How To Do The Infant Visual Stimulation
In Fun And Creative Ways

Infant visual stimulation is an important activity for parents to do for the baby since of the five senses, vision is the least developed sense a baby has at birth.

Babies who receive a good amount of visual stimulation develop vision faster than the ones who don't. Having a good vision early is important since it enables a baby to see her surrounding better, and hence enhances her curiosity, attentiveness and most importantly, improves bonding with his parents. Therefore, it is worth it for parents to help their babies to perfect their vision during the first few months of their baby's life.

So how can you, as a parent, help your baby to perfect his vision ?

Basically, you can accelerate your baby's vision development by providing a variety of visual input.

This article discuses what kind of visual input helps baby to see and focus better and various products which can help you to do that effectively ?

• Newborn visual stimulation ideas and products
• Visual stimulation ideas and products for babies 2-8 months.

Research has found that newborn's eyes see contrasting color such as white, black and red the best. Therefore, it is best to expose your baby to as much dark and light as possible.

In order to do this, you can try these following activities:

• Show your baby black and white baby toys including the black and white baby mobiles, infant wrist rattles and other educational baby toys. You can get a variety of infant stimulation toys from our favorite online store, Genius Babies. Although this store may look to you like 'other' toy store selling educational baby toys, I've been particularly impressed with this store's complete line of infant and newborn stimulation toys. In addition, many of the newborn stimulation toy packages are unique to this store. Therefore, if you are thinking of getting such toys, we encourage you to pay a visit to this store.
• Show black, red and white books for babies such as this to your baby.
• And if you don't mind to go a bit overboard, surround your baby with objects which have contrasting colors, including bedding, play area and even yourself. Don't laugh, but yes, you can actually wear shirts with stripes when tending your baby.

But wait ...

Research has also shown that newborn can only focus their eyes on objects between 8-12 inches away from them. Therefore, try to stay within that boundary when you interact with your baby.

By the time your baby is around 2 months, s/he will be able to appreciate not only black, white and red colors to bright bold colors. Your baby will also enjoy faces and is ready to see a moving object in addition to the stationary one.

Here are some infant visual stimulation activities to try for this age group:

• Activity with the play gym or baby mobiles: place your baby on her back and put the play gym or baby mobile on her. Move the toys like a pendulum.
  
  
  • Play gym recommendation:For playmat/activity gym, I recommend Gymini Super Deluxe Light and Music by Tiny Love because gives good visual stimulation, is developmental and will grow with your baby. The mat and activity toys are fun and have bold colors which are ideal to develop baby's eyes. There are also many activities to accommodate each growth stage. When your baby is young, she can look at the fun mat/toys and enjoy the crinkly and squeaky sound of the playmate during floor time.
    
    When your baby is a bit bigger, then she can enjoy the tummy time with the mirror (good for visual stimualtion) and peek-a-boo flap on the playmat. In addition, she will be excited to kick and reach a a number of fun toys which can rattle, spin, jitter, etc, on the arch. Finally, the playmat plays the music a when the music touch pad is kicked, hit or touched by your baby.
    
    This developmental infant toy is available from here at a very low price (33% off MSRP).
    
    
  • Baby mobile recommendation: as mentioned above to get the maximum infant visual stimulation, baby needs to get a baby mobile which has bold colors. For this purpose, I recommend the Wimmer Ferguson baby mobile which is basically designed based on infant visual stimulation research (available at Genius Babies or at Amazon). However, this baby mobile is not fancy. It's not musical, and can't move by itself. If you want a fancy one, I recommend Tiny Love Baby Mobile (Sweet Island Dream) which not only provides your infant with a good visual stimulation, but also music. Moreover, the toy attached to the mobile moves in a variety of ways, hence encouraging your baby's eyes to focus and follow the movement of the toys. You can get this either at Genius Babies or here at a slightly lower price.
  
  
  
• Activity with infant rattle or other objects with bright colors: move the baby rattle from left to right, or up and down.
  
  
• Activity with baby mirror : show your baby her face. Enhance this activity by pointing her facial features and talk about them.
  
  Baby mirror recommendation: When shopping for a baby mirror, two things you have to make sure is that it has accurate reflection (not all mirror has accurate reflection) and it fits your needs. In other words, if you wanted a mirror for both tummy and crib time (i.e. for hanging), then buy a mirror for that purpose. Remember that not all baby mirrors can be used for both tummy and crib time.
  
  For an interesting and relatively cheap baby mirror which can be used for both tummy and crib time, I recommend Sassy Me In The Mirror. The frame is decorated with bold color fabric and has some cute animals stuck on it. When the mirror is shaken, there's a rattling sound coming out of those animals.
  
  This is not the most sophisticated baby mirror because I'm aware that there are other more expensive baby mirror loaded with music and light to entertain the baby. However, I don't think you need that kind of features for a baby mirror.
  
  Also, if you already has a baby mirror embedded in other baby toys (for instance, the Gymini playmat mentioned above) , then you definitely won't need this toy. If you haven't, and are looking for a good and relatively inexpensive baby mirror, this is the one. This developmental infant toy is available here

When your baby's around 5 months, train your baby?s eyes to focus even more and perform these following infant visual stimulation exercises to help your baby to develop concentration and enhance the curiousity:

• Play the peekaboo with your baby.
• Play with a yo yo and encourage your baby to see the yo yo movement.
• Dribble or throw a ball. Encourage your baby to follow the ball's movement. .
• Follow-a-spool activity: roll a spool of thread towards your baby and then move it to the opposite direction (i.e. farther from her). Let your baby's eyes follow the movement.
• Put a little ball or marble inside a big bowl. Tilt the bowl and move it around, so that the ball moves around the bowl. Show this to your baby and let your baby's eyes follow the movement.
• Play a simple hide and seek game with your baby.

If your baby has been properly visually stimulated, by 8 months, your baby should have completed her visual development and has a good vision.

(Click here to see what other infant toys your 0-6 month old baby needs)

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