8 Milestones and Development to Expect in Your 7-9 Month Old Baby
Babies grow and mature at their own speed. However, it might surprise you how swiftly your baby is picking up new and innovative skills. Infant development milestones of 7-9 month old babies comprise sitting, standing, and smiling.
As your baby turns more mobile and highly curious, infant development sees a boost. It might seem that your little one picks up and learns something new each day. Comprehend these subsequent milestones and what you can do to enhance your baby's maturity.
In this blog post, we will cover physical development, cognitive growth, speech and language development and such other advanced motor skills that act as signs of progress in 7-9 month old infants.
8 Milestones, Growth and Maturity Signs to Expect in Your 7-9 Month Old Baby
Let us explore the substantial growth and maturity milestones that can enable 7-9 months baby development phases.
1. Physical Development
By this age of 7-9 Months, most little ones can roll over in both directions during day time and in their sleep. Most babies can crawl, attempt at standing, and even improve sitting stability on their own, while others require a slight support.
You might notice your baby commencing to scoot, rock back and forth. Some children at this age can even pull themselves to different positions. Soon your baby might take some steps while using the edge of a sofa or table.
Tummy time assists in strengthening your little one’s neck, arms, back, and legs, and aids in gaining elasticity and muscle control. The motor skills and strength they build up will be required for rolling over and sitting, and then crawling, walking and ultimately cruising.
2. Cognitive Development
Cognitive development means how kids think and discover stuff. It includes knowledge development, assistance, challenge solving and temperaments, which assist a child to think about and comprehend the things around them. The growth of Brain cells is part of cognitive development.
With cognitive development in a 7-9 months baby, he or she will explore advancements in object permanence and understanding cause and effect. So, at this stage, they begin to explore their surroundings and nearby environment more actively.
3. Speech and Language Development
Babies interact by leveraging vocal sounds and gestures. In 7 to 9 months or around the first year, they go from babbling to imitating sounds, and consider learning simple words. They play with sounds, copy sounds and place different sounds together.
Children start comprehending and responding to words in the first year. The more stories you as parent read noticeably, the more words your child will hear and the healthier they will be able to respond and converse interactively later.
Hearing words assist to build a rich network of words which further enable speech and language development in a baby's brain. Children whose parents talk and read to them frequently know more words compared to kids who have not been read to and not explored the similar experience.
4. Feeding Milestones
Babies require to initiate having iron-rich solid food around 6 months of age. As your little one’s oral skills develop between 7 to 9 months, thicker and clumpier food items can be introduced.
However, some foods are likely to be choking hazards, so it is vital to feed your child foods that are of the correct texture for their development.
Introducing solids is also imperative for assisting babies learn to eat, offering them experience of new tastes and textures from a wide range of food items. Offering a variety of nutritious foods helps in supporting their growth and development swiftly.
Also Read: Activities To Boost Your Child's Brain Development
5. Sleep Patterns
By 6 months of age, the mainstream of infants is ready to get through the night completing 8 hours or so without any feed.
However, around 7 to 9 months, you may observe that your little one is ready to drop another of their naps, taking merely 2 or 3 hours. But they will possibly still sleep a total of 3 to 4 hours during the day time, as day time sleeping may come in bigger chunks.
Assist your baby knowing that it is night time by ensuring lights stay off. Build a bedtime routine in the early stages. This can assist to send your baby the message that it is time for rest.
Reassure that your baby eats regularly during the day time and particularly in the hours leading up to bed time. While growth flows, it will be much simpler and less challenging for you if they bunch feed during the day time and not at night time, resolving night sleep issues.
6. Social and Emotional Development
Through early relationships with responsive adults, children learn how to be in relationships, how to get their desires met, and how to find and handle emotions. Social and emotional development both comprise behaviors that showcase a child's emotional progress and their capability to navigate their space through communication with their peers.
As these skills are built together, this aspect of development is dealt with as social-emotional development. Social-emotional milestones focus on kid’s developing capacities to control their attention, emotions, and behavior, and to build relationships with people in the surroundings
It is vital to highlight that within this area of social and emotional development, infants are crafting a robust sense of self and creating relationships at the same time.
The following strategies can assist you care for infants who are experiencing social and emotional encounters along with going through separation anxieties.
- Observe the child’s responses to environmental stimuli. Think about approaches to restrict the noise level and visual stimuli.
- View and ask yourself if you observe frustration in the infant while specific routines of the day. Consider conducts to amend the routine to back the child.
- Think about behaviors to sustain physical closeness and provide a calm touch to assist infants uphold a sense of control.
7. Motor Skills Development
One of the advancements in fine motor skills includes pincer grasp. The pincer grasp is the synchronization of the index finger and thumb to hold a product. Each time you grip an object, you are leveraging the pincer grasp. For a baby this is a significant milestone in enhancing motor skill development.
In general, the role of childcare in crafting a safe and stimulating environment is critical and significant for a child's overall development.
8. Teething and Oral Development
Although timing varies extensively, children often start teething by 7 to 9 months of age. The two bottom front teeth are the first to seem, trailed by the two top front teeth.
Typical signs of teething comprise excessive drooling, chewing on objects, irritability, or tender gums.
If your teething baby seems rough, consider the tips to rub your baby's gums, apply a cold spoon on the baby's gums or try an over-the-counter medication. Maintaining oral hygiene and introducing toothbrushing routines enable Oral Development
Do Not be Uneasy if your Baby Cannot Meet All Milestones at a Time
You do not have to be nervous if your child cannot meet every milestone at a time wherein other babies might attain them.
As an instance, your child might initiate crawling when he or she is eight months old, but your cousin's son could do it when he was seven months old. Even for experienced parents, the physical development of the two children is diverse.
Taking another instance, the first baby initiated teething when he or she was seven months old, whereas the other baby did it when he was nine months old.
Hence, do not be worried if your kid cannot meet all growth milestones at a time. They will get there in due course. Some children pick up to respond when they hear any sound but they do not crawl effortlessly.
It means they can do certain activities faster but maybe not all at the same pace of their growth. It would be great if you make some records about your baby’s development and note down their skill sets. You can leverage mobile apps, online diary or note it in a Journal.
Many mothers maintain a book and they even stick their babies’ pictures to it. That would be stirring to share with your toddler once they grow up.
Here is a 7-9 month baby development checklist and series of growth milestones
Key Takeaways
The older your kid, the more skills he or she may have. If your child is not able to do some of these things, do not be anxious too much. It does not mean a problematic situation. They will reach the phase and attain required milestones in the ideal time, soon.
We at R for Rabbit, advise parents to embrace and support their baby's growth and development during this exciting phase. Check R for Rabbit's learning toys and baby gears, that will help your baby grow and keep the baby comfortable and contented.
Also Read: How Stacking Toys Help To Develop Various Skills
