Step-by-step development of your 11-month old baby

Your baby is more mobile now and her skills at picking up objects are refining, she/he is always carrying out little experiments, even if they appear to be rather unsystematic.

This is a crucial stage for your baby’s development in all areas. Her memory is developing and she will understand more words, even if she can’t say them properly. She’ll continue to babble and will recognize particular toys -- and pass one to you if you ask for it.

Physical development:

This is a month of exploration as your baby becomes more confident in her mobility. With enhanced motor skills, your baby can probably go across the room and empty out your bag before you realise!

Exploring surroundings and objects with her hands may take a back seat if she masters cruising this month-she’ll need both hands to hold on.

Young explorer:

Your baby uses her mobility to find out about and map out her environment. In a new place, she may constantly crawl to and from you so as to explore, and creates a mental picture or map of the layout. This is called ‘mapping.’

In this way your baby’s mind gradually constructs a spatial map of the relative positions of objects and people, but always with you as the focal point, She will glance back continuously to check if you’re still present in the same place.

Standing to walking:

 Your baby is still practicing taking her entire weight on her hips, knees and feet, and you may see her standing alone for increasingly longer periods, feet wide apart for balance. At this stage, standing may well be an activity in its own right-but walking is not too far off.

She may also enjoy being walked along with you holding both her hands. Some babies may take a step or two at 11 months -- others not for some time to come.

The joys of cruising:

 As she becomes more stable on her own two feet, your baby may try cruising -- walking sideways holding on to furniture for support. Child psychologists have discovered that there are different stages of cruising. A ‘new’ cruiser uses both hands to hold on and keeps her boy close to her support. Later, she will stand a bit further back, uses one hand and then let go.

Playing games:

Now that your baby is refining her hand skills, she may enjoy playing games that involve practice at letting go, such as filling and emptying a basket or rolling a ball. She may also still throw toys from her pushchair or highchair and ask for them to be retrieved so she can throw them again. Your baby also learns to combine physical and mental skills as she becomes ready for hand-clapping games.

Mental development:

 Your baby is developing long term thought skills to do with memory, which means she understands many words, and increasingly enjoys familiar activities such as reading books.

Growing speech sounds:

As your baby widens her range of speech sounds, she may also start to echo the last words that were spoken to her, which gives her practice at talking. She may babble away in her own special ‘language’ which sounds like parody of real speech, with exclamations, questions sounds and repetitions.

Responding well:

Your baby may demonstrate her growing understanding as he responds to simple questions such as ‘Where’s James?” by looking or pointing -- this is a development of the body language building up to speech. Your baby may also hold an object out to you if you ask or reach for it.

As always, her understanding of language is ahead of her speech -- your baby may now know up to 40 words but she will be unable to actually say them.

Baby experiments:

With a good understanding of basic concepts, such as in and out, and here and there, your baby may practice and test out this knowledge as she plays at filling and emptying buckets or containers, and rummaging through and fiddling with everything.

Play like this, with objects and substances — messy as it can often be — will help your baby expand and refine concepts such as cause and effect, and sorting different things into categories. Exploration of this kind is vital to your baby learning such concepts as over and under, in-front and behind, up and down, big and small, and in and out.

Problem-solving skills:

With her more developed mental skills, your baby may start applying her mind to solving specific problems such as lifting objects together or trying to retrieve a toy which has fallen out of her reach.