Stimulation of development: 12 months

Activity suggestions for parents with children aged 9-12 months

1. Crawling is a gross motor skill that most children learn between the ages of 9 and 12 months. Stimulate your child to crawl by putting toys on the floor a little distance from him. The child will then crawl over to the toy to examine it in more detail. This is good training for coordination and balance.

2. Your child can now stand up, either with or without support. You can train his ability to stand by putting some toys in front of him when he is standing up. The child will often pull the toys down on to the floor, and will then have to sit to get hold of them again.

This is good training for gross motor function and coordination.

3. Sound toys are fun and educational for children in this age group. The child will have sufficiently good fine motor skills to press on the toy to trigger the sound, and he will also start to imitate sounds. This is the start of language development.

4. Put toys on a small table so that the child can reach them. This will stimulate him to crawl over to the table and pull himself up and play while standing.

5. Gradually, as your child becomes better at standing, he will try to stand for short periods without support. You can stimulate this by giving your child a toy so that he will have to let go of the support. Do not press him to let go of the support as this may make him frightened and uncertain.

Standing up, sitting down and standing up again is good balance training for your child.

6. You can improve the child’s balance by putting a toy on a chair so that he will have to stand up to reach the toy. He will then sit down again to play with the toy on the floor.

7. Put a toy on a low table so that the child can crawl over to collect it.

8. The child understands that, by throwing the toy down, he can play with it afterwards on the floor.

9. The child brings both toys down to the floor by taking one in his hand and throwing the other one down.

10. From about the age of 10 months, the child will be able to walk with support, first supported with two hands, then with only one hand.

This is good training for walking.