How we use Evidence-based thinking
For babies, every moment is an opportunity to learn and grow and that doesn’t stop in the hospital. We include important items in each of our Baby Boxes that support a baby’s learning and growth by offering items specific to a baby’s developmental stage.
How were these items chosen?
With the help of early learning and health care specialists, we chose items that not only support a child’s growth and development but are also brands we can stand behind.
Items in our boxes teach children:
Language & communication: The ability to understand and communicate both verbally and nonverbally.
Gross motor: The movement of large muscles in the arms, legs, and whole body.
Fine motor: The movement of small muscles in the fingers and hands.
Sensory development: Sense of touch, smell, sight, hearing, and taste.
Social & emotional skills: Ability to understand, experience, express, and manage their own emotions and those of other people. Ability to develop quality relationships.
Brain development: The building of brain architecture, namely the synapses or connections in the brain.
Executive functioning: The mental processes that enable us to plan, focus attention, remember instructions, and juggle multiple tasks successfully. Dr. Daniel Siegel describes it as our ability to be flexible, adaptable, coherent, energized, and stable.
Children learn through play, active exploration, and through their relationships with other human beings.
Developmental Spotlight
To offer a better explanation of the thought and care that went into each item in a Baby Box, here is one of our favorite items and it’s developmental opportunities:
Books:
When picking out books for infants we considered everything from sensory to language to motor development.
Infants learn best from books that…
Are simple with clear language and bold images
High contrast images and patterns or black & white illustrations
Baby faces! Seeing babies making different faces and expressing emotions teaches important social and emotional skills.
Large simple pictures of familiar objects. Seeing and hearing about familiar objects helps to build that brain architecture and learn even basic skills such as pattern recognition and vocabulary.
Rhyming text. Rhyming text is important for building vocabulary and teaching components of speech such as articulation, voice pitch, and volume. Not to mention it builds important brain skills such as working memory and sequencing. For added benefit add some fingerplays to rhyming books, such as The Itsy Bitsy Spider.
Offer sensory engagement. Touch & feel books or Indestructibles (that they can literally put in their mouth) build those sensory skills and brain connections. These books can also offer emotional regulation skills. Sensory supports (putting things in mouth, soft materials) literally help the brain calm down and wire those neurons so it is easier for babies to self-soothe.
