Your 6 Months Old Baby Growth and Development

Hard to believe your baby is halfway through a year already? 6 months baby growth and development have some things in common. It is time you took your baby out to see the world with their physical, mental, and cognitive skills making a tremendous leap. While you monitor their progress, make sure you grow and evolve with your child in the process as well, while also establishing a well-cemented bond.

Video: Your 6-Month-Old Baby Growth and Development – Milestones, Activities & Baby Care Tips

Growth of a Baby

More congenial with waves, smiles and blabber, your baby is now evolving into an entertainer. Ready to take on the role of an explorer, your baby is slowly turning into an acrobat. Get ready for a lot of activities to stimulate your baby’s growing needs to put their social and intellectual skills to productive use. Pay keen attention to their attitude as you could find your baby learning and showing a preference for some types of food.

Baby Development

Imaginations come alive, emotions develop, and your baby is graduating to be an individual. Your baby will now understand your voice and emotions. You may notice signs of strong attachment, stranger anxiety, and a preference for everything from food to toys in your baby. Your baby will now start communicating with her babbling sounds, responding to your calls and also gesticulating with her arms and legs. With the first signs of teeth erupting, your baby is now ready to start with solid food. Your baby will now start rolling over and try and crawl around the house with great effort. The stage is one where your baby is constantly learning new things and imbibing new habits, from grabbing things, putting things down, and seeking help when needed.

24 Week Old Baby Development

Rolling stone

With stronger neck and arm muscles, your baby is rolling all over, much to your amusement. Your baby may also prefer to skip rolling and start trying to sit, lunge or crawl. (1)

Social Butterfly

Your baby will now fancy interactions with delightful strangers. There may be some anxiety, but they will crave attention for you and others. Your baby will now start comprehending your responses to their behaviours and try and engage you more. His repertoire of seeking attention will range from making weird noises to blowing raspberries. (2) Your baby will have their own of establishing a pattern to indicate what they want.

Dressing for comfort

With increased mobility, you may wish to dress your baby in clothes that will give them the leeway to stretch and breathe. Avoid clothes with too many frills, tassels, and scratchy seams that will hinder their activities and restrict them.

Diaper Diaries

Now that your baby is on solid food don’t panic if you see odd colours or experience odd odour in your baby’s stools. Switch to foods that have a laxative effect if you find your baby constipated.

25 Week Old Baby Development

Sign language

Introduce those first signs to indicate hunger and reading (open palms with hands together) to help your baby develop her language and motor skills. Most kids adapt to sign language at this stage and develop better language skills once they grow up.

Left-handed or Right-handed

Your baby may show an inclination to use a particular hand, but it will not be established until they are 2 or 3 years old. Do not try to influence your choice, as it may lead to confusion, hand-eye coordination, and dexterity later.

Games

Your baby will now love to play games, especially ones that help her exercise her vocal cords. Try and amuse your baby at every instance by making animal noises, and you may find them repeating it or mimicking you on several occasions.

26 Week Old Baby Development

Encouraging his senses

With his increasing use of his sensory skills, your baby will find it amusing to explore anything that they can touch, feel, and put into their mouth. (1) Make sure you offer them plenty of soft and safe things to learn different sensory perceptions.

Storytime

Your baby will love pictures and images. Books are the best way to garner their interest and also develop a hobby for a lifetime. Read illustrated books with a lot of colour, pictures, and textured illustrations.

Finger Foods

Your baby will not start making an attempt to eat on its own. It may get messy, but encourage it by offering a small amount on a plate. As they develop their appetite, offer them food of different shapes, sizes, and varied tastes. You may offer them the finger foods like small cut pieces of soft, different fruits, homemade potato chips, etc., so the baby may try to have and learn slowly to experiment and eat soon.

27 Week Old Baby Development

Bouncing Doll

Your baby can now bounce with the support of her weight on her legs. Help your baby stand by holding them, and they may start moving by lifting off the ground.

Sleight of the Hand

Your baby will now become adept at holding things and transferring them. Fine motor skills like hand, finger, and wrist movements will be used frequently. Develop their gross motor skills that involve the use of large muscles by placing things out of their reach, Encourage them to grab it even if they get frustrated. Keep hazardous things out of reach, as your baby will now be up and about all the time.

Imaginary Friends

Your baby will now show preferences for some of their toys, especially figures or soft toys resembling normal beings. This is a sign of their growing independence and is absolutely normal.

Baby Health

The first few months after birth are filled with visits to the doctor for routine immunizations. This month your baby will be due for the 3^rd lot of vaccinations. Be prepared for an eventful day after your baby has been vaccinated, although it may differ in children. Your child may also catch their first cold at 6 months, but there is no reason to panic. Try to stay on top of things and rush to the doctor if you see a change in feeding pattern, temperature, rashes, vomiting, or unsettling behaviour.

Baby Milestones – 6 Months

Take a look at the surprises that you can expect from your baby in relevance to their mental, physical and social growth. Baby milestones can be sorted into three categories- cognitive, physical and social, and emotional.

Cognitive Milestones

This relates to the magnitude of your baby’s brain development, and intellectual and thinking prowess.

• Curiosity: Your baby is more curious and eager to touch, feel and smell anything that fascinates them.
• Basic Sounds: Get accustomed to hearing the usual “Ah”, “Eh”, and other sounds to acknowledge things. These are the forms of polysyllabic vowel sounds.
• Imitating Sounds and response to calls: Your baby will try and imitate sounds you make or sounds from toys. He or she may also respond to his or her name. (2)
• Conscious of Self: Don’t be surprised if you see your baby admiring themselves in front of the mirror with glee-stricken expressions. It’s just that they are working on the discerning powers of their brain.

Physical Milestones

Some traits associated with their physical and motor skill capabilities:

• Vision and Perception: With increased and enhanced vision, your baby will now differentiate between shades and love colourful images. (3) Your baby can also perceive depth and distances to judge and track objects accurately.
• Handy-Eye Coordination: Your baby can now reach out to an object, grab it, study it and pass it on with increased concentration.
• Finger Power: Using all their finger, the raking grasp, your baby will now hold tiny objects with a sturdy grip. (4)
• Sitting without Support: Your baby will now start to sit briefly, with the support of the pelvis, and lean forward on their hands. You will see that his back is also rounded.
• Supports Head: The neck muscles are now firm, and your baby will stretch their neck and turn around to observe things.
• Rolling Over: Your baby will now roll over from their back to tummy and vice versa.
• Support Their Own Weight: Your baby will stand confidently if you hold them up and probably even bounce and dance.
• Sleep Pattern: Your baby will sleep for six to eight hours at a stretch in the night before waking up for a feed. (5)
• Solid Food: Your baby will be ready to progress to the next step in their diet regime with solid food by slowly biting and chewing. (6)

Social and Emotional Milestones

This charts out the social skills gained over a period of time

• Response to Emotions: Your baby will now experience varied emotions ranging from sadness to joy, depending on circumstances.
• Vocal Expressions: Your baby will now have a typical way of expressing themselves for a particular occasion.
• Recognition Skills: Your baby will now recognize familiar faces and panic when they spot a stranger.
• More Play: Your baby will show an inclination to play with you and their caregiver as they are keen on exploring new things.
• Inspection of Objects Around: The 6-month-old infant has discovered his hands and will soon learn to manipulate objects. At first, everything is mouthed. In time, he will pick up novel objects, inspect them, pass them from hand to hand, bang them, drop them, and then put them in his mouth. This will be the usual pattern for understanding things.

Behaviour

You will find that your baby is becoming increasingly clever when they blow raspberries, grab your face or try to put everything into their mouth. Babies love to hear from you and try to read and chat to engage them in a conversation. Your baby will like the occasional time to play games and will express their irritability when they have had enough. Mastery behaviour occurs when infants feel secure; those with less secure attachments show limited experimentation and less competence.

6-Month-Old Baby Activities

Your baby now enjoys movement-based activities. Some activities to give impetus to her instincts:

1. Read Out Loud: Any conversation is always welcome as your baby is a keen listener, and reading will gain a lot of attention.

2. Play Games: Your baby will love games like peek-a-boo, racing to the finishing line by crawling, or the tickle with their sift toys

3. Sensory-based Activities: Indulge in play that will involve your baby in touching and feeling objects. Play with a range of objects from cloth, blocks, water, and even sand.

6 Months-Old Baby Care

With your baby becoming increasingly adventurous, always be on your guard. Their tendency to stuff everything into their mouth may seem annoying at times but try not to be too fanatical about it. Give them a chance to explore when you are around them. Baby-proof the areas so that your baby knows that it is quarantined. Spend time with your baby outdoors as they will learn to expand their horizons. Be on top of their immunization schedules to avoid any lapses. Talk, listen and respond to your baby all the time to develop a strong bond.

Feeding

Milk is still the paramount source of nutrition for your baby. However, the iron store built up when the baby was in the womb is now depleting. Babies may not like the taste initially, but you could try alternating foods with pureed fruit or vegetable with the taste they prefer until they settle into their new regime.

Sleeping

A minimum of 10 hours of sleep at night and three sleep routines of 1-3 hours during the day are what your baby needs at this stage. Stay calm and try and establish a pattern to promote sound sleep habits in them. Settle them with strategies and techniques for a few days, which they will habituate to eventually.

Tips for Parents

Infant development at 6 months is not very different from children, and they are at that cute stage of exploring, learning, and seeking new things. Don’t be paranoid about extreme hygiene, as they need to get their hands dirty to learn things. Engage in baby activities for six months old babies to get the best out of their motor and cognitive skills. Keep a check on your 6 months old’s baby weight during your routine visits to the paediatrician.

Each child is different, and this particular phase, which is halfway through their first year, is a radical period. Spend enough time with your little one as it is sure to help you mould their behaviour and monitor their growth.

References:

1. What developmental milestones is your 6-month-old reaching?; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/actearly/milestones/milestones-6mo.html, 2022

2. Your Baby’s Developmental Milestones at 6 Months; UNICEF Parenting; https://www.unicef.org/parenting/child-development/your-babys-developmental-milestones-6-months, n.d.

3. Your Baby’s Hearing, Vision, and Other Senses: 6 Months (for Parents); Nemours KidsHealth; https://kidshealth.org/en/parents/senses-6mos.html?WT.ac=ctg, n.d.

4. Developmental Milestones: Fine Motor Skills and Visual Motor Skills; CHOC – Children’s Health of Orange County; https://www.choc.org/userfiles/file/Rehab-Developmental+Milestones+final.pdf, n.d.

5. Your Baby at 6 Months; UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals; https://www.ucsfbenioffchildrens.org/education/your-baby-at-6-months, 2021

6. E.; First Year Infant Development; American Pregnancy Association; https://americanpregnancy.org/healthy-pregnancy/first-year-of-life/first-year-infant-development/, April 2018

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