Baby Bumpkin ‘Dinosaur Yoga Activity’ - Look for ‘the Reach’ it’s the foundation for so many skills!

By Sue Heron - Training Co-ordinator at Tatty Bumpkin and Paediatric Physiotherapist. 

This week, Baby Bumpkins will be enjoying reaching and creeping on their tummies as baby ‘dinosaurs!’.

As we know tummy time is crucial for your baby, allowing them to: gain control over their body, strengthen key muscles, develop balance skills, refine their eye movements and generally feel good about themselves :-). 

In the natural course of development babies first gain control of their head, then their shoulders and finally they learn how to control their hips as they move to crawl and stand. This means very young babies, when placed on the floor on their tummy, often find this position pretty uncomfortable and scary - they cannot push their head up to look around as their neck, back and shoulder muscles are just too weak and uncoordinated.

Often a more comfortable 'tummy time' position for your new born baby is to gently place them on their tummy on your own chest as your lean back in a chair or sofa. In this position your baby can feel your heart beat and the warmth and softness of your body. 

A great position to move onto is to place your baby, on their tummy, over your outstretched thighs as you sit with your legs out in front of you on the floor.  In this position you baby can still feel the warmth and softness of your body. You may find it comfortable to lean up against a wall so your back is supported. This is Baby Bumpkin cat or dinosaur pose. 

Baby Bumpkin Cat or Dinosaur pose

If your baby is younger (1 - 2 months old), or has not yet gained good control of their head, you will have to support their head more on your thighs. 

However, soon you will notice your baby is able to control their head, neck and upper shoulder movements more as they strengthen their muscles and develop their balance skills. You will see your baby starting to lift their head further away from your thigh and you will feel them shift their weight backwards and push up from your thigh more through their chest.

At this stage you can challenge your baby further by bending up your leg which is under their shoulders and chest. Your baby will then be gently tipped upwards and backwards, this will encourage them to push up through their forearms to lift their head even higher – the next stage in body control! See picture below.  

Once your baby feels happier on their tummy they will benefit from having a firmer surface to push up from i.e. playing on a rug or mat on the floor. However it’s still enjoyable, and beneficial, to do cat or dinosaur pose with your baby. The pose allows you to actually feel the tiny changes in your baby’s patterns of movement, and this strengthens your ‘connection' with your baby as they travel down their development pathway, and, of course, your baby will love the close contact with you.

At around 4-6 months you may notice that your baby starts to wriggle side to side more as they lie over your thighs. This is a result of increasing strength in their shoulder, back, tummy and quadricep muscles and the further development of their balance skills. The side to side wriggle is exciting as it's the basis for many complex movements.

For example reaching skills.  If your baby is younger, e.g.  4 months, when you are playing with them on the floor with appropriate toys you may notice that when they turn their head to look at you, or a toy, this results in them leaning over to the side they are looking - a great start to learning the side to side wriggle -  but also possibly frustrating for your baby! This is because when your baby shifts their weight over to the side they are looking they naturally 'trap' their arm on that side, meaning they are unable to reach out for the toy they are looking at - aarh!

Younger baby - looking at a toy on slightly on their left side and, as a result, leaning over to their left . This means they cannot free their left arm to reach out! 

However, practice makes perfect! Keep giving your baby loads of chances to play on the floor on their tummy with their toys and you, Then, at around 5 – 6 months, they will learn the most amazing skill which will have a huge impact on their development.

Your baby will learn to shift their body weight away from the direction they are looking!

For example, now if your baby spies their favourite toy to one side - they will anticipate the consequences of turning their head to look at it and will automatically shift their weight to the other side. This small weight shift will allow your baby to ‘free’ the arm on the same side as the direction of their gaze enabling them to reach with that arm to get their toy – hooray!

Older baby looking at a toy slightly to their right. But now they have learnt to shift their body weight away from the direction they are looking i.e. onto their left side  - they can now reach forwards to get the toy with their right hand. 

This seemingly tiny reaching skill has huge benefits for your baby:

• Emotionally, being able to reach for objects, will boost their self-esteem – they can now get their toys all by themselves - f they are within reach.

• Physically reaching for objects and holding them in their hands with progress both your baby’s eye-hand coordination and their early grasp skills. 

• As your baby reaches and picks up their toy remember to give them plenty of smiles to show them how proud you are of them. Even whilst they are still perfecting their reaching skills – keep smiling and give loads of praise to encourage your baby to keep on trying!

Love Baby Bumpkin x