4 Things You Can Do To Improve Infant Brain Development

 1. Talk to your baby.

Language skills are vital to your baby's ability to learn and think. Obviously, these skills also have a significant impact on overall educational experience. Many studies have found that children who are good listeners are normally good readers. And children who are slow to speak are often slow to read.

But, only live language helps children develop these language skills. Stated differently, television will not develop the same skills. This is because babies relate what happens around them to the language they hear. In short, your baby learns faster and better if you talk directly to him/her.

A few everyday things you can do to make talking to your baby easier:

• Tell your baby what you are doing when performing ordinary household chores
• Use proper words to describe the objects around you, whether you're in the house or even taking your child shopping
• Use simple words and sentences and then gradually introduce more descriptive words

2. Often read to your baby.

Some scientists see reading as a more structured form of talking to your child. Obviously, since your baby learns faster and better by relating words to pictures, it is vital to use picture books or magazines when reading.

Here are a few useful guidelines:

• Point to the pictures, look at your child and describe what you see
• Also say and describe the words on everyday objects such as cereal boxes, stores and household equipment
• Describe the activities in your everyday routine, regardless of what you do

3. Playing with educational toys.

Educational toys are nowadays designed to encourage infant intellectual development through a range of ways. Activity centers, rattles, mobiles, textured and soft toys are all great for starting stimulation, learning and fun.

We suggest very specific toys to encourage and stimulate certain development areas.

A few guidelines for getting the most from educational toys:

• Describe the toy to your baby while you're holding it in front of him. Give to him to touch and further explore
• Choose toys with bright, bold colors for visual stimulation
• Choose toy types which are useful and can still be enjoyed even if part of it is lost
• Some of the best value for money toys you will ever buy is one which can be grown, added to or expanded... like wooden blocks or construction toys
• Give 3-5 toys at a time. Exchange them for others as soon as you notice he becomes bored

4. Listen to music.

  Music is another powerful way to stimulate and encourage hearing skills and other more subtle infant intellectual developments. Chimes, tunes and sounds are often included in baby toys for this very reason. Of course, you can also pick from your own music collection. But there are also many tapes and CD's on the market which encourage early learning. Or try out one of the traditional children's song tapes.  But there is one caveat though... do not play the music too loudly.