Room For Error

This morning I went to a preschool fair.  You might be thinking that I must be crazy, Bitty is not even eleven months old, why on Earth am I thinking about preschool.  But around here, the options are plentiful and diverse and the waiting lists can be long.  Rest assured, I have no intention of enrolling her in preschool until she's three...or maybe I might consider it at two-and-a-half if we have another baby in the picture by then.  Consider today more of an exploratory, fact finding mission.

Bitty and I perused the tables of preschools showcasing their programs for about forty minutes.  Or rather, I perused, while she focused on kicking her shoes off about five billion times.  Within ten minutes of our arrival, she made it perfectly clear that this was not how she intended to spend her morning.  But if I managed to keep moving and not stand still for too long, Bitty was distracted enough to avoid a meltdown.

I left with a fairly significant handful of brochures and information pages, and just in the nick of time.  Bitty had run out of patience for this nonsense.  I hurried to the car, and set my stack of papers on the roof in order to free up my hands to buckle her in.  Bitty really hates the car seat these days, and in her mind, this morning was going from bad to worse.  First I had her strapped into the ergo,and now the car seat.  No matter how often she fusses, I still have anxiety when she does and it still throws me off my game.  I tried to be quick and scurried around to the drivers' side, hopped in, and hurried home. 

I put Bitty down for her nap when we returned and then settled in to look over all of the paperwork I had gathered at the fair.  Except I couldn't find it.  Not in the diaper bag, not in the car...and then I realized--I left the stack on the roof while I was buckling Bitty in and then drove away.  So typical.



A Few of My Favorite Things--10 Months

So I haven't done one of these in a while...since four months, actually.  And since I'm in need of a post for this week, I thought I'd do what all mom bloggers do in this situation--tell people what they should buy.  This one is going to be solely devoted to toys, check back next week for some of my other favorite things. 

I think the best toys are ones that are open ended and grow with your child.  So the subsequent links are favorites that Bitty has been playing with for a while, and I expect that she will continue to return to in the future and discover a whole new way to play with them.

1.  Baby Band

Always a fave with Bitty and her pals.  Plus, it might make your child smart in math and better in reading and have a longer attention span.  There is some correlational data about this in three to five year olds;  why not give the babes some early experience experimenting with rhythms?

Or, Toddler Band

2.  Baby Maracas

3.  Baby Tambourine

4.  Sassy Sensory Ball Set

Babies love balls.  Lots of different types and textures.  A good variety of balls with keep your babe entertained. 

More Balls

These are nice and easy for little babies to grab on to, and Bitty still likes to carry them around with her.



This Too

5.   Go old school.  There is a reason that the classics are still around.  They've stood the test of time and babies still love 'em.

Nesting Cups

Shape Sorter

Your baby will probably just start out mouthing the pieces.  Then she'll dump them out of the box and bang them together.  Then she'll engage in the favorite baby pastime of filling and dumping.  Eventually she'll sort the shapes through the corresponding holes.  This one really grows with baby.

Stacking Rings

Bucket Of Beads

6.  Earlyears Busy Ball Drop

Ok, so this one is probably for an older baby--the manufacturer lists it for nine months and older.  Bitty just became interested in this at ten and a half months; some babies would probably get into it earlier than nine months.  She has been very interested in this lately, and I really like it because it is good practice for those small motor skills.  At first she really struggled to drop the ball on to the ramp properly, but after a few days I could already see her directed movement was becoming more smooth and precise.  I like it.

7.  Soft Blocks

Every baby needs blocks!

8.  Hide and Squeak Eggs

Why do babies love these?  I dunno, babies are weird.



9.  Toys made out of wood
 
I read a book a few months ago, The Power of Play: Learning What Comes Naturally, by David Elkind (good book, a must read), and in one chapter the author commented about how children nowadays don't get the opportunity to explore with toys of a composition other than plastic like they used to.  I try to make a conscious effort to look for old-fashioned wooden toys, but you know what?  It's hard!  Especially for this age group.  Bitty's mema found her some wooden teething toys on an etsy site called little alouette that Bitty has enjoyed.  The toys are made from locally sourced wood and finished with organic flax oil.  Here is the website, and here is their etsy site. By the way, the dogs also love these toys.  :-/
 
Now go get your credit card and when the toys arrive, tell your husband that they are early birthday gifts from great aunt Louise.

Read For The Record

Bitty has been practicing.  She is in training.  Tomorrow, she will attempt to break a world record.  Well, she and over two million other children.  Thursday, October 6th is Read for the Record day!  Jumpstart is again sponsoring this campaign in which people sit down and read the same book on the same day, breaking a world record, and in the process spotlight the early achievment gap in our country.  (If you want to skip my speil about why I think this is important, scroll down to the last paragraph for info about joining in for the record-breaking).

Do you know what I like best about this campaign?  I like that it brings attention to the fact that children from low-income neighborhoods take their first step into kindergarten already far, far behind children from middle class and upward neighborhoods in terms of school readiness skills.  It's my belief that the only way to truly close the achievement gap is to start with the under five set and get those little ones' brains primed and ready for academic learning once they reach kindergarten. 

If you do much reading about early brain development, you know that the most sensitive period for postnatal brain development is from birth to three years of age, when the brain's primary task is to establish and reinforce neural connections (synapses).  After that, the creation of synapses slows, but they become more complicated.  The synapses that are often used become more complex, and the synapses that aren't used are eliminated (neural pruning).  Which makes both of these periods so important, and why a young child's experiences are a big deal.  The good news is that the young brain is pretty malleable (referred to as plasticity).  The brain has never been more open to learning new things and to enriching experiences.  But it's bad news, too, because the brain has never been more vulnerable to the absence of stimulation and an environment that isn't nurturing.  And that's where the problem comes in for children living in low-income neighborhoods, where they are much less likely to be growing up in a brain-nourishing environment.  Remember what I mentioned about neural pruning?  If you don't use it, you lose it.  Truth. 

So that's my part in spreading the word about why we should support early intervention efforts for our low-income children.

Here are the details on joining in to Read for the Record:  Go to the jumpstart website and click on the tab and pledge to read Llama Llama Red Pajama by Anna Dewdney.  Don't have the book?  No problem!  You can read the book online here.  Make sure you take pictures of your little one breaking his/her first world record...it'll be a good one for the baby book!

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