Ideas for Making Your Own Infant Curriculum at Home
If you are a stay-at-home parent and don’t send your baby to preschool or daycare, it is important to devise your own infant curriculum. While you can certainly purchase an infant curriculum online, many people opt to make their own, and thus, save money. If you are a parent seeking information on creating a curriculum for your infant, several age-specific ideas are listed below to help you get started.
1 – 4 Months Old
This is an important bonding time for you and your baby’s rapidly developing neurons. Your baby relies on you for everything, and genuinely craves attention and interaction with you. This is also the period of time when their little eyes are developing and their vision is beginning to focus.
In order to start your baby off on the right foot, a primary focus of curriculum at this age should involve black and white pictures for them to focus on. Babies love looking at objects, but when they’re very young, their field of vision is limited. Stark, black and white images provide enough contrast for them to see.
A simple image search online will give you literally thousands of black and white pictures to download and print, so you certainly have your choice. Try to get pictures that have a thick black outline, but are white on the interior of the image, similar to a coloring book picture.
In addition to their vision, it is also important to stimulate the different areas of your baby’s brain. Singing and reading to your baby is an excellent way to provide neuron connections. Find a comfortable position to hold your baby, and while making eye contact, sing nursery rhymes to your little one. This is great for naptime and feeding time too.
Most people know several musical nursery rhymes, but if you don’t you can find several online that are free to listen to. If you’re tone deaf, several CDs are available for very low prices that feature many of these songs. You will find that your baby will begin to recognize the songs that you sing to him or her and will genuinely delight in the repetition and familiarity. You can also choose to read the nursery rhymes to your baby.
4 – 6 Months
By this age, your baby’s vision is much improved, as is his or her attention span. Black and white images can give way to brightly colored pictures of animals, vehicles, plants, etc. Be sure that while you show your baby these images you also use the name of that object repeatedly. Your child can’t speak yet, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t understand what they hear.
Nursery rhymes and singing should still be done daily, but it is a good idea to introduce different types of music (easy listening, classical, reggae, etc) and longer stories. Be sure to use funny voices for the characters, and keep in mind that children respond more positively to higher voices.
Now that your baby is a little older, you can also incorporate physical exercise into your infant curriculum. Tummy time is very important, since it encourages your baby’s muscle development and will lead to rolling over and eventually crawling depending on your child’s physical development speed. Holding your child’s feet in your hands while they push against you is another great form of exercise and comes with the bonus of assisting your little one with any gas or constipation they may have.
6 – 9 Months Old
By this age, your child will recognize and show favor to certain colors. Colors are a great focus for this period of your baby’s development. Print or make brightly colored shapes out of construction paper (triangle, circle, square, etc). Explain to your baby what color each shape is, and the name of the shape. Hold the “red triangle” out for them to touch.
By now your child will most likely have a musical preference, and you may notice a fair amount of swaying and giggling when certain music is played around them. Music is still an important part of development, so make sure that it is played frequently. The Alphabet Song and any number of counting songs are great at this age as well.
Exercise can be increased at this age to include more complex stretches like the bicycle position or fun toe touches. If your baby has decent balance, it is also a good idea to incorporate bouncing time by placing them on your knee, holding their hands, and bouncing them up and down. This will improve their lumbar strength gradually, as well as their arm strength.
9 – 12 Months
Many babies start talking a little during this age. Encourage speech development by teaching vocabulary words such as bottle, kitty, mommy, daddy, bunny while pointing out examples to your little one. It should be stressed here that using baby talk is not appropriate and will only hinder your child’s language development. Use the correct words for the correct object. Do not refer to dogs as bow wows, or bottles as babas. Your child will think those are the correct terms.
Incorporating blocks and stackable toys is great at this age, because your little one’s motor skills are developing and need some encouragement. Investing in oversized building blocks is a wise choice. Sit with your little one on the floor and demonstrate how to interlock them. Don’t be discouraged if your child just wants to throw or pull apart the blocks. They’re exploring and experimenting!
For exercise, help your baby practice walking. If they are standing at this point, hold their hands and give them enough support so they can stand for short periods of time. To practice walking movements, take your little one into the bath with you and hold them up. You will see them “walking” under the water. This is a great way to let the concept of walking sink in, while giving them muscle memory for when they are finally strong enough to do it on their own.
Curriculum Alternatives
There are also many fine curriculums online that you may wish to look into. Many of them have lesson plans that you print out with a list of supplies that you will need for the month. This is a great option if you would like to take all of the guess work out of teaching your baby.