Nature exposure stimulates language development in infants
As parents or caregivers of an infant or a toddler, we all are familiar with the day when we first think of taking our baby out in nature for a stroll. And once we do, it seems that all they now want to do is wait for the clock to strike 4 or 5 and start giving signals in their own way to go out.
Now if your baby has already started giving you signals (by crying or making sounds) like these then congratulations, the brain development of your kid has already begun.
For those parents or caregivers, the babies of whom are not at this stage of development might want to start bringing your baby outdoors in nature.
Why?
Well, it turns out Nature provides every being enough room to grow. And it certainly includes our babies as well who have nothing to do but learn new things.
It’s not just philosophical. There is science behind it too 🙌.
You see, out in nature, the senses of infants and toddlers are stimulated by the ever vibrant and natural colors, new scents and smells, not to mention the soothing sound of birds and sweet chirping. It creates a perfect and holistic environment to provide an exposure to brain development activities in infants.
It’s a new experience, it is exciting and both thought-triggering for an infant or a toddler. The neurons inside the tiny little brain work rapidly to create synapses which is nothing but brain development explained in a scientific way.
Now you don’t need to worry if you’re in a big city or have no near access to a garden or natural environment. You can still go out and the happenings around wherever you go will trigger the same brain development. Just make sure the place where you go is not noisy and irritating.
And yet all these things are just one part of it. There are a lot more other benefits to bringing your baby outdoors in nature. And these can be categorized into 4 ways that your kid’s brain develops.
- Intellectual development
- Social development
- Emotional Development
- Physical Development
Intellectual Development
Bringing your baby out in nature can actually trigger intellectual development. By intellectual, we mean that spending time in nature can trigger a series of language-development activities. Of all the language development activities for infants, bringing your baby out is the most natural way your baby can learn language and speech.
All you have to do is narrate to your baby what you see and make her experience it with your voice. This type of early conversation is really effective in triggering language development.
Do this often and soon enough your baby will start verbalizing her response and make different sounds. And since you will just absolutely adore your little one making cute sounds. They will, according to a proven 2014 study, start doing it more often to see you like her response.
For eg: You can have your baby touch the grass and tell her “what she’s touching is grass”. This will intrigue your baby into a new experience and respond to that new experience.
Social Development
Being social is not just all about being outgoing and accepting of good people around you, it is a major skill now. It is a very imperative quality that even some adults lack. So we want to start early on to develop this life skill.
If your baby is an infant, try to engage your baby with your friendly neighbors and make your baby comfortable in accepting to go into their arms. However, If your baby doesn’t want to then it is not mandatory.
On the other hand, if your baby is a toddler (1-3 years of age) then utilize the opportunity of being in a park and make your baby play with other kids of the same age, of course under your supervision.
Emotional Development
Emotional Development is also just as important as intellectual or social. Your baby whilst learning new things also gets a chance to bond with you better especially if your baby likes going out (because you’re doing what your baby loves, so the baby naturally tends to love you more, a basic human response).
Physical Development
At last, bringing your baby out in nature also means that your baby can indulge in supervised playful activities, right (Given that your baby is old enough to walk properly)?
As we have also addressed in our previous post which is, “Ways to Build Strength, Stamina & Endurance to Support Early Physical Development in Babies”, play has a direct role in the physical development of your baby.
Indulging in play makes your child run, grab, scoot for things which builds their Fine Motor & Gross Motor skills.
Fine Motor skills are particular movements or activities/sets of activities that help develop smaller muscle groups like those in hands and wrist.
Gross Motor skills are movements or activities/sets of activities that involve and develop larger muscle groups like arms, trunk, legs, neck.
Indulging in physical activities will also result in better sleep which would help build your child’s circadian rhythms (better and timely sleeping patterns).
To sum up, all these activities are great for your baby and can be well-categorized as brain development activities for infants.
So basically you can trigger brain development in your infant and language development by just taking your kid out in nature for an hour. Half of your job is done.
Now all this is good but make sure you follow the following dressing guidelines before you take your baby out.
1. Avoid direct sunlight if it’s too hot outside. Use a hat to avoid sun exposure.
2. Don’t use any type of sunscreen on your baby until she’s one.
3. In cold weather. Dress your baby in layers because they can get cold very easily. Layers will keep your baby warm by trapping the heat even if it gets cold outside.
That’s all! Thanks for reading.
If you found this post helpful, we recommend you to Join our Program today to know : the SUPER SECRETS about ‘Raising a Prodigy Kid’ during their precious 0-2 year old window, and How to Unlock your 0 to 2-year baby’s inborn genius & amazing abilities with our At-home Program for Parents & Caregivers.
This was brought to you by : the brain behind PSK – Mr. Arjun Seth, and the PSK Learning Team, through the medium of ‘Here with You’ – an informative platform specially designed for New Parents and Guardians, that they should definitely make “their thing”.
