The first year in babies’ lives is when physical and cognitive development takes rapidly, and the foundations for the following years are laid. 85% of babies’ brain development is completed in the first three years. For this reason, you can play to support your baby’s cognitive skills such as understanding, grasping, establishing cause-effect relationships and problem-solving.
So, let’s take a look at plays that are effective in the cognitive development of babies.
The Importance of Plays in Cognitive Development of Babies
For a baby, almost everything other than feeding and sleeping means to play. Because babies can socialise, perceive and classify new things, and discover themselves and the outside world through play. Because babies can mix, perceive and organise new things, and find themselves and the outside world through play, they play and set up. In addition, the effect of stimuli on cognitive development in infancy is relatively high. Thanks to touching, hearing and visual interaction, the connections between the neurons of the baby’s brain are strengthened and developed.
In short, the lack of incentives negatively affects cognitive development and affects the baby’s abilities such as speaking, making friends, expressing herself and her feelings in the future. Plays and toys help the baby interact with these stimuli by comparing them. For this reason, the quality of the play and chosen toys are essential factors for every baby.
11 Supportive Plays for Cognitive Development
The Where Play
Take a toy or object your baby likes and show it to her. Then hide the object under a blanket and ask, “Where?”. Then lift the cover and find the thing. Play again to get her to see the toy in the same way. Hide the toy under the covers and wait for it to find it. Make sure that she finds it herself by making small interventions where you need them. Thus, with the where game, you can enable the baby to establish a cause-effect relationship and realise how a lost object has returned.
Puppet Play
Obtain finger puppets (such as animal or human figures) of various characters and colours and attach them to your fingers. Talk, chat and sing songs with the help of these puppets in front of your baby. Let the baby recognise animals by imitating animal sounds with animal figure puppets. Telltales with human figures and put them in various roles.
Flashcards Play
Obtain flashcards that are suitable for your baby’s month. These cards should have a wide variety of vegetables, fruits, animals, shapes, items, colours and vehicles. Then take a card in front of your baby and say it a few times, emphasising the name of the thing on the card. Create stories using these words in different contexts. Thus, you can help both increase the vocabulary and strengthen the visual memory.
Puzzle Play
Get a variety of puzzles with different numbers and large pieces to suit your baby’s age. Together try to place the puzzle piece in the appropriate place. Let your baby learn by trying. Develop problem-solving skills with puzzles to concentrate and extend her concentration-time with each attempt.
Wrist Rattles Play
Lay your baby on her back on a flat surface. Wear rattle wristbands on her wrists and ankles. Then started chatting and singing with her in a soft and melodious voice. Turn on some fun baby music if you wish. Support her to shake her hands and feet according to the rhythm of the music. Your baby will understand that she can make sounds as she moves, thanks to the rattles on her wrists. This play, especially for 1-2-month-old babies, supports your baby’s cognitive development while developing the sense of rhythm and encouraging establishing a cause-effect relationship.
Sensory Integration Play
Use different materials for sensory integration play, which helps babies feel and grasp different textures such as soft, hard, rough, smooth and wet, in addition to objects such as a damp towel, aluminium foil, a jagged ball, chickpeas, bead pasta or granulated sugar in zip lock bags. You can either lay your baby face down and place the materials in front of her, or lay the materials you have chosen on a table and let her touch them while your baby is on your lap.
Separating Balls Play
Put balls of the same size in different colours in a basket. Put it side by side the containers or boxes of the same colour as the balls. Ask your baby to put the ball from the basket in the appropriate coloured box. In this way, have her classify the balls by colour. You can help your baby develop classification skills with the play of sorting the balls.
Peek-a-boo Play
One of the favourite plays of babies of all ages is “Peekaboo”. Babies can have fun and have a pleasant time and learn to make connections between events by understanding the concepts of hiding and finding. Stand in front of your baby and cover your face with your hands. Then saying peekaboo, open your hands. Try to entertain your baby by making different facial expressions as you open your face.
Chatting Play with Songs
Music and songs have a significant effect on the cognitive development of babies. Therefore, no matter how old your baby is, describe everything you do during the day as if you were singing with different melodies that you made up. Tell your baby melodiously about her daily life when she wakes up, eats, takes a bath, and plays games.
Pompoms Rescue Play
Get a basket with holes. Put various pompoms of different colours and sizes in the basket. After putting the pompoms in your hand, take a not very thin and non-breaking yarn and randomly pass it through the basket’s holes. Create a simple maze inside the basket. Then put the basket in front of your baby and ask her to pull the pompoms out of the strings. With this game, you can help your pup find different solutions to save the pompoms. In addition, you can play by using a ball instead of a pompom if you wish.
Find-Plug Play
Get your baby a cube with square, circle, triangle, and star shapes. Put the pieces that can pass through these shapes in front of your baby mixedly and ask her to pass the appropriate amount from the rightful place. Thus, encourage your baby to establish hand-eye coordination while learning geometric shapes.
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Have a nice and healthy day!
