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How Music Play Develops Cognitive Skills
The cognitive case for music with young children sits in an unusual spot — both real and routinely overstated. The research from Nina Kraus's Brainvol...
8 min read
Articles on Baby Health and Development
Expert guides, tips, and insights to help you and your family live healthier lives. From preventative care to wellness strategies, find everything you need to make informed health decisions.
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Music and Rhythm Activities for Young Children
A toddler dancing in the kitchen with no self-consciousness is, on a typical Tuesday afternoon, having one of the better developmental moments of thei...
9 min read
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Music Games for Babies Under One
A 3-month-old will turn toward a singing voice across a quiet room within seconds. The same baby, on a recording of the same song, will give a noticea...
8 min read
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Music Classes for Babies and Young Children
The baby music class industry has grown substantially in the last twenty years, with brands like Music Together (international), Caterpillar Music, Bo...
8 min read
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Using Movement to Release Tension
The 4-year-old running laps of the kitchen at 5pm on a wet Tuesday is not being annoying. They are doing roughly the right thing for their body. After...
9 min read
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Using Movement to Release Tension in Young Children
The toddler who is melting down at 5pm in the kitchen does not need a calm conversation about big feelings. They need to move. Verbal regulation is a...
8 min read
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Movement Games Set to Music for Babies
A grandparent bouncing a baby on her knee while singing *Horsey Horsey* is doing something cross-culturally universal — variants of bouncing songs exi...
8 min read
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When Messy Play Is Not Suitable
A friend's 2-year-old took one look at the playdough on the table, started crying, and asked to leave. Her mother apologised — "she's just not into me...
7 min read
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Messy Play: Benefits and Boundaries
Most parents have already done the cost-benefit calculation on messy play and concluded that the floor cleanup isn't worth it. That conclusion is, in...
8 min read
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Messy Play Ideas for Home
A 2-year-old has their hands buried in cooked spaghetti for forty minutes, completely absorbed. Five hundred pounds of toys could not buy that level o...
9 min read
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Magnetic Building Games for Toddlers
Magnetic tiles arrived in the toddler toy market about fifteen years ago and have since taken over a noticeable slice of every preschool and family-ro...
8 min read
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Matching Games for Toddlers
The thing a 20-month-old does when they put both socks in the same drawer — looking back and forth, deliberating, deciding "yes, those go together" —...
7 min read
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Toy Books and Lift-the-Flap Books
*Where's Spot?* sells around 60,000 copies a year in the UK alone, four decades after publication. The reason isn't nostalgia; it's that an 11-month-o...
7 min read
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How to Play Together When Time Is Limited
A working parent who reads to their 3-year-old for ten focused minutes, phone in another room, eye-level on the rug, is doing more developmental good...
8 min read
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The Lifelong Value of a Play-Rich Childhood
The case for early-childhood play used to rest on tradition and intuition. Over the past 20 years, the evidence has caught up — long-running cohort st...
8 min read
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Interactive Reading for Toddlers
A 2-year-old being read *The Very Hungry Caterpillar* will, given the chance, have plenty to say about it. Most of us read straight through anyway, be...
7 min read
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Lacing and Threading Activities for Toddlers
Threading a wooden bead onto a stiff lace is a properly demanding task for a 2-year-old. One hand has to hold the bead steady, the other has to drive...
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Indoor Climbing and Physical Play Spaces
Telling a toddler not to climb is like telling water not to flow downhill. The urge appears around the first birthday and runs until about age 6, and...
8 min read
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Independent Play: How Children Learn to Play Alone
A 3-year-old standing in the middle of a tidy playroom announcing "I have nothing to do" is, in that moment, doing something developmentally important...
7 min read
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How Imaginative Play Builds Language Skills
A 3-year-old turning a wooden block into a phone and saying "Hello, Granny, I'm at the shops" is doing something cognitively remarkable. They're holdi...
7 min read