Hope this post isn’t disappointing to those Doman devotees out there who really did start the program from Day 1 and whose kids really are superb, but I’m so excited I have to post this.
DS2, aged 9 weeks has been moving on his cot top changer (same surface as a crawling track, just flatter) for a while now. This morning he was in his cot and after a while I heard his head bumping railings. When I looked, he had travelled the 70cm breadth of the cot! I put him back, he did it again! I have just spent the best part of an hour helping him move up and down the mattress. I’m just speeding his progress by putting my arm behind his feet so he can push off properly. This might be “cheating” but I’m just trying to compensate for the absence of a crawling track…
I looked in the book and Im exaggerating a bit about his superbness because he’s only just above average as “crawling in the prone position culminating in cross pattern crawling” is average at 2.5 months apparently but I’m soooo pleased because I didn’t start the program until he was about three weeks, then I didn’t do it religiously because I mainly spend time on DS1 while DS2 fits in or gets put away in his cot alot (on his tummy 24/7 - naughty naughty). Maybe being carried all day in a mei tai also helps…
I’m ashamed to say I was even a bit sceptical about the program despite the rave amazon reviews but Messrs Doman and Hagy, if you are reading this, I’m so sorry! And thank you so much!!
Wow, now I’m off to see where in my home I can fit a 12 foot balance beam… it might work if I take out the dining table and sofa. Or I’ll just use the line of bricks supporting the flowerbed outside.
Have a great day everyone,
That is very advanced and very physically superb! I let my son push off my hands too because I didn’t have a crawling track either at the suggestion of another member here. It worked well in our circumstance!
We just got the smallest one shaped like that one in the link. It’s stayed useful - we put it under my daughter’s gymnastics bar most recently (they like to launch off of it, haha).
No bumpers on a ramp like this, so of course it needs to be only used with extreme supervision when they are tiny! Also, you have to be a little extra careful with babes who have been allowed to figure out their limbs early - they can get into all kinds of trouble you don’t expect!! Mine was about 3 months old (same time we had started the ramp) when we left him for about two seconds to step into the next room - when we came back in, he was standing on the TV table clutching the edge of our flatscreen and couldn’t quite figure out what to do from there - it was terrifying!!
At about 2 months of age my son took about 40mins to cross from one side of the king bed to the other.
At 3 months he was able to stand holding onto the molding on the wall.
By about 5months he could crawl it in under a minute.
By 6 months he was pulling up and cruising.
By 7 months he took his first steps.
By 8 months he started to toddle.
By 9 months he was walking everywhere.
By 12 months he could run, walk backwards, walk up steps holding hands, pickup something off the floor by bending and keep walking (stoop and recover)
At 18 months he started walking/running a 1/2 mile each morning. He started to jump and tumble.
At 19 months he can walk his balance bike around.
At 20 months he can walk a ‘balance beam’ which is just a 2x4.
I never adhered strictly to the Doman program. But I did take ideas from it. My son spent a lot of time on his belly as an infant. He has never once spent a minute in an exersaucer, jumperoo or walker. He was never in a swing, and only in a bouncer for 15 mins a day when I introduced solids. And in the car seat only when he was in the car. Maybe 2hrs total a week. I did baby wear using a moby wrap. When he started to cruise I set up plastic totes around the house to create a cruising wall and he would use that to cruise around the house. I never held his hands when he started to walk either. I let him do it on his own.
My son at 7-8 months old when he started to ‘toddle’
I wish the same could be said of my son! I tried to do a lot of crawling with him when he was tiny, but he had bad reflux so it wasn’t easy with him being sick every time he was on his tummy! He was really stubborn about putting his hands and feet down, and from April to August, he ‘swam’ with arms and legs moving lots but off the floor! He was 10m before he even managed a commando crawl! I expected him to be slower, as he was 10w premature, but not that slow!
He was 18m before he got up to hands and knees and I am STILL trying to convince him to let go and walk! He is now capable, but won’t let go - the best we have managed was a whole rendition of incy-wincy spider, when he did the actions without really thinking about letting go!
At least he is getting lots of crawling - I know that cross-pattern crawling is good for brain development, and was worried he would skip that entirely as he had such an efficient commando crawl. Maybe he’ll walk by two… lol
Thanks for your responses
Yesterday I found him on his back in his cot. I wonder if he rolled or if DH turned him over… can’t be sure on that one.
Ella, The book is How to Teach your baby to be physically superb by Doman. It will be on Amazon or ebay. There are plenty of tips in this thread though. I would also add pram to Korrale’s list of things not to use, as far as possible.
Korrale, I’m really pleased for you. I watched the video and it’s amazing. Thank you so much for sharing. I hope we can progress as fast you, especially because my mum is terminally ill and I like to have something new to tell her because she won’t be around to see in the long term.
Don’t know if you saw my other threads but DS1 had a big op when he was born and now has a physical and speech delay so I was keen to do soemthing to encourage DS2 if circumstances allowed.
MummyRoo, sometimes we do our best but circumstances just don’t allow for the progress we hope. I found this site because I was looking for early learning materials for DS1. My friends thought I was mad but I bought LR anyway. Turns out the reason he wouldn’t look at books was that he had a problem with his eyesight so he would have had no educational input otherwise. I like to think we are on this forum for a reason and it’s not always to turn out the best, fastest, cleverest child but to help in the ways we can. PS DS1 walked at 21 months, then fell a lot less than the earlier walkers
Thanks for this post. It has really inspired me to try this with my 4 week son. I haven’t read Doman’s book and I have to admit I feel a bit too tired to face any book right now! Can anyone offer any tips or summarise the program for very young babies?
Thanks!
Basically, you just make a ramp with sides - you start with an incline (so they are going downhill) and get flatter and flatter as the baby progresses. The book also talks about doing this with bigger kids, but I didn’t do that so I don’t remember that part well!
Here’s a youtube vid with a newborn wiggling down the track - I think she has more videos too. http://youtu.be/D92j4Xco68A
The track we made was much shorter, about the same width, padded about the same amount it looks like, and we just used a sheet instead of the nice faux leather in the video (which is what the book recommends, but ours worked fine).
That’s awesome. I didn’t know anything about Doman with my girls growing up. But always knew the importance of ‘tummy time’ . Sadly it took a long time for my girls to stay on their tummy. Tummy time was torture time for me. They would just scream and cry and it wasn’t any fun for them at all. I ended up being the mom that put their child in a walker , in a swing, just because no matter what I did for tummy time (putting toys out to encourage them, pictures etc.) They would just scream and cry, and cry , and cry and cry. Even letting them do tummy time on the bed (thinking maybe the floor was to hard) they wouldn’t have any of it. I see the videos of the babies crawling and on their bellies. Those just weren’t my girls.
My baby refused to spend anytime on his tummy. He hated it! I was worried about his development when he was 9 months and not crawling. I started to feel guilty because I had read but not followed “How to Teach your Baby to be Physically Superb.” But, he took his first steps at 9 months and one week. About the same time he learned to scoot on his butt and then crawl. Now I try to encourage him to crawl and walk as much as possible. We go outside for walks everyday. He often just stands there contemplating a leaf in his hand. But, we both enjoy it.
The main idea of the book is give your baby lots of opportunity for development. A lot of the suggestions are a impractical: building a crawling track, monkey bars in your house…for me anyway. So we just try to have lots of development opportunities which are also quality moments we spend together. The quality time together is more important than anything.
I have heard a lot of people say their babies don’t like tummy time, like Tracy reports, however the book does say that they will cry on their tummies, but it’s because they are trying to take in more oxygen to make the physical effort. It’s true that DS2 is a bit noisy with it. He is still improving though. I think he rolled over at 10 weeks, back to front and front to back. He definitely rolled over yesterday (12 weeks) and I know it because my friend was here and she commented. Previously I had thought I was imagining it!
Book also recommends stimulating the balance area of the brain, playing aeroplanes etc.
Does anyone have suggestions of a cheap infant crawling track alternative I could buy? I saw mentions of a cot top changer–I don’t know what that is, but it looks like a crib top (right?), and we aren’t using a crib–and a skate ramp that still looked quite pricey. Any other ideas?
It was me who mentioned the “cot-top changer” It is a kind of hard mat that fits across the top of a crib for changing the baby. The reason I used it was because it has foam and then plastic stuff, like Doman suggests, although it isn’t tunnel shaped. Maybe you could buy one and put it on the floor. Can’t remember how much they are, sorry…
I Googled the cot top, and I pretty much only found a Cariboo brand one that sells for $169-$300! I then checked eBay and saw an item from the UK, but its shipping cost is prohibitive:
