From the third month on, the baby begins to discover his hands and use them to try to take the objects at his disposal. Start using all your fingers and you can only grab objects according to your hand size, but it will be approximately from the eighth or ninth month when you start using grip in the form of a clamp or digital clamp picking up smaller objects between the thumb and index finger.
Gradually you will perfect this more mature way of grabbing the objects until you do it with increasing precision. Now you can grab and at the same time squeeze your fingers to hold the objects.
That the child learns to take things with two fingers instead of with the whole hand as he did before may seem insignificant, but in reality a fundamental advance in the psychomotor development of the child.
It is not only important from the point of view of manual dexterity. From this small great achievement in his fine motor skills, a world of possibilities to explore that positively influences his learning opens before the little one.
The evolution of the grip on the baby
Approximately in the twentieth week of gestation the baby can already close the fingers of the hand inside the womb.
From that moment on, the reflex reflex arises, which remains during the first months of extrauterine life. When we place our finger on the baby's hand he takes it and squeeze hard. It is an instinctive act, believed to be inherited from our ancestors as a defense measure in case of danger.
By the third month the child begins to open the little hands, take them to his mouth, try to take things, but it is only around five months when he manages to calculate the distances better and manages to take the objects with his whole hand.
Later he is able to change the objects from one hand to another and take things with both hands using the thumb in opposition to the four fingers.
As coordination and dexterity improve, the baby perfects the grip technique until he is able to catch smaller and smaller things through the opposition of the thumb and the index in the form of a clamp.
He is able to catch a marble, a small piece and even a crumb. At this stage we must have a thousand eyes to control that no small objects are introduced into the mouth, ear or nose.
The funny thing is that the baby has learned to catch, but still does not understand the concept of releasing. The relationship of loosening the pressure of the thumb and index finger to release the object is not clear. You can only do it around ten or eleven months of age. To help you, we can place the palm of the hand under that object so that when it meets a flat surface you can relax your fingers by releasing the toy (or whatever).
Once you have learned the concept, prepare yourself, as you will start throwing things to practice your new skill.
By twelve or fifteen months, the child reaches a refined grip with the fingertips of the index and thumb fingers with better mastery of the manipulation adapting to the weight and size of the object.
How to stimulate gripper grip
A good way to stimulate the grip of the clamp is to place pieces of soft food that the baby can take to put in the mouth such as pieces of boiled potato or banana (do not stop controlling it in case it could choke).
It is a practice that will help you improve the grip technique while stimulating the baby's experimentation with food, which is very enriching from the nutritional point of view. If you are interested, you can expand the information on this modality in Supplementary feeding: "Baby-led Weaning".
It is curious that this new way of grabbing the objects coincides in the stage of development in which the baby is able to eat by taking the food to his mouth by himself.
Another way to stimulate the use of your fingers independently is through play. You can play “this bought a little egg” by taking the baby's fingers from each hand one by one.
Also taking papers from a table and later, pressing buttons, pointing, playing with modeling clay, pressing soft balls.
A fundamental step in its development
He gripper grip marks a milestone in the child's psychomotor development. After he begins to take objects in a more precise way, a world opens up before him for possibilities to discover, explore, touch.
An exploration of more complicated objects and forms will begin. It will begin to introduce the fingers in holes, it will take the spoon to take it to the mouth, it will introduce cubes or toys in a hole, it will take a rope to drag a toy… Actions that are related to the chain between cause and effect and with an increasingly complex and complete understanding of the world around him.
Photos | Bawdy Nan, ThrasherDave and madgerly on Flickr In Babies and more | The baby discovers his hands, Stimulate the hands of a baby, The reflection of grip and its evolution
