Playing with 9-12 month old infants

WHAT YOU CAN DO AND OBSERVE

• Play hide and seek with your infant and see if she/he can find the objects you hide. You can hide it under a cloth, and say: “where does it go”? “Is it still there”? “Can you find it”?

• You should see an increase in your child’s curiosity and willingness to find out what happened to the object.

• Tell your infant the names of things and people you are referring to.

• She/he should show interest and soon will try to make relationships between words and objects or people.

• Show your child how to say things with hands, like “bye bye”.

• Soon, your child should try to imitate you and wave “bye-bye” on her/his own, making a relationship between a movement and a vocal expression.

• Point to the eyes, nose and mouth on a doll. After showing one part on the doll, touch the same part on yourself and on the baby. Take the baby’s hand and have her/him touch the eyes, nose and mouth of the doll you, and her/himself. See the nose on the baby doll? Here is my nose and here is your nose.

• You should see the baby’s curiosity increase. Slowly, the baby will be able to memorize and identify these different words and relate them to her/his body parts.