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Parenting guidelines: Here's how you can support the healthy development of your baby’s brain

Parenting guidelines: Here's how you can support the healthy development of your baby’s brain

From morning feedings to bedtime, there are lots of routine opportunities to nurture your baby's brain development. A few parenting guidelines for you.

Written by Satata Karmakar |Updated : October 23, 2020 9:36 AM IST

At birth, your baby's brain contains 100 billion neurons but in his very first year, the child grows trillions of brain-cell connections, called neural synapses. Pretty impressive, right? But, this is the most important period for the child and the parent as it decides the child's mental growth. New parents always want to give their baby the best start in life, and a big part of supporting a baby's early brain development is stimulating the newborn's brain. It might seem like a huge task, but boosting your wee one's brain doesn't have to be complicated, a few changes in your lifestyle can do the trick. Our parenting guidelines will help you do just that.

How well your child's brain develops depends on several important factors in addition to genes, such as:

  1. The diet that you followed during your pregnancy
  2. Exposure to various toxins or infections

Here are a few parenting guidelines that will help you to boost your baby's brain.

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Feeding your little one

Feeding your little one isn't just great bonding time, but it is also one of the greatest opportunities to get the baby's brain working. The time when you are feeding your little one, you and your baby share facial expressions. Try and respond to your baby's expressions to help the baby communicate.

Going for a drive/ walk outside

Although, it is not recommended to take your kid out of your house right now when the world is under the drip of a pandemic, usually, to develop your baby's brain, taking him out for a ride or for a walk is extremely important. Allow your little one to observe the outside world and develop ideas and knowledge. There are so many things for your baby to see when you're out for a walk, the trees, the sky, people, roads, shops, animals, etc.

Sing those nursery rhymes you remember

This is one of the most important parenting guidelines. When you can, add body motions and finger play (like waving your arms during "ba ba black sheep " or "twinkle twinkle little star.."). This helps your little baby connect with the sounds and relate to your actions. Songs also enhance your child's learning of rhythms, rhymes, and language patterns.

Talk to your little one and introduce family members

No, it's not too early! You should start teaching your little one about relationships from early childhood days. Make your baby understand who is father, grandfather, grandmother, and other important family members. This not only helps the baby to know the family members but also makes the connections strong from the early days.

Bedtime stories

Many parents include a bedtime story as part of the end-of-day routine, which is a great way to boost baby's brain development. You can use picture books and character books to teach your baby the small little things. When the baby falls asleep at night the stories get embedded in the brain and thus you help in your child's mental growth.

Mealtime

This is one of the most important times for the baby. And as a parent, you should make the most out of it. Feeding your child is necessary but after a point of time (after a particular age) make sure you allow the child to have the food all by himself. You can also use your baby's mealtime to teach some interesting concepts, like different types of textures, the difference between hot and cold.

Play peek-a-boo

This game helps newborns develop object permanence, which means they will have an idea that an object exists even if they can't see it. The perfect age to start playing this game is when the baby is about 9 months old.