We can influence the progress of our child’s psychomotor development by offering them activities and changing environmental stimuli.
According to studies carried out by Piaget, the processes behind child development during the first years of life are: the repetition of activities that the child knows and the modification of such behaviors due to changes in the surrounding environment. We can influence and improve the course of our child’s psychomotor development, providing activities and continuously changing environmental stimuli.
We therefore recommend activities to perform with your child every month, to promote the correct psychomotor development of your little one:
At 12 weeks, your child will start to develop the ability to smile, which in the beginning will not be intentional, but later on it will become a true distinctive sign capable of conveying fondness or discomfort. So, make room for huge smiles, funny faces reacting to the amusing sounds that you make. Yes, they might make you feel stupid but that are definitely useful for giving shape to your child’s first sign of communication.
Do you know this game? I used to play it when I was little and now I play it with my son. You place your son on your lap and you make him sway. Why? A child between 3 to 4 months old starts to keep his head straight as well as his chest, so we can take advantage of this game by teaching the child to keep his balance. Then, once he finds his balance, to make the movement that will help him stand up in order to walk. It’s not important that you sing a song while you do this, but it could definitely make the moment more fun. From a psychomotor point of view it is a very stimulating game for your child.
At 6 months, your little one will start to sit up straight without losing balance, thanks to the neuromuscular development phase that he is undergoing. Slowly, at around 10 months, these will give him perfect balance, but further to this, he will also start to improve his manual grasping of objects.
It’s time to build a Montessori-style treasure basket. It’s easy, don’t worry; all you need is a wicker basket (if possible) filled with everyday objects of all sizes and made out of materials that are safe (preferably eco-friendly). Then the child is given all the space in the world to play, with no limits whatsoever.
The child can therefore decide to switch the objects from one hand to another, insert them in his mouth or toss them out of the basket…
We have reached a lallation era, that is, the repetition of a consonant and vowel together (i.e. Ma–ma–ma; pa–pa–pa), a time that reveals true language through which the child will experiment with the sound of words. And this will start him gaining a series of useful skills for his psychomotor development.
So, we can recite nursery rhymes and sing lullabies to our toddler, maybe even the same ones that our mothers or grandmothers used to recite and sing for us, and start to “lalla-ate” with him.
Therefore it’s useful to chit chat with our child, imitating sounds that he makes; this will let the little one know that there is a communicative relationship. And consequently, in some way, he is trying to speak to us.
Reaching this stage, your child will be able to do so many things; we can even start to aim for manual motility so that you can play together. Now we can play the clap your hands game and the little butterfly game with him/her. These simple games will help your child’s motor coordination.
At this age, the child will start to develop anxiety while facing certain unexpected situations or in front of strangers, but you can help your child overcome this with a simple game, the famous peekaboo game. This game is just a precursor of hide and seek and its purpose is to help your child get used to being away from you and to be alone. Closing the eyes of your child, he won’t see you for a few seconds and to him, it will seem like ten minutes, so little by little, he will get used to not seeing you and being apart for longer and longer periods.
The time has come for you to let your imagination run wild! After 12 months, your child will make giant steps during his psychomotor development that will lead to the development of reasoning and language. In this phase, it is very important to stimulate children’s imagination. It could be fun to use puppets and invent fairy tales, which become an excellent method for communicating your desire to your child, like what one should or shouldn’t do.
After 18 months, each month, your child will be able to use language as a means of communication and he will start to appreciate your conversations. Always by his side, you can choose games, appropriate for his age; I’m also talking about computer games, encouraging him to learn how to count, playing memory games or musical games that stimulate his sense of rhythm. Another important tool is a ball; one of the most well-rounded games to play with children: it seems easy, but it helps your children constantly improve their motility and coordination.
Continue to offer your child stimulating psychomotor activities throughout your its growth period. Technology can help you: with the games and stories of Smart Tales it is more fun to develop logic and memory and to learn science and math.
