When children begin to hold the head and how can they help in this?

From the first moment of his life, the child is constantly evaluated from the point of view of neurological standards. This is the first focus of the look, and voice tracking, and much more. And among these parameters of parents most often worried about the question: "When do children begin to hold the head?" What is the value of this skill and how to help the child master it? Let's try to understand.

Skill and its meaning

So why is it necessary to know when a child should hold a head? Pediatricians and pediatric neurologists believe that this skill indicates that the muscles are gradually gaining the right tone, and the baby is already beginning to show curiosity using such sensory organs as hearing and sight. In addition, the moment when the baby starts to hold his head confidently, can tell doctors about his physiological and mental development. Therefore, it is very important to record both attempts to implement this skill and its successful final formation.

So, the stages in mastering this ability are traditionally considered the following:

• 3-4 weeks - the first attempts to raise your head on one level with the trunk;
• 6-8 weeks - confident raising of the head to one level with the trunk;
• 2-2.5 months - the child holds his head slightly above the shoulder line;
• 3 months - the baby confidently holds his head and even turns it from side to side.

It should be noted that the stages presented only partly shed light on how much the child holds the head on his own, give an average. This reservation is based on the fact that parents can independently spur this process.

Assistance in the formation of

The weakness of the muscles is the natural state of the crumbs after birth. But this provision should be a signal for parents that they need to help their baby gently develop them, including the neck muscles.

It is quite simple to do this, but, of course, subject to the regular following of the rules of physical development.

So, the first thing parents must do in order not to find out when the children begin to hold the head in three months is to put the child in the "lying on the stomach" position. Such procedures should not begin before the moment when the umbilical wound will fully heal. At the same time, the procedure starts from one minute and is brought to five. They should only be carried out when the child does not sleep.

The second is a daily light massage and exercises, prescribed and shown by the pediatrician, aimed at strengthening all the muscles of the body.

The third is control over the position of the baby during sleep. In this case, parents distribute the load on different muscle groups, which gently stimulates their development.

These three activities will help parents to see the correct development of their baby and not to wonder about when children begin to hold the head.

Crashes in graphics

Despite the fact that the above stages are recognized by pediatricians and neurologists as conditional, there are still cases when there are "failures" in the formation of this skill. All of them are considered pathological, which means that parents should know about them in order to eliminate negative consequences in time.

The first case is an early independent holding of the head. Speech in this case is that the baby at the age of up to a month fixes his head for a long time. This is a signal that, perhaps, the child has increased muscle tone or intracranial pressure. So, you should seek help from a neurologist.

The second case is the inability to fix the head at the age of over three months. In this case, you can talk about both physiological rejection, and about the carelessness of parents.

The question of when children begin to hold the head and the answer to it, as was demonstrated above, are really important. After all, the joint work of parents, doctors and the baby depends on how quickly he will master and other skills: sitting, crawling and walking.