Hearing is one of the earliest senses awaken even before birth. Therefore, any practice of fetal/prenatal education, such as reading to the fetus or playing music to it, is actually not a waste of time (see Fetal education in 4th month). This practice continued after birth.
When DD first came to this world, her version was still quite blurry. While she couldn’t identify an object farther than 8 to 15 inches away, her hearing was already well developed. So her baby training during the first two months focused on listing to music and talking, which I believe, would help stimulating her brain development and lead to physical accomplishments.
The music I played for her was the soothing and light music which I listened during my pregnancy. Sometimes I rocked her gently along with the music. I told her mommy listened to this music quite often and asked her whether she could remember hearing it when she was in my womb. Although she couldn’t give me an answer, she did seem calmer when the music was on.
Talking was another major stimulation. Since she couldn’t see well yet, the content of our conversion runs randomly from weather, the coming thanksgiving, flattering, game playing, to self-made lullaby (see Baby talk).
These are the principles I follow when I talk to DD:
1. Don’t treat the baby as a bundle of organs who only knows the basic needs like eating, drinking, peeing and pooping. Regard her as a baby human being, who also has senses, feelings, personality, likes and dislikes. Respect her soul, respond to her needs and comfort her feelings.
2. It is fine to occasionally imitate her cooing and uttering back. But most of time it is better to talk meaningfully to her. The wording can be simple, and repetition is fine. But be sure to talk to her with complete sentences, correct and more adult language and things that make sense.
3. Last but not the least, have fun! Don’t feel intimated about baby talking. It should be a fun thing to do.
This is only the first step of hearing education. The next step is to combine visual and audio together, once her version is mature, to improve the efficiency of baby training.
Related posts:
Pre- and perinatal education
Parents: child’s life-time teachers
Healthy eating for baby
Baby training: month 3
Baby Training, First Year, From Lina | Lina | 
September 30, 2008 10:44 am | 
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