Infant Development

It has been a while since we talked about how children develop. Understanding the process of development is important to your helping with skill development. Because of this, I feel a need for a refresher course. Infants develop cephalocaudally (from head to tail) and proximodistally (from the inside, closest to the center, to out) from conception through the first 2 years of life. As an example, brain/head, brain/spinal cord and organ system development before arms and legs. Physical development also follows the same orderly and predictable sequence.

Head and trunk control occurs in the first few months after birth. The infant lifts his/her head to look at Mom/Dad or look at a moving object. The moving object requires the infant to move the head from side to side. By repeating this action the infant is building core trunk muscles necessary for the next major movement, rolling over from stomach to back. The repetitive movement strengths the muscles necessary to allow the infant to roll from back to stomach. In order to achieve this, without delays, the infant needs your involvement in “tummy time” play (topic next week).

Once again, rolling practice builds core trunk muscle strength necessary to sit in a high chair, which is followed by independent sitting. At each of these steps, it becomes your responsibility, as your child’s first teacher, to offer opportunities for practice of developing skills. Independent sitting leads to pulling self into sitting position, and eventually crawling, standing and walking. Muscle development determines readiness for each of these important steps. And… motor development is instrumental in other developmental areas.