Ecd 40 - Infants Observation

ECD 40

Infants Observation  

Changcan Li

        Babies, in spite of where they grow up, do the similar things. Each of the babies is looked after by their parents, plays with toys or not, and interacts with animals and their surroundings. Regardless of location, child-rearing practices and environment, the developmental process and behaviors are similar for all the children. In the movie of “Babies” I observed four babies. They are Ponijoa from Namibia, Baayarjargal from Mongolia, Mari from Tokyo, and Hattie from San Francisco. I noticed that many foreseeable, nurturing and sensory–enriching caregiving were shown in the movie. Each primary caregiver developed a strong emotional bond with each baby. The relationships with each baby brought about a sense of safety, comfort, soothing and pleasure as well.

        Documentation of Ponijoa. From the movie, I first noticed that mother of Ponijoa sat around with other mothers outside most of the day, breastfeeding Ponijoa. Rocking her baby and lying down with Ponijoa, the mother puts Ponijoa to sleep at night. Carrying and holding Ponijoa were also obviously seen in the movie. As Ponijoa grew up, her mother began to teach her words such as “mom or dada.” Besides these, the mother also encouraged Ponijoa to share her pleasure with her. As we can see in the movie, there were a lot of laughing and babbling together between the mother and her daughter, Ponijoa.

        The mother showed great interest in her daughter’s dancing. As Ponijoa started to dance, the mother clapped hands with a smile across her face. Each time Ponijoa smiled at the mother, the mother would smile back and imitated her baby. The mother was also very responsive to her daughter‘s voice and constantly made eye-contact with Ponijoa.  

        In addition to these, the mother also created a flexible environment for Ponijoa so Ponijoa can anticipate the daily flow of events. In the movie, Pionjoa spent outdoors and interacted with nature most of the time. Over there Ponijoa played with stones, sticks and running water. Sometimes Ponijoa ate bones found on the ground and sometimes ate food with her family. Walking around half naked, Ponijoa was occasionally left to her own devices to entertain herself. She was even cleaned with her mother’s saliva and red ochre paste. It was noticeable that smiles often stretched across Ponijoa’s face.

        Documentation of Baayarjargal. Each baby has its own traits. Bayar, the Mongolian baby, was actual cheerful and delighted no matter what he was doing, except when his aggressive older brother was constantly beating him in the face with a piece of cloth. Baayar started crying immediately, but he recovered rapidly. Smiles and bright eyes were often seen stretching across his face in the movie.

        The birth of Baayar was tough and medicalized, and Baayar was instantly wrapped and laid apart from his mother. The baby was put into his clear bassinet with the mother gazing at him indifferently and exhaustedly from her hospital bed. Bayar stayed swaddled until he could crawl. I did notice that the parents were trying to stimulate their son’s interest with some toys like shakers. However, most of the time I noticed the parents would then just leave him lying around, rather than carrying or holding him with them. Once Baayar could walk, the parents tied him to a table leg to keep him from wandering far.

        I did see Baayar’s mother, (it was often a tense scene) washing his face with breastmilk, whereas he screamed, being spanked constantly for tipping over a bucket of dirty water which he and his brother were playing with when he was around 8 months old.

        It was a moving spectacle: when I saw Bayar and his mother interacted with each other on the bed. It is about 20 second clips. The mother was talking softly to her son and Bayar also attentively looked at his mother.

         However, Baayar was very active with himself and his surroundings, discovering his body parts such as toes, looking at the sky, or some goats, allowed him to develop a relationship with the world. In the movie, I noticed that most of the time Baayar wandered around the yard at will, playing with the goats and exploring on his own.

        Documentation of Mari. Mother of Mari often intentionally sought out other mothers and groups to belong to. Mari was taken out to the park and they had a picnic with other moms over there. Besides these, Mari was also breastfed and worn a lot, which was attractive. And she co-slept in a great big fluffy bed. I observed that Mari slept very peacefully with a smile across her face. In addition to these, mother brought Mari to the toy store and she was given lots of sensory toys to play with.  Moreover, Mari was taken to "mommy and me" type classes as well. Mari showed independence by being able to entertain herself with toys and her father's work equipment such as CD box.