WHY SHOULD BABIES CRAWL BEFORE THEY WALK?

If walking is the end game, why should my baby crawl first? There are many benefits of crawling! If this developmental stage is skipped it may have consequences like missing out on the multitude of foundational skills crawling provides. Crawling helps promote positive motor, sensory & neurological development. From eyes to hands, and the ever-important core, crawling it truly baby’s first total body workout.

EIGHT BIG BENEFITS of CRAWLING:

1.     Upper Body & Hand Strength: crawling builds muscles in the chest, shoulder girdle, arms, and arches of the hands which are the foundation of pulling/pushing, grasping and future handwriting skills.

2.     Core & Hip Stability: crawling requires strength and endurance of the trunk and hip muscles needed for future climbing and balance.

3.     Neck Length for Jaw Strength: crawling prompted lengthening and strengthening of the neck and jaw, which are the precursors to spoken language development.

4.     Coordination & Body Awareness: crawling requires reciprocal movement and communication between the right and left side brain, this coordination between the right arm and left leg builds body awareness and skills the lay the groundwork for higher motor skills such as walking, running, and balance-vestibular based motor activities like skipping.

5.     Vision Development: crawling improves eye teaming, depth perception and early eye hand coordination. As baby moves through space to explore, they are learning near & far, over & under, above & below though kinesthetic awareness.

6.     Sensory-Motor Maturity & Development: crawling exposes babies to different textures, surfaces, and visuals to explore and appreciate, which helps integrate the sensory & motor systems, decreasing aversions while increasing understanding.

3 TIPS to PROMOTE CRAWLING:

1.     Start with Supervised Waking Tummy Time: Tummy time is the foundation for crawling and crawling builds the foundation for walking. Learn MORE about tummy time here!

2.     Place It Out of Reach: Move favorite toys, pets, people and snacks out of reach to encourage baby to move. Sometimes we have the habit of making things easier for babies in an effort to keep them happy, but babies quickly grow board of things they see all the time. Keep it interesting, change things up and move things around to promote crawling.

3.     Make it Fun: Over, under, around & through. Use pillows, tunnels, and siblings to encourage obstacle course style exploration. The longer babies crawl the more diversity of movement they incorporate and the more muscles they activate.

Let’s end by clarifying 2 myths and misconceptions I hear about crawling.

Myth #1: Baby’s Who Walk Early Are More Advanced.

• Fact: Not always. Some babies are truly advanced motor babies; however, these babies rarely skip the crawling stage. They just hit every motor step faster and harder. Sometimes parents encourage early standing and walking before babies are ready because their little ones “really like standing”. However, promoting early standing before crawling does not promote future motor development. Instead, it is often a sign a baby has too much extension or stiffness in their movement. These early walkers skip motor steps, like crawling, because they lack the muscle balance and trunk rotation required for more skilled movement. This skip may impact future quality of movement, balance reactions and higher motor skill.

Myth #2: All Babies Will Naturally Crawl Before They Walk.

• Fact: Not always. Many babies crawl without help, however unfortunately when babies spend less time on their tummies, they are more likely to skip traditional crawling because their muscles are weaker, and crawling becomes much harder.

Crawling provides foundational skills in a multitude of systems from motor, to sensory, visual and neurological. Crawling is easy to promote and an early talent not to be missed. But, more importantly keep it fun & cherish this stage in development as it will soon be replaced with the next.

LUCK, LOVE & LIGHT Rachel

NEWER RESEARCH

Carson V, Zhang Z, Predy M, Pritchard L, Hesketh KD. Longitudinal associations between infant movement behaviours and development. Int J Behav Nutr Phys Act. 2022 Jan 28;19(1):10. doi: 10.1186/s12966-022-01248-6. PMID: 35090492; PMCID: PMC8800227.

Yamamoto S, Yonghi L, Matsumura U, Tsurusaki T. Diversity and regularity in infant crawling with typical development. J Phys Ther Sci. 2020;32(8):483-488. doi: 10.1589/jpts.32.483. Epub 2020 Aug 8. PMID: 32884166; PMCID: PMC7443550.