Athens, February 2016
The boy in the video Billy and his mother took part in Child’Space group lessons with me when Billy was 5 months old. They came back to me to have a follow up lesson when Billy became 11 months old. Billy was a typical development baby, so the mother didn’t have any particular worries or concerns about him, on the contrary she mentioned that she was enjoying him very much and she wanted to know more about the stage Billy was exploring at that time and about games that were suitable for his age. So, in the occasion of our lesson we discussed about cognitive games we play at this age for e.x. hide n’ seek, putting things into containers, playing with big lego’s, and how all that works in combination with fine motor skills development.
What is also interesting, in my opinion, to watch during the lesson, is how a secure attachment between infant and parent is expressed. The baby is open to the new challenges (encountering the practitioner, playing games) but shows always the need to look at his mother or even go back to her every now and then, in order to get reassured, to share his joy, to express feelings, to feel safe himself, before going back to explore the new challenges around him. The above behavior is typical for babies of this age that have experienced a secure attachment to their parent.
Concerning gross motor skills, Billy had just started to cruise at that time, so during the lesson we explored this movement and I talked with the mother about the importance of experiencing right and left direction in cruising, before exploring forward direction that he will soon do in order to walk. During the lesson, you can also watch how the baby gets back on the floor several times from standing position while holding on to the chairs and finally how beautifully he responds to the challenge of combining the movement of side walking with using rotation of the body. Towards the end of the lesson the baby manages to organize the legs underneath him and make this combined movement more smoothly.
Why does the teacher grab the toy at such speed? Even taking it away from the child in this fast grabbing way? I wonder what she thinks that she’s teaching the child apart from dropping a ball into a cup. And how a child with special needs would react to that speed. Has Chava seen this and approved?
Hello Susanne,
Good question. I have send your question to Martha Kloukina herself, so she can react on it. I can only guess. But for sure the tempo of Martha and the tempo of the boy is at a different pace. You are right that there are different ways to play this game. Martha is here much focused on putting the ball into the cup. She also could have played first with ‘give and take’ in her hand. I think she wants to use the sound of the ball into the cup to heighten Bills curiosity so he comes more freely into the room. She could have used a second ball for that though.
The idea is you go with the tempo of the baby and of course with children with special needs that’s even more important. Chava have seen this video and showed it in the last training as an example.
With warm regards, Tjitske
Dear Susan,
Thank you for taking time to watch this video and comment on it.
Answering to your questions, gives me a good chance to rethink on the strategies I chose during that lesson. So, I will do my best to be as much analytic as I can.
As you already know, during a lesson many possibilities are unraveled ahead of the teacher and the teacher sometimes has to decide fast enough which available “pathways” to follow in order not to lose the momentum of the baby’s curiosity. The above requires of course on behalf of the teacher to take into consideration each case separately.
In this particular case, the games with the ball I chose, were “Hide n’Seek” first and after “Putting the ball into the cup”. I used these two cognitive games mainly to establish communication with the baby. I definitely agree with Tjitske, that in the beginning of the video you can see clearly that there was another available option for me, to play the game of “give and take the ball”. However, I obviously did not follow that and started with a different dynamic.
I took the option of playing the above two games and chose to suggest a quick tempo immediately focusing in heightening the baby’s curiosity, establishing the conventions of the games and make him connect with me. A little afterwards, I used one of the same games to make the baby travel into space, leave the mother instantly and give him the chance to go back at her again. Because Billy accepted the tempo and didn’t feel disturbed at any moment, I continued to keep the same tempo and slowed down when I was waited for his reaction. His repetitive smile confirmed me that the “pathway” was right. Of course, if Billy would not have accepted neither the tempo or the game I probably would have gone a different “pathway” with him, suggesting a different game and a different rhythm and would have reconsidered my primary decisions.
I definitely agree that the teacher has to follow the tempo of the baby that is in front of her. Although, sometimes I don’t find it forbidden – especially with older babies and according always to each case separately- to start by proposing a tempo that at first might seem different from theirs. It catches their attention right away, builds a dynamic and makes them follow. Each baby reacts efficiently to a different rhythm. Finding that rhythm is one thing and changing the rhythm at any point of a lesson is another. However, preserving the playfulness of the moment through trying out and manipulating different rhythmic patterns is a major tool for the teacher. Moreover, responding to a rhythmic variety of actions is an important skill for babies.
In special needs cases, as you yourself made a reference on that, the whole context is completely different, so the lesson would have been structured differently in all levels. But I cannot elaborate further on that as it is only a hypothesis.
Martha Kloukina