few days time and see how fast your baby develop and learn.
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