The list:
- Give your baby a physically healthy start before he is born.
- Have meaningful conversations.
- Play games that involve the hands (patty-cake, peekaboo, this little piggy).
- Be attentive.
- Foster an early passion for books.
- Use diaper time to build your baby's emotional feelings of having a "lovable body."
- Choose developmentally appropriate toys that allow babies to explore and interact.
- Respond promptly when your baby cries.
- Build trust by being attentive and focused.
- Use body massage to decrease your infant's stress and enhance her feelings of well-being and emotional security.
- Enlist help from your toddler at clean-up times -- a good way to practice categorization.
- Set up a safe environment for your crawling baby or toddler.
- Sing songs such as "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and "Ring-Around-the-Rosy."
- Match your tempo to your child's temperament.
- Make meals and rest times positive.
- Provide clear responses to your baby's actions.
- Use positive discipline.
- Model empathic feelings for others.
- Arrange supervised play with messy materials, such as water, sand, and even mud.
- Express joy and interest in your baby.
For more details read Alice Sterling Honig's full article
