Play-Based Learning
Receptive language—words a child understands but doesn’t yet say—typically precedes language production by several months. At 8 months, a little one begins to understand his or her name along with such common words as “bottle,” “mama,” “dada” and “bye-bye.” “No no” and “all gone” typically are understood at about 11 months. By age 1, a child will understand more than 50 words, and that number will continue to grow dramatically month-to-month, even though that child may barely be talking. Meanwhile, the acquisition of expressive language—words a child understands and says—relates to what a child best knows and is interested in—mom and dad, for example.
Every object is a potential play object. This includes everyday objects around the child, and not necessarily just toys.
A resilient child thrives in the classroom, tending to have fewer or milder behavioral and emotional problems, greater engagement in school, and stronger academic skills.
Researcher Mildred Parten identified six stages of play that children progress through in their first 5 years of development.
A child’s social-emotional development creates the context in which they develop and exercise all of their other abilities. Discover four critical social-emotional milestones for you to watch for during baby’s first year.
Serve-and-return interactions help infants and toddlers encourage neural connections, and improve parent-child bonding. Learn more.
Your little one’s strength and cognitive development have made impressive gains over the first three months. Now, gross-motor milestones are getting more complex, preparing your little one for crawling and getting into a sitting position independently.
A child’s social-emotional development creates the context in which they develop and exercise all of their other abilities. Discover four critical social-emotional milestones for you to watch for during months four to six.
Expose your child to diverse cultures in fun, memorable ways with these simple parenting approaches.
Use ParentPal’s Purposeful Reading Strategies to begin developing your child’s language and pre-reading skills from birth.