The strength translates into fine motor skills that are helpful when learning to write or use silverware. It is not uncommon for children who did not crawl to exhibit messy handwriting or experience difficulty with upper body strength, such as climbing monkey bars at recess.
An important lesson of brain development involves assessing objects. Dropping or throwing an object puts it further away and necessitates movement to retrieve it again. Likewise, some objects, like trees, remain stationary and others, like toys, can move away. Crawling helps develop visual skills that assess the differences between movable and stationary objects.
Stationary objects, like trees or furniture, must be navigated around while toys can be picked up and moved. This develops spatial skills that differentiate between stationary and moveable objects and how to assess them. Move around it, move to it, or pick it up? Those are the questions the brain learns to ask. The brain will also develop binocular vision which helps the eyes work as a team.
While crawling, babies first look into the distance to focus on a goal and then back at their hands to start crawling. This requires eyes to adjust and focus. This further develops cooperation between brain hemispheres and helps the eyes with reading and writing. Crawlers tend to explore what ignites their curiosity and will go to what interests them instead of hoping it comes to them.
The ease of the movement enhances confidence. Navigation skills with crawling include speed, turning, and stop. You may even need to get down on the floor and crawl with them. Believe it or not, babies can make huge learning strides from building their muscle tone and gross and fine motor skills.
Here are some of the benefits of crawling while your child is young. The physical benefits are plenty. Crawling boosts gross and fine motor skills large and refined movements , balance, hand-eye-coordination and overall strength are just a few. The development and refinement of these skills will assist your child later in life with activities such as running, jumping, writing, fastening clothes, and throwing balls.
The strength they build also boosts their posture and preps them for walking. As a child maneuvers around, they discover distance and placement of objects. So they create a new path and voila they have just developed and implemented basic problem-solving skills. Examining a distant object and then refocusing on their hands in order to reach that object forces their eyes to adjust to the varying distances and encourages the eyes to work together.
This development helps with later skills such as catching, driving, or copying words off a board. Have you ever heard of the right and left side of the brain? Well, in order to function at our best, these two sides need to be in full communication with one another and their ability to communicate is not an entirely inborn skill.
There are things we have to do to encourage these two sides to work together and crawling is a huge step. The movements required to crawl cause the two sides of the brain to interact which, in turn, improves coordination.
Another mental benefit and one of my personal favorites to witness is the self-confidence. A child learns about taking risks and the failure and success that comes from those risks. They also learn to make decisions about destination and speed, and the pleasure of achieving goals. This is an easy benefit to witness as children grow more elaborate and determined in their movements. Now that you know the importance of helping your baby crawl from the time they are babies, you are probably wondering how to encourage them to crawl instead of jumping right into the walking phase.
A great place to start is to ensure your baby gets plenty of tummy time. Tummy time allows babies to rock back and forth, which helps them get a better feel for the movement of crawling. It also allows them to stretch, play with toys, and explore their surroundings. More importantly, tummy time gives your baby an opportunity to raise their head to strengthen those head and neck muscles.
October 18, , One Comment. I started walking because it was easy. Now I walked with purpose. I walked so I would get out of bed in the morning. October 29, , No Comments. A skipping rope is such a versatile toy! Check out these eight fun games your kids can play with one indoors or out.
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