7 Simple Ways To Encourage Your Baby To Crawl

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Crawling is one of the major baby movement milestones parents look forward to as they anticipate baby’s first steps. While most babies start crawling between 6 – 9 months, some opt for bottom-shuffling or skip crawling altogether and progress to pulling up, standing and walking.

To prevent delay and get your baby to attain this milestone as soon as possible, find 7 simple things you should do…

1. Place baby on their tummy frequently from the first few days of life. Though babies may resist this initially, keep trying it consistently to make them get used to it soon enough. Research shows that the amount of time babies spend playing on their tummies significantly influences speedy acquisition of motor skills including rolling, belly crawling, crawling on hands and knees, and sitting up.

Playing on their tummies helps them develop muscle strength in their shoulders, arms, back and trunk. This aids learning to crawl faster.

2. Create lots of space for supervised exploration. Provide safe and hygienic play areas for baby to play and explore his environment. Avoid restricting baby’s movement by always placing him in walkers, bouncers, baby carriers, high chairs, car seats, and so on.

3. Encourage reaching out for items.While on the floor or bed, place items like their favourite toy or other items they seems interested in a little out of his reach to encourage shifting or pulling their weight forward to get them.

You can also place baby on his tummy on the floor and use items that roll, such as small balls and sensory bottles, as bait to get him to keep moving until he reaches them.

4. Place baby in front of a mirror. Seeing his reflection will get him quite fascinated. Make sure the mirror is at quite a distance from where you place him and watch him try to move towards it just to say ‘hello’ to that other baby or admire him from a closer distance.

5. Set obstacle courses. You’d be amazed how determined your little cutie can be and how willing he is to tests limits. These will help hone his motor skills significantly. Just make sure to create ones appropriate to your child’s ability and watch him closely.

6. Have baby crawl towards you. Hold something baby really wants at a little distance, get down on baby’s level and encourage him to crawl towards you to get it. Hand it over however if baby begins to cry and try again next time.

You can also try crawling towards daddy, a mirror or toy with baby. Babies love to imitate, so, your baby will likely be more eager to try out what you are doing. If baby has an older sibling, let him join in to make it more like a game and sustain baby’s interest.

7. Place your palms behind baby’s feet when on his hands and legs to stabilize him and offer something to ‘push off’ from. This is quite helpful when baby is just learning to crawl.

Meanwhile, avoid excessive use of baby walkers, baby seats and carriers as they limit ample floor exploration and may impede prompt muscle development.

While encouraging baby to crawl, go at baby’s pace and make learning fun. Putting too much pressure may cause fatigue and discourage the prompt results you want to see. When baby eventually learns to crawl, remember to take safety precautions by babyproofing your home.