1. Guiding Principles: Safety, Orientation, Comfort, Bonding and Curiosity
This is the first of four in a series of companion articles and recorded zoom sessions. It is part of our Preparing for Caring project to build awareness and educate about the importance of handling skills in caring for a baby.
We have built our work at Babies Project around the progressive states of safety, orientation, comfort, bonding and curiosity. In this post, we unpack these ideas.
2. Baby Ball: A Responsive Container
This is the second of four in a series of companion articles and recorded zoom sessions. It is part of our Preparing for Caring project to build awareness and educate about the importance of handling skills in caring for a baby.
At Babies Project, we often say that if we teach parents and caregivers nothing else in their first session, we teach them “baby ball,” a shorthand term for a recommended way of holding a baby. There’s a lot to unpack about baby ball - it encapsulates our principles, it’s relevant for babies of all ages, and it plays out both physically and metaphorically.
3. Four Surfaces: We Are Their Environment
This is the third of four in a series of companion articles and recorded zoom sessions. It is part of our Preparing for Caring project to build awareness and educate about the importance of handling skills in caring for a baby.
Building specifically on the ideas of “baby ball” and “horizontal is home base”, this post looks at the ideas behind one of our specific positioning suggestions – having a baby experience lying on all four surfaces of their body (back, front, left side and right side).
4. Picking Up, Putting Down, and What to Avoid
This is the last of four in a series of companion articles and recorded zoom sessions. It is part of our Preparing for Caring project to build awareness and educate about the importance of handling skills in caring for a baby.
In this final post, we’ll apply our principles to the moving transitions involved in picking up, putting down, transferring and repositioning a baby.
Handling Practices: Some Historical Context
We’d like to share a bit of context and history about our handling suggestions. Where did they come from? The short answer is that we didn’t make them up! There’s history behind them, though we do like to think we’ve honed, curated and elaborated upon them over the years.
Chaos Theory & Babies
We're inspired by the writing of Esther Thelen, a developmental psychologist and multidisciplinary out-of-the-box thinker who applied chaos theory (or dynamic systems theory) to infant development.
Q&A: Follow-up on tummy time
This is a follow-up to our previous Q&A post where we responded to a question about tummy time on a pillow.
We've heard back from the parent, who sent new photos that we're happy to share as they beautifully illustrate our points.
Q&A: Tummy time on a pillow?
We respond to a question from a mother of a 4-month-old:
Someone told me that it’s good to put babies on top of pillows (on the floor) so they can get perspective and help them develop. I wanted to hear your thoughts on this.
NOBL Change at Work Conference
We're honored to have been included in a virtual conference in March 2020 called Change at Work: Leadership, Resilience, and Remote Work in a Post-COVID World. It was hosted by NOBL, an organizational design firm.
We talked about our philosophy and values, and our focus on teaching touch and handling skills to parents and other caregivers. See the amazing visual summary created by Craighton Berman.
Coronavirus Updates
This post includes our updates during the first few weeks of the pandemic.
Update: Preparing for Caring at Early Head Start
This is a December 2019 update on our project with Ellyce DiPaola, IDME and EdD candidate at Teacher’s College, Columbia University, which included offering our Preparing for Caring: Touch, Handling & Bonding Practices (PFC) workshop to an Early Head Start community in NYC.
Big Picture, Little Picture
This post is the last in a series of 4 that unpacked our “be with, be a witness, be in relationship” tagline as part of our 2019 fall fundraising campaign.
Why did we choose our tagline and why are we focusing on it now?
Unpacking "Be in Relationship"
This post is the third in a series of 4 that unpacked our “be with, be a witness, be in relationship” tagline as part of our 2019 fall fundraising campaign.
We’re going to continue to unpack our tagline, this time taking on the last sentence, “Be in relationship.” What are some of the ideas and principles packed into this simple statement that are relevant to relating to a baby?
Thoughts on Meeting a Baby
In our work at Babies Project, we meet new people every day. Many of them are babies. We’d like to share what we’ve learned from our experiences, with the support of our values, principles and ongoing conversations and questions. We offer this in the hope that it might lead to more fruitful, mutually enriching meetings between babies of all ages.
Unpacking "Be a Witness"
This post is the second in a series of 4 that unpacked our “be with, be a witness, be in relationship” tagline as part of our 2019 fall fundraising campaign.
We’ll continue unpacking our tagline, this time focusing on the second sentence, “Be a witness.” That can mean so many things - what do we mean by it?
Thoughts on "Good Job"
One of the most common phrases we hear caregivers say to their babies and toddlers is “good job.” We have some thoughts on this ubiquitous expression that we’ve been sharing with parents and caregivers, and we’d like to share our perspective more widely.
Unpacking "Be With"
This post is the first in a series of 4 that unpacked our “be with, be a witness, be in relationship” tagline as part of our 2019 fall fundraising campaign.
What do we mean by “be with” in our tagline?
Developmental Movement: Elders & Babies
At Babies Project, we offer developmental movement education for "babies of all ages." What do we mean by this?
We have a common personal history. We were all once babies and our earliest experiences as babies are still with us.
Developmental Movement: On Track or Behind?
A good part of our work at Babies Project involves talking about developmental movement— what it is and why it's important. The topic comes up in our discussions with parents and caregivers who bring their babies to Babies Project, often with questions like these:
“Is my baby on track?"
"Are they behind?"
"Should we be concerned?”