A professional development support resource for early childhood centres working with Early Childhood Development professional development coordinators. Early Childhood Development – 14 March 2001 1 Creating learning opportunities for non-mobile babies Dedicating an area to non-mobile babies offers an opportunity to create an interesting and educational space. The baby space needs to be in a quiet area, away from the main flow of traffic. Provide a firm, flat, soft surface for babies to practice rolling. A carpet or flax mat is important for warmth and softness, and visually determines where the space is. A baby play-mat can be made easily by sewing objects onto an old rug or piece of polar fleece that babies can touch and see as they lie on their backs or tummies. A variety of items can be placed on the floor near the baby’s head to create visual interest. A scarf drawn up into a peak, allows the baby to grab hold and move the scarf to her face. Baby gyms can hold interesting objects for babies to look at and touch. Provide a wide range of visual and tactile experiences by regularly changing objects on the gym. Try a beautiful shell, feather or piece of driftwood, but make sure objects do not dangle in the baby’s face. A large mirror in the baby area enables a baby to explore the image of herself. Ensure it is securely fastened to a wall. Perspex mirrors are recommended. Babies are attracted to faces and pictures of faces. Providing a board displaying different faces can be interesting for babies to look at, and also helps to define the baby space. One of the best things you can give a baby is another baby. A good baby area can provide space for babies to interact with equipment and each other. Early Childhood Development – 14 March 2001 2 Creating learning opportunities for sitting babies: the magic of heuristic play Heuristic / hewr-iss-tik / ! adj. 1 allowing or assisting to discover. Sitting babies use their hands and mouths to explore the world. They are focused on finding out about objects through their senses, and their essential question is: “WHAT IS IT?” Heuristic play is used to describe play for babies, infants and toddlers that actively encourages exploration and discovery. Babies, infants and toddlers are essentially ‘sensory-motor beings’ (Greenman, Stonehouse, 1997, p. 32). They are dependent on their senses to give them an understanding of the people, places and things that are in their environment. By feeling, seeing, mouthing and manipulating objects, babies begin to collect information that will later lead to identification and naming of objects. Mouths, eyes, ears, and skin are the vehicles babies use to learn with. Babies develop remarkably quickly and this development is a complex interplay between heredity and experience. ‘Infants seem to have, from birth, a powerful drive to try to master new behaviour and skills. But the kind of care they receive and the settings they experience can facilitate – or impede – this tendency’ (Shore, 2001, p. 4). Providing babies with interesting and stimulating sensory play experiences, fosters the connections being made in a baby’s brain that lead to healthy cognitive development. Mouthing objects is particularly important for babies, but it often creates anxieties in adults about hygiene. A baby’s mouth is the most sensitive part of her body. The tongue is teaming with nerve endings and that is why babies are so keen to use their mouths to explore the world. Parent educator and writer Penelope Leach suggests that a baby ‘will not fully understand an object unless he does put it in his mouth’ (Leach, 1986, p. 167). She suggests that regularly washing a baby’s toys reduces the risk of infection by mouthing objects. Early Childhood Development – 14 March 2001 3 Provide heuristic play opportunities for young babies by creating collections of sensory objects, which are easy to access and can explored by babies at their leisure. These have been called ‘treasure baskets’ and are most effective with babies who are able to sit unsupported, and infants up to 9 months. When collecting items and objects it is good to keep the baby’s `essential question’ in mind and provide things that are different in length, weight, softness, hardness, roughness and, shininess, so that these different properties can be explored. Treasure baskets allow for infants to focus their attention and interest for considerable periods of time. Sitting beside the basket, infants can make independent choices about what objects they wish to engage with. Adults stay alongside their infant, providing physical support and attention, but do not interfere with the child’s play process. Early Childhood Development – 14 March 2001 4 Hand out: Making a treasure basket Collect a range of objects that are safe for mouthing and that can be cleaned easily. These might include: • • • • Natural objects – cones, feathers, dried gourds, small raffia mat, pumice stone, large corks, cane bag handles, piece of loofah, lemon, woollen ball, small woven basket. Metal or plastic objects – spoons, small egg whisk, bunch of keys, small tins, tin lids, metal teapot, lengths of different sized chain, lemon squeezer, bottlebrush. Wooden objects – small boxes, cylinder, rattle, napkin ring, wooden dolly pegs, small turned bowl, curtain rings, egg cup, cotton reel, honey spoon, spatula. Objects in material, leather or fur – leather purse, fur ball, fun fur ball, small rag doll, tennis ball, bead purse, beanbag, spectacles case, bath plug with chain. Find a large low-sided wicker or woven basket and fill the basket with a range of these objects. Offer the basket to your baby or infant and sit next to her/him supporting, but not interfering with his/her process of exploring the basket of treasures. Objects in the basket need to be washed and changed regularly. Early Childhood Development – 14 March 2001 5 References: Early Childhood Development. (2000). Learning environments for playgroups: A guide to quality practices in playgroups. Wellington: Author. Goldschmeid, E. (1991). Babies and toddlers: Carers and educators: Quality for the under threes. London: National Children’s Bureau. Greenman, J. & Stonehouse, A. (1997). Prime times: A handbook for excellence in infant and toddler programs. South Melbourne: Addison Wesley Longman. Leach, P. (1989). Baby and child: From birth to age five. London: Penguin. Ministry of Education. (1996). Te Whåriki: He whäriki måtauranga mø ngå mokopuna o Aotearoa. Wellington: Learning Media. Shore, R. (2001). Making sense of the brain debates. Every Child, 7(3). 4-5. 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