Give Your Child The Best Start They Could Have

When Should You Start Thinking About Your Baby's Development ?

O nce you're well out of the 'Zombie Zone' (due to way too many sleepless nights!) and you've settled into a happy routine, you'll be ready to nurture your child's development.

Don't worry, it WON'T be difficult... but the results will be dramatic for your child. Simply by including a few fun things into your daily routine, you will boost your child's future learning ability.

Consider asking your partner to help here, it's a great way for them to get involved with an important aspect of their child. Alternatively, you could team-up with another parent you know with a child of similar age, and progress together.

Your Child is at a Crucial Stage of Their Development

Babies have a compelling, natural instinct to learn.

Your baby’s brain is developing at an astonishing rate. Their learning ability will never again be matched in their lives.

In a short period, they will begin to master a wide range of new skills such as smiling, crawling, talking and walking, to name but a few. Nothing in our 'high-tech' world comes anywhere near to this amazing feat.

Your baby truly is a marvel.

You are the key to unlocking their full potential. To do so, it's important to understand how you can best help them develop. A good place to start is to first understand 'how' your baby learns.

How Your Baby Learns

As well as needing to be protected, loved and nourished, your baby needs to (and wants to) learn.

Learning comes naturally to babies. It has been proven they start learning language whilst in the womb using their hearing.

Babies learn in a different way to us... they learn 'effortlessly'.

Consider the effort we must apply, just to learn the basics of a new language... now compare that to how your baby learns. The way your baby learns is similar to how a sponge takes on water.

These are the key aspects of how your baby learns -

By Observing -

Babies learn by using ALL of their senses (touch, sight, hearing, taste and smell) to interact with everything in their surroundings making new discoveries minute-by-minute.

By Experimenting -

There are three main ways your baby 'decides' what to do...

Instinct provides many essential survival skills which include; sucking, grasping and seeking attention through crying.

Copying from observations they have made, they discover the effects of these actions for themselves, "Oh that's a nice smile from Daddy! I'll try that... Wow! When I smile back it makes him get all excited... What fun. I think I'll do more of this smiling lark!"

Curiosity is also a major factor in their experiments with their new world, "I wonder what will happen if I... a) Eat my food (tried that already... boring) or b) Drop it on the floor... Hmmm..."

By Repitition -

Babies love repetition, it's a major source of comfort and fun for them. The significance of repetition can be seen in the way babies babble, and in simple games babies love such as 'peek-a-boo'. This repetition forms valuable 'practice' for your baby, essential in mastering new skills and for them to be remembered.

Your Encouragement is Vital to Your Baby -

Babies need encouragement, it gives them valuable feedback about their actions. Encouragement guides babies to repeat certain behaviour and is a major factor in mastering new skills as well as learning the difference between what is deemed "right" and "wrong". Encouragement also plays a major part in confidence, if you (their biggest fan) say they can do something, then it is probably worth a try.

Recent research has proved that babies can learn new behaviour patterns even whilst they sleep, using their senses to constantly monitor their environment.

[cartoon: baby photo sleeping with thought bubble thinking about new ways to keep mum and dad up at night]

This instinctive way your baby learns is supremely effective. Sadly, this incredible learning ability will naturally ebb away as they get older, tailing-off about the age of six years.

Clearly, this is a crucial time for your child's development. You can help them establish a solid foundation for learning which is certain to help shape a brighter future for them.

Please remember that the rate that babies develop will vary since every child's personality is different.

At EasyStreetLearning we believe that the importance of parents' interaction with their children is often underestimated, poorly understood and sadly neglected.

Learning through play, discovery and practice is the heart of EasyStreetLearning success.

What is Your Role in the Way Your Baby Learns ?

Remember, the way your baby learns is much like a sponge... absorbing new observations, behaviour and interactions using all their senses and storing them in their memories for later use.

Clearly, providing a happy and stimulating environment for your baby is key... and the most important, stimulating and fun thing in their environment is YOU! Their parent.

Don't believe the TV adverts, having you as a playmate is far more interesting for your baby than the latest best selling fancy toy.

Education experts and teachers are all in agreement that parents play the major part in a child's development.

Your reactions provide essential feedback for your baby and gives them an a reason (and opportunity) to practice new skills. Your encouragement stimulates even more reactions from them, which leads to even more development. It is this 'snowball' effect which partly lies behind the dramatic success of parental involvement.

This interaction between you and your baby forms the basis for communication, speech, confidence, social skills and many more important life skills.

One of the most rewarding things about being a parent is being a loving and caring 'guide' to your child and watching the positive effects on your child.

Begin to see yourself as their 'guide' to their new and exciting world.

You can play a major role in helping your child master listening and speaking skills... it won't be difficult, and the positive effects will be lifelong.

What is Literacy ? Will Anything I do Now Make a Difference ?

Literacy is about anything to do with words, and includes the skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing.

Clearly, reading and writing are not skills for your baby now, BUT the 'foundations' for reading and writing ARE established now and lie in good listening and speaking skills.

So, yes, the things you do now with your baby will help them communicate later.

Towards Literacy: Listening and Speaking

Babies begin to learn to speak by listening (and watching) people speak to them and around them.

Slowly but surely, with your help, they will understand more and more language. What you do now will dramatically help your child.

Babies listen and learn from the sounds around them like your voice. They also watch your facial expressions as you talk and begin to understand how they can control the sounds from their mouth.

Read on, to find out about some simple playful things you can do that will dramatically help your child flourish whilst at the same time you'll both have lots of fun.

Summary of Key Points

• Once you feel settled with your daily routine, it's a good time to find out about helping your baby's development
• Work as a team with your partner, or, consider teaming-up with another parent... we'll guide you on what to do
• Literacy is a skill for your child in later years BUT the important foundations are built NOW with listening and talking skills
• YOU can set your child on course for confident listening and speech skills, and later on reading and writing skills
• It won't be difficult, it will be fun and rewarding for you and your child
• You will be avoiding problems in the future for your child by taking simple steps now