Opal Dunn explains why, and recommends some useful books for starters
Some adults underestimate the extent of a baby's cognitive and linguistic development in the first six months They mistakenly judge a baby by the well-known physical development milestones, not noticing the development of the mouth box, neck and lungs all vital for speech.
From birth, a baby's brain starts to make connections, aided by experiences shepherded by an adult voice using parentese (see Nursery World, 1 March).
Research shows babies are capable of thinking, remembering and predicting from the first months.
Babies use eyes to make some of their first contacts. Up to eight weeks old, their retinas are not fixed and vision is still blurred and two-dimensional. From eight weeks, babies can see 20-30cm away and appear to recognise photos of faces and smile at themselves in a mirror. They appear to see vibrant, highly contrasting colours better than pastel shades.
Communication
Babies need to master most of the sounds of their language before they can say their first words around 12 months. Apart from expressing needs through crying, some babies of three months develop communication through as many as five different types of coos, sounds and smiles. Around the age of six months, babies begin to babble using consonants linked to vowels. Babbling marks the end of the international phase of baby talk, as those from different cultures start to imitate sounds picked up from their environmental language. A Chinese baby babbles using the tones of their spoken Chinese.
Babies learn about speech sounds long before they can talk, by listening and watching mouth movements in one-to-one sessions with an adult, whose face is sufficiently close for their myopic vision. Learning to make the mouth movements for the 44 sounds of English requires practice and playing with sounds is part of the necessary preparation for saying words.
Books Many parents find it difficult to know how to share books with babies. But a baby soon begins to look forward to book sessions, showing excitement and signs of predicting as a page is turned. From two months, babies can discriminate images and show preference - perhaps through wiggles and sounds for 'yellow chick' in a book of farm animals as their carer repeats, 'cheep-cheep, cheep-cheep'. Books provide fun-focused, brain- stimulating activities from which babies absorb more than adults might imagine.
Recommended core titles
A selection of books showing developmental levels from birth to babble
Baby Sees Flowers
(Picthall and Gunzi)
* Black and white contrasting flower-head designs with alternate spreads introducing contrasting vibrant colours. No text. Good first experience.
Baby Sees Spots and Dots
(Picthall and Gunzi)
* Black and white and colour spreads with contrasting designs, additional black and white spreads. No text. Good first experience.
Baby, Boo!, Amazing Baby Series
(Templar)
* Photographs of babies' faces with a final search for 'baby, Boo!'
followed by peekaboo and a mirror. Simple text on differently coloured spreads.
Twinkle Twinkle, Amazing Baby
(Templar)
* Traditional rhyme/song supported by simple designs of stars.
Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes
by Annie Kubler (Child's Play)
* Abbreviated traditional, action rhyme/song (music supplied) introducing eight parts of the body. Realistic colour illustrations modelling babies doing actions.
Float and Flutter
by Hannah Wood (Child's Play)
* A concertina book with mobile-like suspended butterflies, blossom and leaves. Helps babies to play blowing games.
Baby Says Hooray
by Opal Dunn and Angie Sage (Hodder Children's)
* Father plays with baby, naming things which baby gets, claps hands to 'say' Hooray. Simple, supportive pictures.
Little Big, Amazing Baby
(Templar)
* Hand-sized book with story introducing outlined, simple colour drawings of little and big ted, car, fish and tree.
Baby's Day, Amazing Baby series
(Templar)
* Photographs of babies' day ending with 'night, night, sleep tight!'
Hide and Seek, Amazing Baby series
(Templar)
* Hide and seek with a touchy-feely, pink bunny. Lift up flaps of everyday things to see if bunny is there. Simple black outline colour pictures.
Models a routine for transfer to play at home.
Ring Ring!
by Caroline Davis (Orchard Books)
* Hand-sized book naming nine shimmering and colourful household items making noises, such as the 'splish splash' of the bath and jingle-jangle keys.
Little Garden by Lucy Richards (Chrysalis Books)
* Introduces four garden animals and their noises. Simple, soft designs and illustrations.
