When Your Baby is 11 Months Old

You will begin to notice some more fascinating changes in your child’s progress and this experience will be also be a very pleasurable and knowledgeable one for you.
Let us look at some of the aspects.

a) Becoming more independent from a physical perspective

Your baby has reached a stage where she does not need you for at least some of the physically related aspects like standing on her own, squatting or even stooping. Though she still requires a lot of attention, the fact that she can achieve some of these physical tasks without your support means that she is making the right progress. She may still need you to dress her up or hold the drinking cup for her, though some are able to manage this too on their own.
Having got the confidence and strength to drink from a cup all by herself, your baby would resort to pranks like dropping the cup deliberately, so that you pick it up or would just toss it nonchalantly – to gain your attention.

b) Introduce her to books

You can let her leaf through some pictorial books, just to engage her curiosity. She might not turn the pages in any specific order and would just gaze at the pictures randomly. She is also likely to have some favorite pages and would keep looking at those pages repeatedly. This again is a positive development indicating that she is absorbing the content, color and form of those pictures.

c) Asserting herself

If there are siblings, your child will now start asserting her individuality by playing along with them without any conflict on her own. She may have specific objects of preference and will show a distinct orientation towards them while playing.

d) You can start becoming a bit firm

Your baby is now in a position to recognize and know certain instructions and at times may selectively decide to ignore you, especially if you are not in favor of something. You have to appreciate that the use of the word “No” needs to be selective and should ideally only be used to convey your disapproval of things that are either dangerous or harmful to her. You can however slowly start the process of establishing certain limits and acquaint her gradually with what is right and what is wrong. The idea is not to be too strict about things, but just to let her know that not everything she does is okay and to slowly introduce the concepts of protection and safety. This is necessary to ensure that her natural curiosity for the things around her does not cause her or others any harm.

e) Greater level of interaction

Your baby is now more coherent and is able to use certain words meaningfully. You can stimulate faster development of her brain’s frontal lobes by interacting more frequently with her. This interaction will improve her cognitive skills and by talking to her and listening to what she says with interest, you can enhance the speed at which these skills are being developed. Playing certain games like Peek-a-boo helps to complement your efforts and boosts her memory.

She is able to make certain sounds by imitating someone and is also able to understand simple instructions like asking her to fetch something. This stage of her development is a fascinating one and you must make the best use of it by being close to her and engaging in regular conversation with her.

f) Is my baby okay?

This is a question that every parent is continuously worried about and the only advice is that you must appreciate that each baby will develop at a pace that is unique and the behavioral characteristics mentioned above are only meant to be guiding principles and should be taken in that vein.
It is a fact that prematurely born babies do things much later than those born normally and that is not something that should be of concern. You need to be in close consultation with your doctor and he should be able to advise you on what you can do to expedite your child’s development.

When Your Baby is 11 Months Old

You will begin to notice some more fascinating changes in your child’s progress...