MY FIRST FIVE YEARS
TM
Baby
Everyday activities to support your baby's development
Introduction………… 6 BLOOMSBURY EDUCATION Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK 29 Earlsfort Terrace, Dublin 2, Ireland BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY EDUCATION and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published in Great Britain, 2023 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc Text copyright © My First Five Years, 2023 Illustrations copyright © My First Five Years, 2023 My First Five Years have asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN: PB: 978-1-8019-9156-8; ePDF: 978-1-8019-9157-5; ePub: 978-1-8019-9155-1 2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1 (paperback) Text design by Peter Clayman Printed and bound in India by Replika Press Pvt. Ltd
The My First Five Years Approach………… 7 How to use this book………… 9 Chapter 1: Social and emotional………… 12 • Mirror, mirror – Looking at reflections………… 16 • Five little ducks – Puppet play………… 17 • Let me look at you – Spending time face to face………… 18 • Sharing photographs – Developing a sense of belonging and family………… 20 • Copycat – This is you and this is me………… 22 • Hello and goodbye – Playing peepo………… 23 • Build it up to knock it down – Anticipating the tower falling!………… 24 • You choose – Giving attention to your baby’s interests………… 25 • Box of treasures – Everyday items to explore………… 26 • Goodnight Teddy – Learning the bedtime routine………… 27
Chapter 2: Gross motor………… 28 • Bare legs, feet and toes – Freedom to feel the world………… 31 • Tummy time – Developing the core muscles………… 32 • Baby gym ribbons – Reaching and grabbing………… 33 • Sit-ups – Supporting your baby to gain strength………… 34 • Blanket roly-poly – Rolling over………… 35 • Try not to topple – Keeping a stable sitting position………… 36 • Stack them tall, watch them fall – Coordinating movements………… 37 • Here comes the ball – Tracking the ball and planning when to move………… 38 • Standing on my own two feet – Pulling up to standing………… 39 • I’m off – Furniture walking………… 40
Chapter 3: Fine motor………… 41 • Stretch out – Finding out what hands, fingers, legs and toes can do!………… 44 To find out more about our authors and books visit www.bloomsbury.com and sign up for our newsletters
Acknowledgements Thank you to Anne Statham, it was your knowledge and passion that enabled this book to come alive, and to Jennifer Garrity for your beautiful illustrations and creative vision. Also, to the whole My First Five Years Child Development Team for their enthusiasm, ideas and support.
• Feeling textures – Discovering different surfaces………… 45 • Splash and grab – Watching, reaching for and grasping floating toys………… 46 • Ribbon play – Holding tight and pulling………… 47 • Treasure basket – Objects to explore at your fingertips………… 48 • Bubble pop – A homemade bubble kit………… 50 • Turning the page – Reading with your baby………… 51 • Celebrating scribbles – Enjoying the physicality of making marks………… 53 • Action songs and rhymes – Finding your favourites………… 54 • Masking tape toys – The satisfying activity of removing tape………… 56
Chapter 4: Sensory………… 57 • Massage moments – Touch and proprioception………… 60 • Sensory socks – Sniff and smell………… 61 • Tasty finger paint – Homemade paint that’s safe for your baby………… 62 • Exploring light – Developing vision………… 63 • You’re in the band! – Making your own recycled music………… 64 • Joyful movements – Dancing together………… 65 • Magic carpet – Rocking, sliding and swinging………… 66 • Sensory cave – Your own space to explore………… 67 • What’s outside? – A sensory adventure………… 68 • Can you hear me? – Moving towards a familiar sound………… 69
Chapter 5: Language………… 70 • Talking time – Face-to-face conversation………… 73 • Listening walk – A tour of your home………… 74 • Making noises – Starting and stopping………… 75 • Peek-a-boo – Back-and-forth interaction………… 76 • Story den – Snuggling together to share books………… 77 • ‘That’s you’ – Pictures of your baby………… 78 • Narrate your day – What’s going on today?………… 79 • Experimenting with sounds – Buckets of noise!…………80 • Rhyme bag – Choosing props………… 81 • Animal noises – Testing out voice sounds………… 82
Chapter 6: Cognitive………… 83 • Rolling – In and out of sight………… 86 • Sounds like fun – Get creative with the baby gym………… 87 • It’s all about you – Songs about your baby………… 88 • Cloud spotting – Taking a different perspective………… 89 • Watching water – Anticipating actions and sensations………… 90 • Laundry basket – What clothing can we discover?………… 92 • Egg box puzzle – How many can you fit in?………… 93 • Sensory bottles – Roll them and shake them!………… 94 • Shoe box posting – Testing what fits through the holes………… 95 • Floor drawings – Make your mark!………… 96
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Play is the super power we all possess! Alistair Bryce-Clegg, My First Five Years Founder
Introduction
The My First Five Years approach
Parents often feel a lot of pressure about their baby’s development, and we know that comparing your baby’s pace of development to others can be a source of worry.
Knowledge is power!
We want to help you to relax and enjoy being present and playful with your baby, trusting that learning will happen naturally during the flow of everyday life. Your baby is wired to discover their world through playful exploration. They will learn to talk by being immersed in language, with lots of practice listening and responding. They will learn to move by being given lots of chances to move freely without hindrance. They will learn numbers and counting through exploring collections and comparing quantities of real-life objects, and so much more.
We believe you are, absolutely, the expert when it comes to your baby. But sometimes you might want to know a bit more about the whys behind their development. Our activity ideas are underpinned by knowledge and research, and we give simple pointers to interesting and relevant facts about baby development, so you can feel empowered to make informed choices when journeying with your baby through their first few years of life.
Relationships are at the heart of all learning
Your baby needs you, and we are here to support you.
We are sure you know that all the best learning happens in a playful, relaxed way as your baby interacts with you or other people who are important to them. Family life is part of learning, so we have included activity ideas that can become a playful part of your whole family’s regular routine.
This book will inspire you to joyfully and playfully help your baby to learn, from the very first moments you share together. It’s full of simple activities that give your baby time to explore, discover and connect experiences at their own pace. We believe that play is definitely not the opposite of work. Play certainly isn’t always just for fun, play can be a serious thing even for a baby. It can be scientific, mathematical, creative, and involves testing ideas, making connections, adapting approaches and persevering. Time with a new baby can flow in a different pattern, certainly in the earliest days. It involves a huge shift in your habits and routines as you settle into life together. Whether you are a brand-new or more experienced parent, you can feel comforted by discovering how the small magical daily moments you share together are so important, and how simple adjustments and enhancements can maximise them.
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Play is the natural and primary way that babies and young children learn, and is essential to wellbeing, health and development. Alistair Bryce-Clegg
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Again, again and again
Repetition is an important part of learning as it supports deeper thinking through giving the opportunity to revisit, connect and consolidate skills. We love the idea of wallowing in learning! We encourage you and your baby to take it slowly and to revisit activities again and again, in order to learn deeply and well. It’s important for your baby to enjoy the feeling of mastery involved in doing something they have done before, and perhaps take it a little step further. You can take time to notice and build up skills at the pace that is right for your baby.
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How to use this book
A realistic approach
Our realistic parenting approach means you won’t find Instagram-style ideas (which take hours to set up) in our books. Instead, we offer ideas and activities that you can fit into everyday life which are relevant and meaningful to you and your baby. Learning happens in lots of incidental ways and we highlight opportunities for you to support your baby’s learning through moments in your daily routine, such as getting dressed, preparing meals or bath times. When you are depleted, it can be helpful to focus on some of these caregiving activities and give them your full attention, like cuddles, chatting face to face, nappy changing and bathing. Take them slowly and these can bolster your own emotional reserves as well as your baby’s. It is important to recognise how you are feeling and know that having a hard day or feeling anxious or upset can be part of parenting. If these feelings feel too difficult to cope with alone, or if you feel like this a lot of the time, speak to a health professional or someone you trust. You can also contact charities, such as PANDAS, who support parents. Remember you are not alone.
At My First Five Years, we use six streams of development to describe children’s learning and development. • Social and emotional • Gross motor • Fine motor • Sensory • Language • Cognitive Like a stream, your child will carve out a learning journey that will sometimes meander gently, sometimes race ahead like rapids and sometimes be still for a time before moving on. Although your child’s development may look similar to others, it is totally unique as the journey of no two children, or streams, is ever the same. The six chapters in this book are organised around these six streams of development. Each chapter outlines and explains developmental highlights within a particular stream of development for your baby and offers you ten playful activity ideas to try together. There is no need to work through a particular section from beginning to end; the streams interweave so you can dip in anywhere and try an activity you think your baby will enjoy. Thinking about learning in terms of these streams can help you to notice the small steps your baby takes before they reach particular milestones. We think marvelling at all these small moments, as well as the bigger milestones, will help you to find the joy in parenting!
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Equipment
Our activities do not need special equipment or costly resources, rather they make use of recycled items, household objects and natural materials. We anticipate that you can find these items at your fingertips ready to go, although you may not have thought of them as ‘toys’ or learning resources before! The variety of colours, shapes, weights, sizes, materials and textures of many everyday items are intriguing to your baby and this encourages them to investigate more closely by handling them, exploring them with all of their senses and using their imagination to discover more about what each item is like and the possibilities of what it can do.
Active play
We focus on activities that allow your baby to move and explore freely and use their whole body as we know this is how they learn best. We consciously avoid suggesting your baby needs to be sat at a table or contained in a chair to participate. You will notice that many activities also suggest that, if possible, you join your baby in their play, joining them at their level on the floor and sharing their perspective.
Food play
We feel strongly that food should not be wasted, but we also know that food play offers lots of valuable sensory experiences for young children and can be especially useful for babies who are still exploring the world using their mouths. Experiencing food through play can give your baby the confidence to try eating a wide variety of foods as they grow. Using some edible items in play with older babies gives them freedom to explore the taste, texture, smell and look of foods without the pressure to eat them which comes at mealtimes. For this reason, we have chosen to retain some food products in our activities, however, we have made several decisions to help reduce waste. We anticipate that the food chosen is a type that can be reused many times, and where we can, we offer alternatives to a food product. Some of our ideas, such as homemade play dough, can’t avoid using food-based ingredients (in this case flour) so we would encourage you to keep your dough once you finish an activity so that you can reuse it many times.
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The activities
Each activity is organised in the same way: What you need lists the resources needed for each activity. The steps gives you step-by-step instructions for carrying out the activity. Benefits for your baby highlights the skills your baby will be developing from the activity. Building on gives you ideas for adapting the activity to suit you and your baby. Routine hack Some activities encourage you to tweak your usual daily routine, just a little, to maximise the learning possibilities of incidental moments, such as whilst getting your baby dressed, preparing meals or bath times. These activities are identified by our Routine hack symbol. Safety Some activities have Safety notices, these indicate extra precautions you might take or things to consider.
Newborn baby
Newborn baby symbol Each chapter includes some playful activities and interactions which can be enjoyed safely with your baby from birth, before they are able to support their head independently. These are clearly indicated with our Newborn baby symbol next to the activity title. Other activities within each chapter are suitable for older babies who are growing stronger and beginning to sit up. Please always use your personal judgement and knowledge of your baby’s unique stage of development to select activities that you are confident are suitable and safe for them.
SCAN ME
QR code Find out more about how My First Five Years provides you with tools, knowledge and support to block out unhelpful comparisons, feel more confident and better understand the way in which your baby learns and develops.
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Chapter 1
Social and emotional Finding out about myself, making relationships and gaining a sense of belonging! Your baby is on an exciting, long and intricate journey to discover more about themselves, others and the world around them and this is an expedition that never really ends! The activities in this chapter focus on your baby’s social and emotional development, exploring the ways in which your baby is gaining a sense of themselves as an individual and beginning to experience, understand and express a range of different feelings and emotions. Your baby will be learning about the responsive, loving and safe nature of their relationship with you and other important people who are close to them. They will be acquiring a sense of belonging to your family, their wider social group and their local community.
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Brains require a social world to develop. They need input from other humans who guide their attention, talk or sing to them, or cuddle them at important moments. Alistair Bryce-Clegg
Understanding and expressing emotions
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Babies feel a range of emotions, but they cannot express, interpret or process them in the same way as older children or adults. You can help your baby by providing consistent responses to their feelings and emotions, as you recognise them, validate them, label them and offer guidance to help solve problems. For example, when you notice your baby becomes frustrated because they can’t reach a particular toy, you might meet their gaze and echo their feelings with gestures and words, perhaps saying, ‘Oh no, where has your ball gone?’ as you hold your palms upturned. You might continue by saying, ‘I think you’re worried your ball has rolled away’. You might follow this by helping your baby to solve the problem, saying, ‘Let me help to roll it a bit closer to you’. This may feel strange at first as your baby is unable to respond with words, but as they grow, this consistent responsive approach will help them to understand and effectively express their emotions safe in the knowledge that you are there to help.
It is in these close relationships that your baby will be able to safely explore their emotions and they will rely on you to help them regulate these emotions by you responding to them and validating their feelings. This will help your baby to feel safe, understood and aware that they can depend on you to meet their needs. Through your warm interactions, your baby will begin to develop a positive sense of self, and confidence in their abilities. The fun and simple activities in this book will help you to support your baby to learn these complex skills by watching others, listening to what is going on around them and by encouraging them to begin to express themselves in their own unique way.
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Developing a sense of identity
Babies develop a sense of self by interacting with others and by exploring their bodies and the objects around them. Your baby’s feelings of identity grow as you make attempts to understand what they are thinking. Sometimes you may validate the fact that your baby’s thinking is different from yours, for example, if they push away your attempt to put a hat on their head and you say, ‘Oh, you are not keen on that woolly hat’. The more you interact with your baby and help them to express themselves with both gestures and words, the more understood they will feel. A sense of self comes from the experience of being important in the mind of others, feeling valued and understood. If children do not feel understood this can affect feelings of intimacy, trust and attachment later in life. But the good news is, it is you who is regularly providing these valuable responses.
Shared attention
Most simply, shared attention means looking at and thinking about the same thing as another person. You will naturally be showing your baby what is interesting in the world around them by drawing their attention to new and novel objects and commenting on the things you see. This is how shared attention begins. It is an important part of nurture, as you begin to tune into and respond to each other’s thinking. You will be supporting these shared attention experiences many times every day. Your baby might also initiate shared attention opportunities themselves, for example, when they show you what they are interested in by turning or reaching towards a toy or an object or passing something to you that captures their attention. When you respond by looking at or handling the same toy or object, passing an item back and forth or making a comment about something you can both see, you help your baby make and strengthen connections in their brain.
Developing a sense of belonging
Babies first learn a sense of belonging by developing a sense of self. Then they will begin to understand more about themselves as part of a family, their familiar local area, their cultural group or their wider community. Relationships are crucial to your baby developing a sense of belonging and the experiences you provide them in your home and whilst out and about will help to add to this identity. The stronger their sense of belonging, the more open your child will feel to sharing ideas, expressing themselves, taking risks and accepting failures in the future. Importantly, it does not take a large family and a big community group to help them feel like they belong. It starts with you and your loving relationship, along with a few other significant adults or children who your baby sees regularly.
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Don’t forget to scan this QR code to find lots more child development content and bonus activity ideas from the team at My First Five Years. SCAN ME
Building relationships
In your warm and loving relationship, your baby will feel safe to express themselves, experience their emotions and learn how to act in the world. All of this starts from the day your baby is born and they begin to recognise that when they are wet, you change them; when they are hungry, you feed them; and when they are sad, you comfort them. They begin to feel safe and secure in your responsive and loving attachment and from this they will learn to explore the world from the comfort of being near you, and the secure base of their family and home.
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Mirror, mirror
Looking at reflections
Newborn baby
Five little ducks Puppet play
What you need:
What you need:
The steps:
The steps:
• A child-safe mirror • A toy (optional)
• Paper • A glue stick
Newborn baby
• Scissors • Felt tips
• Prop a mirror safely against a wall (ensure that it won’t topple forward). • Place your baby on their tummy or their side so that they can see you through the mirror.
• Create some simple finger puppets. • Cut out 10 paper circles of 5cm in diameter (about half the length of the long edge of a credit card).
Talk to your baby through the mirror and see how they engage with their reflection.
Stick two circles together, leaving a gap at the bottom of the circle a few centimetres wide for your finger.
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Benefits for your baby:
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A mirror is a terrific way for your baby to learn about familiar faces and the expressions that they make.
• It will stimulate their curiosity as they discover more about themselves and their movements through reflection. •
As your child grows and engages in these back-and-forth activities, they will learn more about body language and emotions such as empathy. Mirrors are also a wonderful way for your baby to develop visual tracking. This is when your baby follows, or tracks, a moving object with their eyes.
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• Do this until you have five finger puppets. • Draw some simple duck outlines onto each of the circles – you don’t have to be an artist; your baby won’t mind how realistic they are! •
Once dry, place one of the finger puppets onto each of your fingers. Alternatively, you could cut the fingers off an old glove and draw little ducks straight onto those.
With your baby on the floor, sing the song ‘Five Little Ducks’, removing one of the •ducks each time a duck swims away. Lyrics to the song are available online. Benefits for your baby:
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Building on:
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Present other objects in the mirror, such as a toy, so that your baby can track it with their eyes from side to side.
Make different facial expressions for your baby through the mirror or copy the •expressions and the sounds that they make.
Puppets and the song ‘Five Little Ducks’ are a wonderful way for babies to learn that objects exist even when they’re out of sight (often referred to as object permanence). The song will also help them begin to understand the feelings that are associated with being away from a parent.
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This activity can help when you come to separate from your baby, and they begin to understand that you will come back.
Singing rhymes playfully together and repeating a particular favourite many •times can become a lovely ritual in your and your baby’s day, offering them a Place a mirror next to your baby’s changing mat, so that you can engage in this simple activity each time you do a nappy change.
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Ensure that your mirror is safely secured near your baby and opt for a mirror that is child safe and lightweight.
sense of security through the familiarity of the routine, words and actions and the enjoyment of sharing these with you. Building on:
Make other finger puppets and sing other songs to your baby, such as •‘Old MacDonald’ or ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star’.
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Use a hand puppet and play peek-a-boo with your baby – an old soft toy with the stuffing removed can make a great hand puppet.
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Let me look at you
Spending time face to face
Newborn baby
What you need:
• Space that is quiet and free from distractions The steps:
• Sit with your legs propped up in front of you. • Lay your baby on your legs and hold their hands. • Talk and make gestures to your baby whilst they watch you. • Respond to their gestures, facial expressions, movements and sounds. • If they show emotions like getting upset or giggling, respond and make comments about these emotions. Benefits for your baby:
• Spending time facing each other is a fantastic way to get to know your baby. • Watching others is the foundation of understanding their own feelings and emotions as they look and make sense of facial expressions, body language and tone.
Making comments where you demonstrate an insight into your baby’s feelings, •emotions or interests is sometimes referred to as ‘mind-minded’ talk. These mind-minded comments draw attention to your baby’s mental states, so examples include comments such as, ‘I think you are feeling sad’ or, ‘You look excited’. This way of talking allows your baby to realise you are tuned in to their communication cues and thinking, helps them begin to learn to associate feelings and emotions with their labels and helps to validate those feelings. Building on:
This is a subtle way to relax your baby before they go to sleep and is best to do if they are full and clean so that they can give you lots of attention.
You could play peek-a-boo with your •baby in this position to see how this makes them feel.
You could gently stroke their face, arms and •legs, talking about their different body parts as you go. Observe how their body moves as you gently touch them.
If you are feeling musical, you could sing •them some gentle nursery rhymes to see how
they react to the different songs that you sing.
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Sharing photographs
Developing a sense of belonging and family
Newborn baby
Benefits for your baby:
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Looking at photographs helps to develop a growing sense of belonging, both to your family and friends and also to familiar places which are important to your baby.
Sharing photographs of people close to your baby helps them become familiar •with them, develop relationships and also feel connected, especially if you do not see them often.
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Understanding that they are important to others and part of a wider community fosters a sense of belonging and security. Building on:
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Create a photo album for your baby by folding five pages of A4 card in half and stapling it at one side. Stick a photo to each side of the card and voila! You have made your own photo album.
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Ask your family to contribute to the album – they will be delighted to be involved. Bound photo albums also make great presents, with many websites making board book versions, especially for your baby.
What you need:
• Photographs of people or places that your baby sees regularly • Materials to make a photo album (optional – see ‘Building on’ section)
Stick photos of family members to wooden blocks so that you can place them •near changing mats or playmats. When your baby is old enough, they can use them in their play.
The steps:
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Print or order prints of photographs of family members, friends, pets, your home or your local area.
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Place the photographs near your baby’s changing mat, or up against a skirting board near where they lie down.
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Lay your baby on their tummy so that they can see the pictures. Alternatively, you could also share the photos with them as they sit in your arms.
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Talk to your baby while looking at the photos, offering names and pointing out details or features of the people and places they know.
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Your baby might like to hold onto a photograph or photo album during nappy changes or tummy time.
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Copycat
This is you and this is me
Newborn baby
What you need: No equipment needed The steps:
• Sit or lay your baby down in front of you. • Tell your baby that you are going to play a game of copycat. • Take your baby’s hand and gently guide them to touch part of your face and say its name, for example, ‘This is my nose’. • Then gently move their hand towards their nose and say, ‘Here is your nose’. • Continue with different parts of the face.
Playing peepo
Newborn baby
What you need:
• A blanket • A comfortable mat or soft surface The steps:
• Lie down next to your baby and say, ‘Hello’. • Cover your face with the blanket and say, ‘Goodbye’. • Pay close attention to how your baby reacts. If they’re upset, try doing it again, but this time ensure some of your face is still showing. • If your baby likes the game, move a little further away and repeat.
Benefits for your baby:
Benefits for your baby:
Your baby will be curious about touching and feeling the various parts of your face and will be comforted and soothed by your touch.
Hiding games can help your baby learn to cope with feelings of separation anxiety that usually occur in the first year.
By touching corresponding parts of their own face your baby will develop awareness of themselves, and their senses will give them lots of feedback about what they can see and feel.
Your baby will begin to learn object permanence which means that they understand that when an object or a person disappears, they have not gone forever.
Building on:
Building on:
You could touch other body parts with their hand and then yours. For example, ‘Here is your ear and here is my ear’.
Try gently covering your baby with a soft muslin cloth and saying ‘Goodbye’ before removing the cloth and saying ‘Hello’.
Introduce a song, such as ‘Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes’, and move their hands gently to the lyrics.
Build upon this activity by moving further away until you are standing behind a door or a curtain so that your baby can experience a few seconds of not seeing any of you.
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Hello and goodbye
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Build it up to knock it down
You choose
What you need:
What you need:
Anticipating the tower falling!
• Building blocks The steps:
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Place your baby on their tummy, or sit them up in front of you (make sure they can see your face).
• • Count to three and knock the tower down in front of them. • Show them your reaction to the crash each time; this might be a clap of the hands, or saying loudly, ʼOh!’ whilst holding your palms up, or any reaction that Use building blocks to build a small tower in front of your baby.
• A basket or tray • A selection of toys or interesting objects • A room that is quiet and free from distraction The steps:
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Put the tray in front of your baby with two objects on to begin with, and see which one your baby reaches for and grabs.
feels natural and playful to you!
• Then celebrate their choice and describe the object that they grab. they have lost interest in the toy, put two new objects onto the tray and •seeOnce which one they choose this time.
Benefits for your baby:
Benefits for your baby:
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Giving your baby consistent responses to actions like this helps them to develop predictability and helps them feel safe and secure in this predictability. They will enjoy seeing your facial expressions and body language in this face•to-face interaction and learn more about the feelings and emotions associated with the thrill of knocking over a tower. Building on:
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Take your baby's hand or foot and gently show them how to knock the tower over. Mimic their reaction to the tower falling.
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Do this with other toys that provoke other reactions, such as a noisy drum, or a cuddle from a teddy. Your baby will begin to understand the responses and reactions you give to different toys and how each might make them feel.
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Giving attention to your baby’s interests
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By responding to your baby’s choices, you are demonstrating how interactions are formed in relationships. They will feel a sense of pride in your response to them selecting the toy and will enjoy the back-and-forth interactions of sharing the toy with you. Building on:
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Be aware of your baby bringing any objects towards themselves to look at more closely or perhaps offering them to you to explore too. This will tell you what sorts of objects interest your baby the most and you can then respond by offering more similar objects.
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Talk to your baby about their choices and respond enthusiastically if they offer you the toys. This will encourage them to seek out interactions with you in the future. You may then notice that your baby brings objects to you, looking for the same level of interaction you gave them before.
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Box of treasures
Goodnight Teddy
What you need:
What you need:
Everyday items to explore
Learning the bedtime routine
• A small box or basket with a lid • Some interesting objects from around the house, for example, a clean sponge, a clean makeup brush, a wooden spoon, a scarf and any other treasures you can find The steps:
The steps:
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Sit your baby in front of you and sing to them: ‘What’s in the box? What’s in the box? [Your baby’s name] is having a look at what’s in the box’.
Before your baby’s own bedtime routine begins, follow a similar simple bedtime routine with a teddy or soft toy so your baby can watch. Talk them through all of the steps as you carry them out.
Reach into the box and begin to describe the object you can feel, building anticipation with your voice and expressions, before gently pulling the object out of the box and into your baby’s view.
You can do as much or as little of your baby’s routine as you see fit. You could go all out, pretending to wash and dry the teddy, put a nappy on it, put it in a sleepsuit and then wrap the teddy in a blanket or tea towel.
Hand your baby the object and give them time to explore it by handling it or perhaps putting it into their mouth, as you describe it to them.
Ensure you tell your baby all the different elements of getting a teddy ready for bed and then say, ‘Time for your bedtime routine now’. Repeat the elements of the routine to get your baby ready for bed.
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Benefits for your baby:
This simple game has many benefits. Your baby will feel anticipation as you •build up to showing them what is inside the box, and they will also feel a sense of excitement and joy as they find out what the object is.
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Your baby will begin to understand that things exist even when out of sight (object permanence).
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Your baby’s eyesight will improve by visually tracking the objects from the box until you hand them the object (so ensure you move the object slowly). giving your shared attention to something with your baby, you are sharing •a By moment of connection and communication. Building on:
• As your baby grows, you might want to encourage them to take an object from the box themselves.
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Add lots of language to this activity by describing to your baby what each of the objects might feel like.
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• A teddy or soft toy • Some of your baby’s night-time items (nappy, sleepsuit, hairbrush, blanket)
Ensure the objects you choose are suitable for your baby to use, for example, avoid small items that might present a choking hazard, those that might shatter if dropped or items with sharp edges or corners.
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Benefits for your baby:
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This run-through of part of the bedtime routine allows your baby to understand the steps of the routine and anticipate what is going to happen next. It is particularly useful for parts of the routine they may not usually look forward to. Talking through routine allows your baby to link language related to routine, •which can additionally help them emotionally process events. Building on:
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As your baby grows they can help you with the steps of the routine for their toy, gaining a sense of ownership over what happens.
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You could role play other parts of your baby’s day, such as bath time, mealtimes or getting dressed.
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Use story books about routines to help your baby become accustomed to the events that happen as part of the day.
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