Babies and toddlers often open our own eyes to the world around us. As they discover the fascination of gravity as they drop a spoon from their high chair, we re-discover gravity. As they watch in fascination as a fly defies that gravity, we, too, become fascinated with life that we have learned to take for granted. Books are part of that discovery process. You can learn a whole new appreciation for reading and the processes involved through introducing your children to books.
Picture Books
Babies and toddlers don’t understand one-dimension. Everything in their lives is 3-D, with a front, back, and volume. You’ll see them trying to pick up the picture on a page in a book. Failing that, they’ll pick up the book and look under it, trying to find the other dimension of the image. This is all part of the learning process, so enjoy it! Your baby is developing thousands of dendrites in his or her brain every time he experiences this. He’ll also bring the book up to his mouth and feel of the picture with his lips and tongue, because those are delicate touch receptors.
There are books on the market that have texture inserts that the toddler will enjoy. Through these experiences, the baby can learn rough, smooth, soft, shiny, fluffy, and many other textures.
At first, select picture books with simple pictures. The reason so many things for babies are in primary colors is because their vision isn’t so good yet, and the primary colors are brighter. But, by the time the baby can sit up by himself, he can see better. You’ll find that the baby focuses on faces in pictures. You can use this instinct to teach him the parts of his own face, as well as your own. As his world expands, so can the topics in the pictures, such as items such as baby bottles, stuffed toys, then furnishings and animals. Getting your child to associate learning language with fun could get them to really enjoy learning language and perhaps more than one, translation is a great profession to get into.
Let Them Ramble
Children love familiar books, and that’s ok. They learn a valuable skill in prediction. But, what do you do if the toddler wants to skip to the end of the story? Let him! Children will start to experiment with the story line, to see if it changes. They’ll want you to read the end of the story, then the beginning, and end with the middle. This is a crucial phase of learning, in which the child learns place value – preparation for math when he’s in school.
Read Them What They Like
I’ll be forever grateful to Adam Raccoon. My son didn’t want to sit still while I read books to him, but he loved Adam Raccoon because of the roads. Each page had a trail, maze, road, or path on it, and my son would trace the path with his finger while I read the page to him. If your little one wants action, give it to him. Books that have you go on treasure hunts from one page to the other are great, too.
