Using a large tube splice bracket assembly poster board

Expect your baby to show uneven development in many of the developmental milestones. . Developmental charts show the average age at which infants perform the most easily identifiable skills, such as sitting or walking, called developmental milestones. Early in the newborn period a baby learns that her language, the cry, is a tool for social interchange that she can use to get attention and satisfy needs. During prolonged colds your baby's growth may level off. Language researchers who have studied moths all over the world notice a sort of universal mother language, called motherese. That's what makes them unique." While you will never be certain what goes on in your baby's developing mind, it is fun to deduce what your infant is thinking by his expressions and the way he is acting. Using a large poster board, list the areas of development down the left-hand side and monthly stages of development across the top. He may plot "ahead" in one milestone and "behind" in another. It helps parents to understand the wide variation in normal growth patterns and the way that many of life's little setbacks may affect growth and development. Some infants seem to make a quick stop at one level ant then quickly progress to the next. Ectomorphs (tall and slim "bananas") often put more calories into their height than weight, so that they normally plot above average in height and below in weight, or they may start out hovering around the average line and eventually begin a stretching-out phase, soaring up the chart in height but leveling off in weight. Concerning cognitive development, fill in what you think is going on in baby's mind. Both breastfed and bottle-fed infants who plot on the overweight side of the first six months normally begin a slimming process that we call "leaning out" between six months and a year as their increasing motor milestones help them burn off the chubby rolls. Milestone races are neither an indication of baby's smartness nor a badge of good parenting. You may think that babies don't talk much until one and a half to two years. For example, the fiftieth percentile, or average, means that one half of babies plot above the line, the other half below.
Gross motor skills. So please keep an eye out for more of my articles. Some breastfed babies, especially high-need babies and frequent feeders, may plot high on the weight chart and be unfairly dubbed "overweight.
Why Infants Grow Differently
Not only do babies look and act differently from one another, they grow differently. With diarrheal illnesses your baby may even lose weight. Endomorphs ("pears") plot in the reverse of ectomorphs, often charting in a higher percentile for weight than height. Like gross motor skills, fine motor skills develop in an orderly progression, from imprecise punch like reaching to pinpoint pickup with the thumb and index finger.
Infants spend different amounts of time at each stage before moving on to the next higher stage.m.
While the chart implies a smooth, steady progression, many babies don't grow that way.
How your infant uses the larger muscles of his body -- trunk, limb, and neck muscles -- is determined by his gross motor skills. That's what makes them unique.
Sick babies temporarily divert their energy into healing rather than growing. In the most commonly used charts, each line represents a percentile, which means that's where your baby is, compared with hundred other babies. They represent averages of thousands of babies. summons -- that's language! To a tiny baby, language is any sound or gesture that makes a caregiver respond. Breastfed and bottle-fed babies may show different growth patterns, and the growth charts currently in use do not differentiate.

There will be more articles on infants, breast or bottle feeding and other related topics to follow. Baby "talk" begins at birth. They include such milestones as head control, sitting, crawling, and walking. Some babies grow in bursts and pauses, and when you plot them on the growth chart, you notice periodic growth spurts followed y periods of leveling off. Mothers are intuitively able to speak down to the baby's level, yet they're able to shift to a higher level of communication when their infants are ready. They usually center around the same percentile in both height and weight. How these competencies flower into skills depends upon interaction with the care giving environment baby finds on that floor.
Mothers are naturals at talking with their babies.
Not only do babies look and act differently from one another, they grow differently. In the fun-things-to-do-with-your-baby suggestions for each stage of development, we give time tested play tips to help you and your baby have more fun. If the interaction is responsive and enriching, baby gets back on the elevator with more skills, and the ride up to the next floor is much smoother. Your baby has his or her individual normal growth. Some may skip a level entirely.
We have frequently watched our babies' facial expressions and said, "I wonder what he's thinking. Because baby reaches the next floor with more skills, the interaction on the next level of development is even more rewarding. Using a large tube splice bracket assembly poster board, list the area A valuable exercise during the first two years is to make your own growth and development chart like the one shown in this chapter. Average growth is not necessarily normal growth.
Language skills. All of these variations are normal and indicate the importance of looking at your baby (and his family tree) while looking at the chart, and putting the two together. By sensitively responding to your baby's early cries, you help her refine these somewhat demanding signals into more polite body language requests that are easier on the nerves." Nearly all of these "overweight" breastfed babies begin a natural slimming process around six months to a year, when breast milk fat naturally lowers. Compare your baby only with himself as he was a month ago.
Progression Is More Important Than Timing
When a child does what is not as important as moving through a progressive sequence of developmental milestones.
Cognitive skills.
The Five Features Of Infant Development
As we travel through infant development from birth to two years, we will group baby's developmental skills into five general areas: gross motor skills, fine motor skills, language skills, social and play skills, and cognitive skills. Note that these charts are not infallible. The developmental chart used most by pediatricians, the Denver Developmental Screening Test (DDST), shows that 50 percent of children walk at one year of age, but the normal range for beginning to walk is ten to fifteen months of age. B they both will follow a similar progression. Your baby will progress from sitting to pulling up to standing to walking.
Baby's body type.
Getting-Smarter Charts
Your baby gets bigger not only in size but also in competence. We will point out what signs to watch for to give you a clue to what your baby is thinking.

How Babies Grow
Here are some basic principles that will help you understand the enjoy the individual variations of your baby.
Social and play skills. Twenty-five babies plot above your baby, and seventy-five below.
Fine motor skills. Charting your baby's development not only improves your skills as a baby watcher, it adds your overall enjoyment of growing together. Like language development, interaction with caregivers can profoundly affect social development. Mesomorphs ("apples") show a stocky squared-off appearance.
Getting-Bigger Charts
At each well-baby checkup your doctor will plot your baby's height, weight, and had circumference on a growth chart. He may accomplish these motor milestones at different ages than the baby next door.
Make Your Own Chart
A valuable exercise during the first two years is to make your own growth and development chart like the one shown in this chapter. Divide the sheet into blocks and plot your baby's skills. Parent input can affect language development more than any other of your baby's skills. Avoid the neighborhood race to see whose baby walks first.
Let's look again at that developmental elevator. If your baby plots in the seventy-fifth percentile, he is larger than average.
Health and nutrition.
The ways a baby interacts with caregivers and plays with toys make up her social skills. It helps parents to understand the wide variation in normal growth patterns and the way that many of life's little setbacks may affect growth and development. For simplicity, you may wish to combine social and language milestones, as we have done on our chart and throughout. Expect catch-up spurts after the illness is over. Other babies show a Drawn Part consistent, steady increase in height and weight over the first year.
Finger and hand skills that baby uses to manipulate toys rely on fine motor skills. These charts are simply handy references to alert the doctor to any unhealthy trends. A baby reaches each developmental floor equipped with certain competencies. Cognitive skills include the ability to think, to reason, to make adjustments to different play situations, and to solve problems such as how to crawl over obstacles.
Here is where your skills as a baby communicator really shine. The cry of a newborn that causes nurses to come running, that causes mother to drip milk and embrace her baby, and causes a parent to bump into furniture during a nighttime sprint toward the 3:00 a.
Growth spurts.
Your baby is endowed with tall and slim genes, short and wide genes, or in-between genes. The progression of gross motor skills from birth to tow years means getting more and more of his body off the ground, moving from head to toe. During the first year, called the prelinguistic state of language development, baby learns to communicate before she is able to say words