How does a baby's vision develop?
We have brought you some interesting facts about the development of vision in infants aged 0-24 months. Many parents are interested in what their child sees in the world at birth, and when they are able to consciously recognize them. The maturation of vision is closely related to motor development, motor coordination, balance, spatial orientation, and indirectly to communication, socialization, and even hearing. Therefore, its development can only be well presented together with these areas.
A newborn's vision is very immature.
In its mother's womb, its visual system receives very little stimulation, although it does not live in complete darkness. At birth, it can mainly perceive contrasting objects . These can be black and white, dark blue and white, or the play of light and shadow, the main thing is that the dark and light shades are nicely and clearly separated from each other.
As your baby's vision develops, they become more and more interested in their surroundings, so it's important to provide them with the right stimuli . Their vision is still blurry, but they can follow objects with their eyes. Their eyes are not yet coordinated, so they can sometimes be seen to be almost crossed. This will even out as their nervous system develops.
Nature has come up with a beautiful solution, as during this period, the baby can see clearly at the same distance as the distance between the mother and the baby during breastfeeding. This is approximately 30 cm.
Source: Teddy Bear Clinic
The era of "palmistry" has arrived
Between 2 and 4 months of age, your baby follows objects by moving his head. Contrasting objects are still in the foreground for him, but he can see more clearly and change focus more quickly. Parallel eye movements develop by 4 months of age. He spends a lot of time watching the movements of his hands and fingers .
He is getting better at recognizing faces
He observes the lines of faces, the contours, the small and large details. His vision is around 30% of the fully developed state. The eyes and brain are now well coordinated, and spatial vision is developing . This will be important for the baby for movement, and for all areas of his life.
It is worth paying attention to your child's vision at the age of 4 months. At this age, the sharpness of the image seen is very important because if he can see the image blurry, his brain will not use this image. If it stays like this, it will not be possible to correct it later, not even with glasses. This condition is called amblyopia . Therefore, it is good to attend an eye examination and correct the problem in time.
As we reach 5 months of age, our child already recognizes our faces . He follows us with his eyes. He also watches his toys in the same way, persistently, but he also wants to hold them, put them in his mouth, and feel them. His mouth-hand coordination is becoming more and more skillful. He also focuses on nearby points, which can lead to him collecting all the seaweed from the carpet. That's why it's good to be careful, because he likes to pinch small things with his fingers and put them in his mouth!
Source: Dr. Csilla Serfőző, ophthalmologist , Early Childhood Program
We have reached the half-year mark!
As a result of another huge development, the baby can now see his environment, people, objects, and small details quite well. If he holds an object that is structured in his hands, he will study it with pleasure. He will put his fingers into the holes, put his mouth to feel the bumps.
Distances and depths are starting to become visible to him . But they are just starting, so we have to be very careful, because he does not yet perceive depth properly, so he can easily roll over from the bed. As he perceives distances, he will become more and more attentive to things in the apartment, and he will try to reach them. We do well and help him in his development if we place toys around him at a distance of 1-1.5 meters that he will be able to notice. But not only toys are suitable, we can also choose safe kitchen utensils. Often, babies are more attracted to these objects than their own toys.
After 9 months of age, the basic functions of vision are already developed.
Spatial vision is constantly being refined, so it is increasingly able to perceive objects, their location in relation to each other, and to separate them from each other. The combination of movement and vision plays a very important role here, as it senses depths and distances, and adapts its movements to them in order to be as efficient and skillful as possible.
He is already interested in books , he recognizes shapes seen on a plane, and can even connect them with what he sees in space.
He has loved training his vision since he was one year old.
He loves any movement that allows him to perceive approaching, receding, light and darkness, and he even likes to look upside down. He can now see distant objects very well.
Looking at books is still his favorite pastime. He watches the characters and really enjoys turning the pages. Choose baby books in which the characters are easily recognizable, are not distorted, and the book itself should not be abstract.
Vision can also show differences at this age, for example, it can deteriorate. It is also possible that certain functions do not develop at the right pace during development. If your baby stumbles a lot, bumps into objects, then show him to an ophthalmologist .
Around the age of one and a half, he notices more and more small details
While looking through a book, he points out small but familiar things that have caught his attention. In fact, he looks for these special parts directly. For example, he may recognize the flower in the little girl's hand or the butterfly hiding in the background.
Interestingly, he still needs both eyes to maintain balance. This means that if one is covered, the child will lose balance and fall over, even in a sitting position.
Instead of television, let's show it to him! This shared pastime has countless advantages. It is a truly intimate and friendly form of reading stories , while we can also incorporate interactive elements through our communication. After all, the characters all have different personalities, so their voices must be shaped accordingly. In fact, we are playing a role-playing game and teaching the child, who will later be very happy to play it on his own.
Source: Children's Media, Nikoletta Szekeres ,Early Childhood Program
From one and a half months old, he places objects on top of each other.
He starts building. He already has a great sense of space and fine distances. That's why he can stack the individual elements on top of each other accurately. This also requires hand movement: he can release the objects more carefully. At first, he tries only two games, and then this leads to building with blocks. He can already see colors clearly and choose from them.
Let him be outdoors as much as possible ! The natural environment provides him with a lot to explore and further refine his senses. There is a lot of space here, there are distances, lights, shadows, sounds.
Drawing is a tool for children to leave their mark. They start creating slowly, initially scribbling with large movements, and enjoy what they have created. Large movements remain for a long time, and small details are not usually forced too much, even in kindergarten. Since even the little ones are proud of their own creations, put them on the refrigerator or stick them somewhere so that they can always show everyone that they made them.
Source:Early Childhood Program
