Information on Infant Milestones

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Infant Milestones

During his first three months, one of your baby's major accomplishments waslearning to keep his head still enough to focus on an object and track a object with his eyes. Now he is starting to use larger muscle groups thatAientually allow him to sit up on his own. This begins with more decisive control, which you will notice when he is lying on his stomach while awake. You can make a more deliberate effort to keep his head elevated so he can seegoing on in front of him. You can encourage the exercise of these upperd neck muscles by placing a small toy or brightly colored object—or your face—in front of him while he is in this position.

He will then progress to lifting his entire upper chest, with or without help from his arms. When he combines this with vigorous kicking, you will see surprisingly active rocking, and by five or six months, the right combination cl movements will send him rolling over front to back. Rolling back to front not be far behind. (A few babies roll back to front first.) Invariably, he will accomplish this skill for the first time when you least expect it, so never leave him alone on any elevated surface such as a bed or changing table, or he may add free-falling to his new movement experiences.

At this stage he will enjoy being propped on pillows in a sitting position, although he must be watched because he can easily topple forward. He will soon figure out how to "sit" in a hunched position with one or both hands on the floor, precariously maintaining his balance. He can still topple easily, so make sure his landing will be on a soft surface. At six months of age at the earliest, he will be able to maintain a sitting position without using his hands, although he is still a few months away from maneuvering himself into a sitting position.

Another adventure for him at this age is being held by the upper body and "standing" in someone's lap. Most babies love to flex their legs and bounce up and down, as if ready to bear their weight in a standing position. They are, of course, nowhere near achieving this milestone, and the playful bouncing won't bring it along any sooner. But it also won't cause any harm to growing muscles and bones. However, you should not suspend or lift a baby's full weight by holding his hands or arms.

Your baby's ability to use his hands will develop dramatically during these three months. As a newborn he spent most of his time with his little fists clenched and could only respond with a tight reflex grip to objects placed in his hands. Now he will spend more time with open palms, and more important, he will begin to reach deliberately toward interesting things that catch his eye. He will grasp as if his hand were in a mitten, thumb against the other fingers, or rake an item into his hand. (Independent use of the fingers and the ability to pick up an object between the thumb and index finger will not develop until about nine months of age.) You will not be able to tell whether he is right- or left-handed at this point, since this characteristic is not clearly manifested until about the age of three years.

But even without fine tuning, your baby will become a first-class grabber by the age of six months. Not only will he reach for toys in his immediate vicinity (or his own feet), but when someone holds him, he will expertly seize hair, earrings, or the pen in Dad's shirt pocket. Furthermore, all of these items will he inspected carefully and fearlessly, not only with eyes and fingers but invariably with his mouth. You will now need to enter a state of perpetual vigilance for small objects if you would rather not see entering his mouth, either because they are incredi-sly gross or because they might be accidentally swallowed and/or block his airway.

As his reaching and grasping skills become more developed, he will also dis-cover the joy of "letting go." During these three months you will see him transferan object from one hand to the other, which requires that one hand release whatthe other hand takes. At some point he will also discover gravity, as he begins todrop things and observe what happens as a result. In later months this may be-come a serious pastime as toys, food, and other unidentified nonflying objectsare released from various heights (such as crib or high chair) in order to watchthem careen or bounce or even shatter. All of this activity is exploratory and nota sign of a destructive streak or a future career in sports. But he will eventuallyneed to be taught what items can be tossed and where.

Vision and hearing

During these three months your baby will continue to gain in the ability to seeand hear what's going on around her. By six months she will be able to focus onpeople or objects several feet away and follow movement in all directions. Shewill show interest in more complex patterns and subtle shades of color, so this isa great time to hang a mobile over her crib. She will also find stroller rides stim-ulating times to take in a passing parade of new colors and shapes.
She will become more skillful at localizing the source of sounds and turningher head in the direction of your voice or an interesting noise in her vicinity. Inaddition, you will begin hearing a wider range of sounds—babbles, belly laughs,Nibbling noises, and even a screech or two for good measure. Sometimes she willeven alter her "speech" patterns, raising and lowering her voice as if giving an ora-tion in a language only she understands. Rather than parroting back her assortedsounds, which is often irresistible, you can begin to transform some of her favoritesyllables into simple words such as baby, doggie, Mommy, and feed them back toher. By seven months of age, she should begin imitating sounds you make.

Between six and nine months, your baby will be figuring out how to sit up andremain steady. First she will need support from pillows or the nearest adult. Thenshe will begin to prop herself up using her outstretched hands in a "tripod" pos-ture. Eventually she will sit up for minutes at a time without toppling. By ninemonths, half of all babies are able to maneuver themselves into a sitting positionfrom any other posture. This will give her considerable satisfaction, because he-hands will be free to examine interesting objects while she remains upright.
Once your baby discovers the wonders of her world that are visible from afew inches off the floor, she will develop a keen interest in moving herself close:to whatever she spies across the room. Whether she eventually tries to roil.slither, scoot, or crawl toward them and when she first makes the attempt will beimpossible to predict. If she takes to crawling, her skill will peak between seer-and ten months, at which point you will be amazed at the speed with which shecan cross the floor. She may use the traditional hands-and-knees approach, scut-tle sideways like a crab, or inch forward military-style.

Some babies rarely or never crawl, and crawling doesn't actually appear onstandard charts as a developmental milestone. Babies don't need to learn to crawlbefore they walk, and there is no correlation between this skill and future athleticor intellectual ability. Learning to crawl is not necessary for visual development.hand-eye coordination, or learning to read later in life. If other skills are movingahead and your baby's doctor confirms that all else is going well, don't panic ifshe decides to skip crawling and move on to bigger and better things.

At around nine months of age, she will make another discovery: Standingupright is really, really fun. Usually someone in the family will pull her to a stand-ing position next to the sofa or a soft chair, and she will gleefully remain there.using her hands to hold her position. Eventually she will figure out how to pullherself to her feet, using any available object that appears tall enough. Nettcomes the ultimate prewalking thrill of "cruising" from one place to anotherwhile holding on to whatever will keep her upright.

There will be three potential problem areas during this phase of exploration.First, expect a minor commotion if she pulls herself to a stand but can't figureout how to let herself down. You can teach her to bend her knees and lower her-self to the ground without a fall, a skill that will save her a few bruises and spareyou several trips to wherever she has become hung up, including her crib.

Second, your baby will have no ability to judge the stability of whatever shesees around her. If she decides to pull herself up using a wastebasket, a petite end .e, a houseplant, or a floor lamp, both she and her unsteady support may end in the floor. The results can be unpleasant if she pulls down a loose tablecloth
which sits your favorite china, or dangerous and disastrous if she applies hernaught to an object that is both unstable and heavy such as a wobbly bookcase.

The third problem arises from a variation on cruising—climbing. Some ba-311es find the lure of heights irresistible and will startle you with their ability tostale low-level furniture, stairs, or even combinations of pillows and stuffed an-imals to explore the upper atmosphere of the room. A few climbers will carry outnPrnarkable acts of problem solving in their efforts to gain increased elevation.Unfortunately, their interest in heights will not be matched by an appreciation ofthe discomforts caused by a fall.

If your budding cruiser is going to he turned loose in a room, take a quickvisual survey or a brief tour at her level to make certain that she won't find outabout the force of gravity the hard way. Particularly important is keeping her off:be stairs, which she will find irresistible once she discovers them. After her firstiiirthday, she can begin to learn, with your direct supervision, how to get herselfdownstairs backwards. But until she is clearly "stair safe" many months fromsow, you will need to consider getting one or more barricades if her activity ar-eas include potential access to a flight of stairs. These barricades should be the horizontal gates with narrow slats (two and three-eighths inches or less , not the old-fashioned accordion-style, wood-slat barriers, which are less
e and are potential traps for inquisitive heads.

Letting her suffer some bruising consequences to "teach her a lesson" is a badsaint at this age. Not only will this risk unnecessary injury, but she is in fact notcapable of understanding and judging the risks involved in her explorations.won't start on this learning curve until she is about fifteen months of age.)
icanding and walking

Your baby continues his relentless efforts to stay upright, he will at some pointto of his favorite support and stand on his own for a few seconds. At the samelate or shortly thereafter, he will take a few shaky steps, perhaps with one or bothparents cheering him on. Within a week he likely will be purposefully walkingJona one end of the room to the other, with or without a few unscheduled dropstor me floor along the way. His legs will be bent and toes pointed outward, givinga thoroughly precarious appearance to his efforts. But all the lurching and plop-pre which you may find nerve-wracking to watch, won't slow him down at all.Von't forget to grab the camera so you—and he—can enjoy seeing it later.)

When will all this ambulating begin? Depending upon his size, center ofgravity, genetic code, and temperament, anywhere between eight and fourteeamonths of age. If he is on the hefty side, he may have more difficulty hoisting hisweight and maintaining his balance. The timing of his first steps has nothing todo with his future batting average or his chances of getting into college, but if hearrives at his first birthday and cannot stand even while being supported, your health-care provider—who will be doing a routine checkup at this age anyway—should be consulted.
What about shoes? Shoes serve little purpose prior to the onset of walkincother than to decorate the feet for a family portrait. Once your baby starts to wait-routinely, however, you may want to get shoes to protect his feet if he will bewalking somewhere—such as the backyard or a park—where terrain is morelikely to contain objects that are unfriendly to little soles.

Shoes should be big enough to allow a half inch of space between his toesand the tip of the shoe, and since his feet will be growing rather rapidly, there isno sense in blowing the family budget on designer footwear. A simple pair of ten-nis shoes with a sole that grips will suffice. Unless prescribed by a qualifiedhealth-care professional to remedy a specific problem, he shouldn't need wedgesheel lifts, or other hardware in his shoes. He won't need arch supports becausehis arch is covered by a fat pad that will gradually recede over two to three years.
Furthermore, you may notice that while his toes point outward when hewalks (because of looseness of the hip ligaments), his feet will tend to point in-ward (pigeon toes) when he lies down. Both of these situations should straightenout by the time he is about eighteen months old. If any positioning of feet or legsseems extreme or not symmetrical, have your baby's doctor (or, if necessary, anorthopedist who deals with young children) take a look. If you see your babylimp, whether now or in the future, a medical evaluation should be carried outas soon as possible. Limping is never normal, and it may indicate that any num-ber of significant medical problems is occurring.

Eyes and hands

By seven or eight months of age, your baby's visual capabilities will have maturedto the point that she can focus on people and objects across the room, thoughnot quite with the clarity with which she sees things directly in front of her. Shemay find a mirror entertaining, as she watches the interesting little person whoresponds exactly to her own movements. She will be more attentive to a varietyof colors and shapes and will be rapidly absorbing visual information about theworld around her. You will at times notice her staring intently at something across the room. More often she will become fixated on, and apparently fasci-nated by, some tiny object directly in front of her—a wad of lint, a stray Cheerio,or a little bug.

Her increased visual skills will be matched by new abilities with hands andfingers. By nine months she will have progressed from the mitten or rakelikegrasp (using four fingers as a unit against the thumb) to the more precise "pin-cer" grasp between thumb and one finger. She will also begin cooperative effortsbetween her two hands such as picking up toys, passing an object from hand tohand, or smacking two items together to enjoy the sound they produce.

Over the next three months, these investigations with hands will becomemore sophisticated. She will discover the joy of releasing something from herhands, or actually throwing it, and watching what happens. She will turn itaround and look at it from a variety of angles, rub it, and shake it. If it has a hole,she'll poke a finger into it. If it has parts she can move, she'll push, pull, twist, orTin them. Toward the end of the first year she will enjoy dumping small objectsout of a container and then putting them back in, one at a time. She will knocksomething over and then set it upright, over and over. And, of course, she willbring everything directly to her mouth for examination by lips, gums, and tongue.

Sounds, syllables, and speech

One of the most pleasant developments between six and twelve months is watch-ing your baby begin to make all sorts of new sounds. After six months he will be-gin imitating various syllables, primarily with vowels at first. By nine months,gurgling and babbling will be replaced by sounds with consonants such as "baba"or "dada," either in short bursts or repeated at length. He will probably not assignthese sounds to a particular person (for example, "mama" for his mother) untiltwelve months or after.

As he progresses toward his first birthday, his "speech" will sound more so-phisticated, though without much obvious meaning. Your one-year-old is likelyto utilize a vocabulary of a few words, along with some wonderfully modulatedbabbling that rises and falls with the inflections of real speech. You can almostimagine that he is a visitor speaking a foreign language. He will also begin tocommunicate with gestures, such as pointing to something he finds interesting,waving bye-bye, or shaking his head to signify no. You may also hear exclama-tions such as "Uh-oh!"

While his speaking vocabulary may not be lengthy at his first birthday, hecan understand quite a bit more (in fact, far more than you probably realize) well before that date. After nine months he will begin responding to his own nameand may show recognition of familiar people, pets, or objects. He will likely (wehope) respond to the word no before he starts using it himself. He may turn hishead toward a person or toy you name, and before long he will surprise you by following a simple command.

You can make a major contribution to your child's language development during these months, even if you're not yet having much conversation. All daylong you can name objects that you both see, talk in simple terms about what youare doing, and even look through simple picture books together. Try to keep yourvocabulary straightforward and consistent, and don't expose him to hours ofconvoluted baby talk. Instead, coo and fuss and caress with your voice to yourheart's content—using real words. His little computer will be processing all ofthis input, associating objects and pictures with words that you provide, and hemight as well get it right the first time.

As cute as you will find his babbling, resist the temptation to repeat back hisgarbled versions of new words. If he points to a truck and says, "Guck!" be sureto say, "That's right, truck!" rather than leading him to believe that he has trulyseen a guck. (One exception: Grandparents almost always proudly assume thenames given to them by the first grandchild, such as "Nana and Papa," "Gombaand Bumpa," etc.)

Now is a good time to think about the kinds of sounds your baby will be im-itating. Does everyone in the family speak in calm, pleasant tones, or do conver-sations sound loud and confrontational? Are compliments or complaintsexchanged across the kitchen table? Is your baby likely to learn "Shut up!" beforehe says "I love you"? Is he hearing more words from the adults in his life or fromthe TV set droning in the corner? If you don't like what your baby is hearing,hold a family meeting and prayer time to help launch some new conversationpatterns (and perhaps lower noise levels) at home.

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