How infants and toddlers learn
THE Jamaica Early Childhood Curriculum Guide: Birth to Three is Key provides guidance and support to caregivers on how to provide developmentally appropriate environments for infants and toddlers in group care. It acknowledges that infants and toddlers are learning all the time –learning that the world is either a caring, responsive, and interesting place, or an unloving, neglectful, and frightening one, and they are beginning to respond in ways to fit their perceptions or how they feel.
Here are some takeways from the guide about how infants and toddlers learn.
It all begins at birth
The foundations of emotional development begin at birth and gradually become less intense after age two. In the physical and cognitive domains, infants and toddlers are highly efficient little ‘learning machines’ designed to absorb and classify or sort information. Their brain cells are undergoing an amazing process of wiring. As they make the connections, they identify voices, faces, colours, and shapes, long before they can say a word. A toddler can sort objects by colour or shape or size before being able to say what these are.
The foundations of language development become active at birth and gradually diminish by age six.
Kids are motivated to learn
As young as these children are, they are powerfully self-motivated to explore and learn at their own pace and through their own means. Learning takes place through their intrinsically motivated activity. No one has to tell them to learn, nor prod them into action. Their own choices and desire for autonomy and initiative take care of that. They learn because they want to. Even the youngest infants make simple choices and decisions all day long. They make choices about what they must look at, whether to reach for an object or whether to continue looking at a book or go for a ball.
In practical terms, this means that group-care settings will support young children’s development if they provide a variety of safe, supportive, challenging and accessible materials for children to explore and manipulate.
The importance of language
Toddlers need language to communicate what they know. The desire to explore and to advance their own learning can only be achieved within the context of a trusting relationship with the primary caregiver. It is very important that children be encouraged to form attachments in group settings. Caregivers should use appropriate language to communicate with children at all times, for example, to explain what is being done at a particular time, or to describe things or events using language that can be understood by the child.
Bath and feeding time
An infant’s bath time should not be rushed. Sensory water plays and floating playthings are mainstays of an infant and toddler programme.
Water is soothing; water stimulates play; and the splashing and slapping of water produce interesting reactions. There should be floating toys that the infant can manipulate while the caregiver holds a pleasant conversation with the child. Similarly, feeding time should be pleasant as the caregiver sits with the children and talks about the different food items. Playing, singing, music (percussion instruments), movement, jingles, and rhymes are the hallmark of a good infant and toddler care programme, following the mantra “Learning must be fun”.
It’s all about the kids
The children’s daily schedule should be flexible and organised around the children’s physiological schedule. It should focus on the basic activities of sleeping, feeding, toileting and playing. Young children need simple schedules with large time blocks which fit their developmental needs. In addition each child will have his or her own needs, which will require that the schedule be individualised as far as possible.
Learning by exploring
Very young children learn best by exploring and manipulating things. Young children have the need to fully explore whatever objects they encounter in their environment. As they focus on a particular object of interest they will “try it out” in a variety of ways – pushing it, feeling it, pulling it, banging it, turning it upside down, tasting it, stacking it.
Infants and toddlers learn with their whole body and with all their senses. Children learn through play, repetition and trying out new things, which may be described as risk-taking. Caregivers and teachers of young children must have the patience and wisdom to listen, to watch and wait until the children’s thoughts unfold and become apparent.
