An Increasing Attention Span
What are the signs that your child's "life of the mind" is taking shape? For a start,
after his second birthday you may notice a marked increase in what psychologists
call selective, or focal, attention -- the ability to switch off outside distractions
and concentrate on one thing at a time.
By 25 months, most children can focus on
a single activity continually for a few minutes, and for an even longer time if
an adult is engaged in that activity with them. "Children this age are also capable
of some abstract thinking," notes Sharen Hausmann, director of Smart Start Georgia,
an agency working to improve the quality of care for young children. "If you give
them a toy truck, they'll understand that they can turn the wheels and the truck
will go."
Although some abstract concepts like "nice," or "heavy," may be too much for children
this age to grasp, Hausmann adds, "they can match objects with pictures and sort
things by shapes or colors." Your child can identify circles, squares, and triangles
now, so simple puzzles are more fun to put together. In some ways, in fact, the
world is one big puzzle that your child is trying to understand -- a process that
sometimes requires taking things apart just so he can put them back together again.
Kids this age are also starting to make sense of number concepts; for instance,
if you ask your 2-year-old if she wants one cookie or two, you can bet she'll say
"two!"
Understanding Cause and Effect
Further evidence that your child is growing smarter: Her grasp of cause and effect
grows ever more sophisticated. As a baby, she quickly noticed that crying from her
crib produced results. This taught her that she had some control over her environment,
because crying brought about a desirable effect: You came into her room and picked
her up or fed her.
Now she also notices that this activity causes the lights to turn on when you come
into her room -- but only sometimes. Why only sometimes? Is it her crying that turns
on the lights? Is it you? Or is it just the sun coming up in her room? As her attention
span and her powers of observation grow, your child eventually sees you turn on
the light switch to produce that effect, and understands the connection.
Experimentation and Repetition
With her improved mobility and nimble fingers, your 2-year-old is out to test her
cause-and-effect theories more thoroughly. To solve the mystery of the light switch,
she might try pulling a stool over to the wall, climbing onto it, and making the
room go from light to dark and back again. She will be driven to try lots of other
great cause-and-effect experiments too: Does a tower of blocks always fall down
when she pushes it? Does her little cousin? Does Dad always use his Big Voice if
she pulls the dog's tail? Because repetition is so crucial to learning, your child
will perform the same cause-and-effect experiments again and again.
In his attempt to grasp the underlying logic of events in his life, your child will
thrive on routine. He'll ask you to sing the same songs over and over, especially
if they involve movement of some kind, both to grasp the vocabulary and to see if
the same thing happens in the song every time. And his behavior will improve if
you establish consistent daily patterns, since repetition of routines can help ease
transitions and provide stability for kids this age. Two-year-olds with a schedule
anticipate what will happen next, feel less anxious about unknowns, and are more
in control of their own impulses. For instance, if your child knows he has to pick
up his toys before he can have a snack in the morning, you'll have less work to
do and he'll feel more independent.
Troublemaking Comes Naturally
Meanwhile, in his ongoing attempts to be master and commander of his universe, your
child will not only make messes but he'll also land himself in trouble. He might
climb onto a chair, then onto a counter, and then onto the top of the refrigerator
to reach the cookies he saw you hide there. Or he may realize that, yes, he can
play with his older sister's forbidden toys -- as long as he sneaks into her room
during school hours, when she isn't there to stop him.
But, Hausmann reminds us, your child isn't being deliberately defiant. "This is
a time in every child's life when he is driven to plan things independently and
try to solve problems on his own. Children this age have a wide range of strategies
for learning new things. Offer them a safe, nurturing environment and they will
be motivated to develop their cognitive skills at a pace that will leave you breathless."
Why Do Kids Whine?
However, many children are perfecting a practice that can be just as relentless
and exhausting to their parents: whining. Why do kids whine? Whining is, in essence,
"a tantrum in miniature form," says Sharen Hausmann, director of Smart Start Georgia.
Whining is brought on by many of the same triggers as tantrums: hunger, fatigue,
too much stimulation, an inability to articulate emotions, and, eventually, habit.
It is a behavior often associated with periods of development during which a child
feels overwhelmed, or expects failure or disappointment, Hausmann adds. "They feel
defeated or tired before they've even tried to do something."
Toddlers latch on to the whining habit because they quickly learn that it gets results.
Like a mosquito in your ear, whining is almost impossible to ignore. It's not that
your toddler is necessarily trying to annoy you, he's just a survivalist who wants
to do whatever it take to produce the desired effect (getting you to give in). If
it takes a nasal continual droning sound to achieve his goal, then so be it.
Parents add to toddler confusion about whining because they sometimes give in only
to make it stop. In addition, your child is not aware of how annoying whining is.
He only knows that this particular voice makes you sit up and take notice. "We're
so busy that we too often ignore our children to talk on our cell phones or get
one more thing accomplished," says Hausmann, "so our children end up resorting to
a more insistent tone of voice. It's all about getting our attention."
Holly Robinson lives with her five children outside of Boston. Originally published
in American Baby magazine, June 2006. This article is kindly provided by:
