In Spring and Summer, the outside world is chock full of colors, smells, tastes, sounds, and things to touch. By this time of year, socks and shoes are back on, mittens cover little fingers, and hats muffle noises.

Did you know that together, hands and feet have over 40,000 touch receptors? Pull off those socks and mittens and take advantage of those 40,000 learning possibilities! Here are some ideas:

Note: All of these work equally well for hands or feet. A tablecloth/oilcloth on the floor or bathtub work well for the feet activities, and a highchair tray or wax paper on a table is a perfect place to contain the mess made by experimenting little hands. Be sure to talk about what your little one is “feeling” (slippery, soft, rough, smooth, scratchy, bumpy).

• Squirt shaving cream or whipped cream onto feet, or in little mounds on a high chair tray for exploration.
• Put dried beans or breakfast cereal in a box or plastic tub. Place packing peanuts or crumpled paper in the other box. Let your little one stomp and jump and kick away. (With your help, a non-walker can do this, too.)
•  Make a box of ribbon and fabric scraps of various textures (satin, grosgrain, fleece, burlap, vinyl) for exploration.
• Take those ribbons and scraps of fabric, add some cotton balls, and put them on floor for your little one to crawl or walk across.
• Cook noodles, oatmeal, rice or jello. Name the different textures as you play with them.
• Mix cornstarch and water until you get a goop about the consistency of glue.  Add food coloring if you wish. This is a non-toxic mixture, so no worries if a little bit gets eaten.

This is not the time to try and contain the mess! Frequently, the messier the experience, the more is learned. Think about it – the more touch receptors (and other senses) that are involved, the stronger and more permanent the learning will be.

-posted by Miss Analiisa, whose favourite sensory activity involves sand between her toes.

Classic "Airplane Baby"

4 to 6 months
One of the biggest changes that will occur during these months is that the parts of your baby’s brain that coordinate sight and touch are now integrating the incoming sensory information. This enables your baby to figure out where her hands are in space (thanks to the proprioceptive system), and make them do what she wants.

With the beginnings of depth-perception, this sight/touch sensory integration means he can reach for an object and pick it up. By about 6 months, he is also able to rotate his wrists, and thus manipulate objects.

What to watch for:  These are the signs that your baby’s brain is organizing sensory input exactly as it should.

1. Banging objects and toys. (Against the floor, or two objects together.)
2. Spontaneous bringing together in a clapping motion of her hands in front of her body. This is the first sign of coordination between both sides of her body. To assist in this developmental milestone, you can play clapping games with your baby even before she can play them by herself.

Ram Sam Sam is a children’s song that originated in Morocco, and was a favorite clapping game of my children when they were infants and toddlers, especially on the changing table. You can listen to the song here, 2-22 A Ram Sam Sam and download it directly at play.kindermusik.com.

A ram sam sam, a ram sam sam (clap your baby’s hands or feet together as you sing)
Guli guli guli guli guli (roll your baby’s hands or bicycle his legs)
ram sam sam (clap your baby’s hands or feet together as you sing)
A ram sam sam, a ram sam sam (clap your baby’s hands or feet together as you sing)
Guli guli guli guli guli (roll your baby’s hands or bicycle his legs)
ram sam sam (clap your baby’s hands or feet together as you sing)
A ra-vi, a ra-vi (lift your baby’s arms over his head, or fold his legs up toward his head)
Guli guli guli guli guli (roll your baby’s hands or bicycle his legs)
ram sam sam (clap your baby’s hands or feet together as you sing)
A ra-vi, a ra-vi (lift your baby’s arms over his head, or fold his legs up toward his head)
Guli guli guli guli guli (roll your baby’s hands or bicycle his legs)
ram sam sam (clap your baby’s hands or feet together as you sing)

Touch Me
As babies begin to coordinate sight and touch, they delight in “touching” games. Here’s a fun naming game to play. (And yes, babies can begin to learn body part labels, even if they can’t yet speak the words!) I found many versions of the lyrics brought to the US by immigrants from all over Europe. Many people commented that this was a beloved touch game played with grandparents, even at 4 or 5 years of age. Here are a couple  of versions:

Here is where the coachman sits (touch baby’s forehead)
Here is where he cracks his whip (touch bridge of nose)
Eye winker (touch or circle one eye)
Tom tinker (touch or circle the other eye)
Nose breather (touch nose)
Mouth eater (touch mouth)
Chin chopper (touch chin)
Gully, gully, gully (tickle under chin)

Here sits the Lord Mayor (touch baby’s forehead)
Here sits his two men (touch eyes)
Here sits the rooster (touch cheek)
Here sits the hen (touch other cheek)
Here sits the chickens (touch nose)
Here they run in (touch mouth)
Chin-chopper, chin-chopper,
Chin-chopper, chin! (tickle under chin)

Airplane Baby
At about 6 months, a baby on his tummy really feels the pull of gravity, which gives baby a strong desire to lift up his head, neck, upper back, arms and legs all at the same time, resulting in the classic “airplane” position.

Babies at this age want and need to have their vestibular systems stimulated by rocking, swooshing, twirling, swinging and other similar movements.  One word of caution – every person (grownups, too!) has a level of moment they can tolerate, and it’s different for everyone. If your baby begins to cry during a moving game, this means that the play has become too rough or wild for your baby’s vestibular system to handle, and the level of play is actually causing her brain to disorganize.

Hold your baby firmly around her body, tummy down, in a horizontal position. Take off! Fly your baby around the room, swooshing, dipping, spinning, rolling, starting, stopping as it pleases your baby. Be sure to make airplane sounds! If you would like some musical inspiration, download  Run and Jump/Soaring from play.kindermusik.com.

As your baby turns into a toddler and preschooler, lie on your back on the floor and bend your knees with your feet off the floor. Have your child place his tummy against the bottoms of your feet. Hold onto your child’s hands. Lift your child up towards the ceiling as you raise your feet and fly!

-posted by Miss Analiisa, whose 9 year old Rob would love to still play airplane on her feet, but at 86 pounds, would likely crush the lift-off mechanism.

Earlier related blogs:
Organizing your brain. By the age of 7.
Baby’s Busy First Month
Two and Three Months: From head to hands

A friend and fellow Kindermusik Educator in Canada (the one our beloved Miss Katie is teaching for while her husband is in grad school), recently sent me this great link to an online clothing store called Soft – clothing for all children.

Here’s a bit more about the company:

Soft was founded in February 2007.  We began a two year market research process and one year sample development and testing phase, and finally launched our first collection in Winter 2009/10! We are a research driven company, therefore we continue to test samples on children with a variety of sensory needs and a range of tactile sensitivity–to ensure that the clothing we manufacture will eliminate the most common complaints we hear from parents and children. No more morning meltdowns, no more spending hundreds on clothes your children refuse to wear.

Mission
Many children are extra-sensitive to the texture and feel of clothing. Soft® is the first line of inclusive clothing designed with the needs of all children in mind, including those with Autism, Sensory Processing Disorder, ADHD, and tactile defensiveness/sensitivity. We use flat seaming and seamless construction for extra comfort, 100% of the softest combed cotton and our specially developed Soft Sensory Blends , wide collars, encased elastic waistbands, printed labels (tagless), custom fits, and much more.

Created by a Mom and Special Education teacher, our goal is to design clothing that can enhance social skills, sensory organization, concentration, by addressing unique sensory needs, but without sacrificing personal style and self expression.

What is so different about Soft?
More than 1 in 150 children have sensory needs that are largely unmet by the children’s apparel market today. Soft is about to revolutionize children’s apparel. We are the first inclusive and universally designed line of clothing geared toward children with sensory or tactile sensitivity, a common symptom of Autism, Aspergers, and Sensory Processing Disorder. Soft is designed and constructed considering the needs of all children, particularly, sensory sensitive dressers.

Soft provides comfort and style for all children. After conducting over two years of in-depth market research, we learned a lot about what parents want and what children like. We have incorporated that feedback to create stylish and comfortable clothes for the people who need it most. We use:

• Flat seaming totally seamless construction throuought (for extra comfort)
• Soft high quality cotton (combed, bio-washed and pre-washed for extra soft and smoothness)
• Wide collars (for a roomy fit)
• Encased elastic (waistbands that don’t pinch)
• Printed labels throughout — printed with water based ink (for a smooth non-plasticy feel that won’t itch)
• Vegetable dyes, natural enzyme washes, and water based digital prints (to protect against allergies)

-posted by Miss Analiisa, who likes their simple and easy refer-a-friend-offer, and can only imagine the relief that Soft Clothing will bring to frustrated parents and children everywhere.

It is the sensations from these kinds of bodily touch that are interpreted by the brain and helps him form his first emotional attachment.  

Touch is a baby’s source of comfort and security. Bodily touch leads to bonding, and gives your baby her first knowledge of her physical body. If this first emotional attachment is incomplete, it will be harder for your baby to form emotional attachments later in life.

If you’ve been in both Village and Our Time, you’ll realize that these classes give a very different experience. And our Kindermusik moms and dads and grandmas and nannies all treasure the Village experience. They might not be able to put it into words, but it is all the touching we do that makes this time so special.  

So, hold your baby close. Dance a little more often. Snuggle a little bit longer. Far too soon they will wiggle out of your arms and begin their journey towards independence.

It is what you do now that has a tremendous impact on your baby’s ability to have happy, healthy, well-adjusted and secure relationships as a grownup.

-posted by Miss Analiisa, who is a wee bit sad that she no longer has babies to snuggle in her arms, but is glad her youngest still is small enough to cuddle in her lap.

Dr. Fernald couldn’t understand anything these mothers spoke. However, the moment they put their babies down, and no longer were touching them, the mothers starting to almost “sing” to their babies. They used “spoken melodies” to remain in touch with their babies.  (Think about how you speak to your infant – “There you are, Livvy.  Hello beautiful girl!”) Try it right now. Imagine you are speaking to baby who is lying on her blanket on the floor.

So Dr. Fernald packed up her tape recorder and went off all over the world, recording how parents talked to their very young babies.  It did not matter if the language spoken was a romance language or a tone language; she heard the same melodies. When a parent wanted to show the child they were happy, the melody was always a rise-fall, no matter the language. “Good boy! You got it!” She saw that the melody kept the child doing a behavior or action.

There are three other universal melodies as well. If a parent wanted their child to stop, the melody was short and sharp and staccato. “Wait. Stop. No.” To draw a child’s attention to something, the melody was a higher, rising pitch – “Look at the horsie.” The fourth melody is one of comfort. “Oh, sweetie. I’ll be right there.”

This is music that is understood by infants who are just new in the world. We all know these songs and what they mean, no matter what language is being spoken. To Dr. Fernald, this isn’t about the language, or even the words; it’s about the sounds. The sounds which are more like touch. Do these sounds startle or caress us gently? She defines sound as “touch as a distance”.

Looking back, I see that I did this same thing with my own babies, as well as other little ones I currently come into contact with. Parents everywhere speak “music as touch”, (it’s technically called “motherese”), and no one taught us. And it doesn’t matter if we are in a public place; we do it without regard for who might overhear. What an interesting, universal, musical language.

If you are interested in hearing the whole podcast, you may listen here.

-posted by Miss Analiisa, who just realized she is instinctively using this same “motherese” on her son’s Christmas present – a 4 ½ month old beagle puppy. She’s not sure if it’s working yet.

Next, we searched the pantry and craft drawer for other items we could use to make the body coverings of other types of animals. My son applied sequins to recreate scales on a picture of a fish. Using macaroni, he made the hard shell on a picture of a turtle. We applied feathers to a picture of a bird. We also went to the kitchen sink and used a spare feather to demonstrate how the oil on feathers repels water. For some strange reason I didn’t have any fake fur just lying around for a craft, go figure, but slightly stretched cotton balls slightly make a very believable polar bear. We also touched the inside of his jacket that has material fabricated to resemble sheep’s wool.

Children LOVE to explore the world they live in. They also love to compare themselves with the information they discover. The fur of a dog is similar to the hair on our heads, which serves the same purpose, to keep us warm. The nails on our fingers are hard like the outer covering of some bugs. Our nails serve the same purpose, protection for a softer body part. Awakening all of children’s senses by experiencing the taste, texture, sight, sound and/or smell of something provides a more rounded understanding of the how and why of their discovery.

After seeing the gummy worm turned snake and the pride in his son’s face at displaying his creation and knowledge, my husband totally agreed it was worth the sacrifice. If you haven’t tried simple science projects with your child, I encourage you to do so!

Have you done any fun science crafts? We would love to hear about them! Sacrifice some food or other household item for science and tell us about it.

- posted by Miss Jesikah, who absolutely loves science and watching the world unfold through a child’s eyes.

The tactile system, or our sense of touch, is the largest sense system. It helps us to identify properties of objects and gives us information about our environment. The tactile sense has two parts – the protective system that has the body automatically withdraw from touch that is perceived as being harmful. (Like from something poky or sharp.) The second part – the discriminatory system gives information regarding the texture, size, and shape of objects. (Like round, smooth, and tiny.)

Tactile play is often messy, but totally fun! I bought a “splat mat” long ago, and it’s perfect for these kinds of activities. I found a great company that sells laminated cotton so you can make your own.  You can look up local stores that sell it, and I’m thinking that no sewing is required. The CUTEST patterns, too! I’ve contacted a local mom and have asked for sewing instructions, so stay tuned.    

You’ll also want a tray (try a cat litter tray) cookie sheet, shallow bowl or dishpan.

Here’s a list of tactile activities to try. Remember to play with your child. You’ll have lots of fun, and you’ll be modeling ways to experiment. Please share your ideas with us, too.

Put any one of these on your tray (on a splat mat, of course!): cooked pasta or spaghetti, jello, canned kidney beans, or mashed potatoes, and let your child squish, move it around, fill small containers, or anything that comes to mind.

On a tray (or my favorite to easy-to-clean-up place – the shower wall), put pudding, shaving cream, or finger paints, and make shapes, squirls, and pictures with your child.

In a dishpan or plastic tub, pour any of these: sand, dried pasta, water, dried lentils (orange lentils are pretty to look at), or bird seed, and provide your child with spoons, scoops, funnels, small containers to fill and pour.

Sink or float: fill a dishpan with objects that sink or float (or both!). Cups, sponges, small toys, rocks, wooden spoons, plastic lids or bottles. Put in some bubbles and colored bath tablets for fun. Let them play and experiment.

Mix a 1 lb box of cornstarch and about 1 2/3 cups of water. You can pour it, pick it up, bounce it, roll it into a ball, step in it (tactile play isn’t just for hands), and play!

Fill a box with toys that have a variety of textures – textured and smooth blocks, a knobby Gertie ball, snap beads, and items from around the house: wooden spoons, egg shakers, rolling pins, whisks, sand blocks, most anything child safe from your utensil drawer.

Put small objects in a bowl of rice or sand and play “hide and seek” with your hands. Push small objects into a ball of playdough and have your child pull the clay off in piece with their fingertips to uncover the objects. Note: This a great activity to develop a pincer-grasp, a necessary precursor to grasping a pencil properly.

Play, play, play with playdough! Tomorrow I’ll blog some great playdough recipes.

-posted by Miss Analiisa, whose children played sink or float for hours!