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Approach to Infant Care

The Baby Vine offers a top quality care experience for infants by committing to nurturing and respecting them as individuals and creating a learning environment where their own needs and goals can be met as they go through this critical time in their lives. The first objective is to partner with the parents/guardians to understand their child’s current routine and developmental milestones well before the child begins care. This is to allow the best support for all involved during the transition to in-home care and allow for consistent practices for the child. Once enrolled, establishing a trusting bond with the same primary caregiver is important for continuous support year over year for both the child and the family receiving care. As the infant continues to grow, they will be cared for each step of the way by having engaging experiences with their caregiver, exploring a stimulating learning environment that supports their developmental needs, as well as provide socialization with other children.
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The below details key developmental goals for the infant age group as well as lists some of the materials/activities that are available to support these learning objectives.

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Emotional Development

• Smiles at and interacts with self in the mirror 
• Shows displeasure at loss of people (loss of enjoyment of watching the person)
• Develops a sense of humor
• Begins to imitate what they observe 
• Remembers where things are/what to expect and likes familiarity
  

Activities

Safety mirror is available in the main playroom of the child care to allow infants the opportunity to develop the concept of self-image. Infants need to develop a trusting relationship with a primary caregiver and when the caregiver role models emotionally supportive language and an environment that children feel safe in, they will learn and develop this skillset as well. Infants need to be allowed opportunities for uninterrupted concentration to build their sense of self and relationship with primary caregiver as well as with their learning environment.

Approach to Learning

• Demonstrates curiosity/awareness to newness in environment or activity
• Begins to show more interest in particular activities that they personally enjoy
• Willing to try something new by full sensory exploration
• Likes repetitive actions in order to master something they are learning
• Needs time to focus on new learning task without interruption

Activities

Provider will set-up the child care environment for the success of the child by offering key learning materials that are age appropriate and accessible at their level. While being supervised, infants are allowed the freedom to move throughout the child care as a form of independent exploration. Areas/items that the infant shows interest in will be included in future activities to build upon their individual learning curiosities. Infants will be able to interact and observe the other children as they partake in learning activities where they can learn from the other/older children as they may be at a different developmental stage.

Social Development

• Responds differently to different people 
• Responds to own name
• Recognizes parents/guardians and primary caregiver
• Participates in games with others like peek-a-boo 
• Begins to assert independence and try to “do it themselves”

Activities

Provider will set-up the child care environment for the success of the child by offering key learning materials that are age appropriate and accessible at their level. While being supervised, infants are allowed the freedom to move throughout the child care as a form of independent exploration. Areas/items that the infant shows interest in will be included in future activities to build upon their individual learning curiosities. Infants will be able to interact and observe the other children as they partake in learning activities where they can learn from the other/older children as they may be at a different developmental stage.

Creativity & The Arts

• Demonstrates ability to express themselves and their feelings (verbal, movement, arts)
• Able to show response/interest to a given stimulation (begins to move when music plays)
• Participates in creative arts activities to encourage self-expression
• Explores sensory elements and discovers how they all relate to given item/activity at hand​

Activities

Infants will be allowed to participate in daily music and movement activities to observe older children as well as express themselves. Primary caregiver will supervise sensory table time and allow infants to explore a variety of materials/textures. Infants will be included in creative art projects with direct supervision where they can color, paint, create, etc. in order to progress in this developmental domain.

Physical & Motor

• Can lift head and hold up
• Develops eye-hand coordination 
• Palmer grasp = all fingers closed into palm
• Pincer grasp = thumb and pointer finger
• Starting to have voluntary control of arms and legs 
• Able to reach for objects with both arms 
• Holds objects and can manipulate them well (one hand to the other)
• Developing self-help skills from practice of motor exploration
• Many physical achievements, all done at their own timeline: roll over, creeping, crawling, pull to stand, cruising, walking

Activities

With the Freedom of Movement method, infants will be able to explore the indoor and outdoor child care freely while being supervised to develop their spatial awareness relating to their own body and their physical environment. The child care environment is intentionally structured for the success of the child by offering a variety of washable objects within reach for the infant to reach, stretch, and interact with. Infants will have access to soft blocks and manipulatives for objects to grasp With safety mats and tunnel materials, infants are given a variety of levels and tools to support their various phases throughout this early developmental stage.

Cognitive Development

• Can coordinate eyes and follow faces and/or objects as they move
• Begin to show they remember what they see/intricate details (notice differences)
• Able to use multiple senses at once to assess situation
• Can pick up and begin to manipulate objects 
• Trial and error learning where they explore new approaches to problems
• Primary Circular Reactions = repetitive movements in which the infant focuses on mastering new skill
• Can begin to predict a sequence of events
• Supporting language development through the use of sounds or infant sign language to describe a need, activity or object of interest (eat, more, ball, etc.)

Activities

Provider will engage in conversation with infants daily to demonstrate clear, concise sentences and context. Stories will be read, songs will be sung, and brain gym movements will all occur on a daily basis which will allow infants to become familiar with words, pictures, sounds, as well as movement tied to words (supports cross-hemisphere development). Primary caregiver will offer a variety of materials and small objects of different textures, shapes, and sizes for familiarity and understanding of uses. Infants will be given opportunities to develop self-help skills such as moving objects out of reach so that the infant has to move to get them and play easy problem solving games.

Language & Literacy

• Infant recognizes language as social participation
• Coos and Babbles when talked to 
• Shape of infants mouth changes, they play with new sounds they can make
• Understands and can respond to commands
• Can shake their head “no”
• Will say their first meaningful word
• Begins to use infant sign language to communicate basic needs (more, hungry, ball, etc.)

Activities

Provider will engage in conversation with infants daily to demonstrate clear, concise sentences and context. Stories will be read, songs will be sung, and brain gym movements will all occur on a daily basis which will allow infants to become familiar with words, pictures, sounds, as well as movement tied to words (supports cross-hemisphere development). Primary caregiver will offer a variety of materials and small objects of different textures, shapes, and sizes for familiarity and understanding of uses. Infants will be given opportunities to develop self-help skills such as moving objects out of reach so that the infant has to move to get them and play easy problem solving games.

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