Vision develops only when it is involved .

Toddlers spend their first weeks and months of life learning to see the world. During this period, such skills as fixing the gaze, friendly movements of both eyes, depth recognition, development of visual-tactile reactions, and spatial perception are developed. Initially, the more visual information your baby receives, the more actively his brain develops. Therefore, a child whose environment is visually enriched is more calm and attentive during wakefulness than a child deprived of stimulation.
The first and most important visual objects that have a stimulating effect on the development of the baby's vision from birth are the faces of mom and dad. Therefore, look at your child as often as possible, communicate with him, smile.
In second place are contrasting black and white structured images that the baby can “look at”. Looking at how my Prime Reader liked to look at the autumn black tree branches against the bright sky, I always regretted that we didn’t have a panda, zebra, or at least a Dalmatian at home.

The period from birth to six months is extremely important for the development of a child’s vision, since it is at this time that the eyeball, the paths leading from it to the brain, and those parts of the brain that are responsible for receiving and processing visual information are most quickly and intensively formed. Psychophysiologists consider this age period as critical for the formation of the visual system. It is the first six months of a child's life that is the most sensitive to external stimulation during the development of the visual system, optimal for conducting classes. As a result of such exercises, visual functions improve: light perception, visual acuity, color perception, contrast sensitivity, field of vision. Classes can be carried out on a changing table, in a crib, on a bed, etc., but it is better that the light source is behind the baby’s head, i.e. it is more convenient to lay the child with his head to the window.

In the first months of life, it is important to form two visual skills: to fix and examine an object, and to trace it. Here is a series of picture-taking and tracking exercises to help your baby ( F - fixing, P - tracking):

0-1 month:
At birth, your baby's field of vision is limited - 30 degrees to the left and right of him, 10 degrees above and below, at a distance of no more than 90 cm from the body. His vision is 10 to 30 percent less sharp than yours, making it harder for him to see fine lines. He sees them as a blurry gray mass. In addition, contrasting black and white patterns than colors, because during this period their rods (cells in the retina that are sensitive to low light and distinguish only black and white) work better than cones (cells that see colors in bright light). In the first month of life, babies prefer simple geometric shapes, a cage, a strip, dots, straight and broken lines to curves and wavy.
Already at 10 days, the baby can keep a moving object in sight (step addition), and at 20 days, he focuses his eyes on a stationary object and on the face of an adult speaking to him. By the end of the month, he tries to follow a slowly moving black-and-white object or an adult's face at a distance of 20-30 cm. He notices objects, briefly examines them.

F: Show and also attach sheets of paper with black and white contrasting patterns to the walls of the crib. Change them as the difficulty increases. This will help your baby focus. Black and white photos of mom and dad are also suitable.

It is useful to make a black and white mobile for a baby. You can hang it on a hanger, having previously made notches for threads on it, or on crossed pencils. It is even easier to buy a ready-made rotating mobile in the store and temporarily change the hanging toys to black and white ones.

P: At a distance of about 30 cm from the eyes, show the baby a picture. The child will notice her and fix her eyes on her. Move the picture slowly to the right, then to the left (horizontal tracking). In the future, bring the picture closer to the baby and remove it again (20 cm - 1 meter - vertical tracking).

1 - 3 months:
The baby can clearly focus on objects at a distance of about 30 cm and usually begins to smile, examines the details of the face, patterns. He is especially attracted to images of circles, rings, spots. In addition, he will look more closely at the outer edges of the drawings than at the middle.
The child is already following the object when it is taken a little to the side. For 1-2 minutes, he can visually focus on a stationary object. By the end of the third month of life, he shifts his gaze to the object that has appeared in the field of view: from the side, from above, from below. Follows an object moving in all directions at a distance of 20-80 cm. Waits for the appearance of an object that has disappeared from its field of vision.

F: Pictures can be hung on the walls throughout the house - the baby can already visually focus in an upright position (in the arms of an adult), so interesting walks await him.

P: At this age, complicate the trajectory of the movement of objects for tracking. To the horizontal and vertical movements of the image in a straight line, add tracking along two diagonals, along an arc, in a circle, following the wave-like movement of the image. Now you can trace the pictures not only lying on your back, but also vertically in the arms of mom or dad, and lying on your stomach (when the baby confidently holds his head). Tracking objects in a circle can be trained using a mobile, removing all objects from it, except for one.

3 - 4 months:
The kid begins to like more complex drawings, instead of straight and broken lines, curved lines and shapes come.
In addition, he remembers what he saw, watches a moving object, looks away and turns his head in his direction. During this period, the formation of color perception occurs, because cones begin to work hard in the retina.

F: You can enter the color (it is worth trying from two months, in some children the cones ripen earlier). At first, the baby is able to perceive red and yellow colors, a little later - green and blue. Then you can show any colors in random order and combinations.

To fix the color, show the baby alternately with an interval of 30 seconds two pictures with a flower that differ only in color (they have the same shape and size). Do the same to fix the shape with images of a butterfly and a Christmas tree (the color of the objects is the same).

P:
1. Take one of the pictures and a thick sheet of white paper of the same size. Show the picture to the baby at a distance of 30-50 cm. Make sure that he fixes it, and then cover half of the picture with a white sheet. After 30 seconds, show the whole picture again.
2. Do the same, but this time hide behind the white sheet not half, but the whole picture at once.
3. Take two pictures and a white sheet of paper, folding them one by one, like a deck of cards: a picture, a white sheet, another picture. Show the child the first picture, and after he fixes it, put it at the end of the “deck”. A white sheet will appear. After 20-30 seconds, show the second picture. The kid will be surprised.

4-6 months:
By 4 months, the child sees all colors and can focus on both near and distant objects, the images received from the right and left eyes begin to combine into one - the baby develops binocular vision and visual depth perception. He will still prefer curves to straight lines and tend to more complex designs. At this age, kids are very fond of looking at objects of folk crafts - Zhostovo trays, Khokhloma, Gzhel, ornaments and carpet patterns. It turns out that in addition to receiving aesthetic pleasure, their contemplation is an excellent training for the child's visual system - they have rhythm, symmetry and asymmetry, clarity and alignment of the composition.

F: Show the child two pictures at the same time. The kid will look from one picture to another. Show the child the picture reflected in the mirror.

P: You will need a picture and a thick sheet of white paper about 40 cm wide. Show the picture to the baby at a distance of 50-60 cm. Let the child fix it. Then slowly move it horizontally into the child's field of vision. After 2-3 shows, take a white sheet with your second hand, and hold it in front of the child's eyes in such a way that the picture on the path of its movement disappears behind it, and then appears on the other side.
If the child has already formed an understanding that the object that has disappeared from the field of view, firstly, does not cease to exist, and, secondly, continues to move, then you can see how the baby will look to the place of the future appearance of the picture from behind the sheet.

You can draw black and white drawings yourself, or you can print the same ones as ours.

For printed materials, you can here: (black and white pictures and ready-made scans for self-made mobiles, color pictures, Khokhloma, Gzhel, ornaments and carpet patterns).

It remains to be said that moderation and good mood mom and baby. Play games when the child is happy, calm and not very tired, for example, after feeding. Do not get carried away only with visual-orienting reactions. For holistic development, it is important to stimulate and interact with all the organs of perception of the child: hearing, touch, smell, taste. And also remember that the most important thing for the development of the visual system is not the number and variety of pictures, but mom's smiling face.

List of used literature:
1. Sears W., Sears.M. Your baby from birth to two years. - M. : Eksmo, 2010. - 912 p.
2. Ivanova L. V. I am a mother. Health and development of the child from birth to a year. - St. Petersburg: Publishing House"Neva"; M.: "OLMA-PRESS Grand", 2002. - 448 p.
3. Brewer S. Superchild. Before birth and after. - M. : Potpourri, 2003. - 256 p.
4. The results of psychological and pedagogical studies of the neuropsychic development of children in the first year of life, pref. N.M. Kelovanov, S.M. Krivina, E.L. Fruht, K.L. Pechora, G.V. Pantyukhina, L.G. Golubeva and others.

Most of the information about everything that surrounds us, i.e. about 80%, a person receives through vision.

Therefore, when a child is born, in order for him to fully develop, stimulation of his vision is necessary.

From birth, a child carefully studies everything around, and he constantly needs new and new impressions. A newborn reaches for everything that he sees, and it is this desire that is decisive for his development.

The child turns over, subsequently crawls to everything that interests him, and thus, cognizes the world.

When do children begin to see?

Children begin to see from birth, they are born with this ability. In the first two or three months, children distinguish only black and white pictures, everything else appears to them as shades of gray tones.

In addition, the newborn sees better with close range.

The radius of his vision is limited: to the right and left - at an angle of thirty degrees, up and down - at an angle of ten degrees. The distance of the object from the baby should not exceed ninety centimeters. Accordingly, during breastfeeding, the child focuses on all objects that are at a distance fifteen to twenty centimeters.

Two weeks after birth, the baby begins to distinguish between mom and dad.

The peculiarity of his vision is such that when the baby looks, he distinguishes only clear, not blurry black and white lines and figures. Children see other colors as shades of gray. This feature is associated with the structure of the human eye. The retina contains a series of cells called cones and rods. Rods allow you to see only black and white objects and drawings, and cones make it possible to see colors and their shades. When a baby is born, his wands work more actively, so he sees everything in black and white.

Cards and pictures

There can be any number of them. It is quite acceptable to draw pictures yourself using a black felt-tip pen or marker, pencil, gouache, watercolor or ink, or you can download ready-made drawings. They are easy to download on our website, print and use for classes with newborns.

Pictures can be made in various sizes: 10x10 cm or the size of an A4 page.

Black and white drawings can contain images of any objects: vegetables and fruits, geometric shapes, trees, schematic images of faces, numbers, letters, etc.

Dimensions black and white diagrams you can choose different ones, since objects in the world around you also differ in size.

For the development of good vision in newborns, they should be placed at a distance of thirty centimeters from the eyes of newborns: during the first two months, children focus their vision best at this distance.

To do this, just download them, print, cut and stick on desired surface. On the basis of black-and-white schemes, cartoons for babies were even filmed, where black-and-white pictures for newborns float across the screen to pleasant, calm music.
Black and white pictures for newborns, if used in the first three months of a child's life, can bring him considerable benefit.

Pictures with colored elements (red and blue)

Video

Application results

According to the observations of scientists, children are born with the same number of neurons, after birth start to set connections between neurons.

The more children can see and observe, the more connections are made.

When a child looks at black-and-white diagrams, connections between neurons are established, which are most activated by eight months and remain at the same level until four years of age. It was noticed that the kids with whom they are engaged in black and white drawings show more attention, calmness during the wakefulness period. The stimulation of vision is favorable for the development of children.

How long can you work with pictures?

How many, when and what black-and-white pictures for newborns to show, the child will tell himself: he will look at some black-and-white pictures with interest and glance at others only occasionally.
Classes for the development of good vision in newborns according to black and white drawings should be carried out in the first two to three months.

At four months, black and white pictures for newborns are no longer relevant, since babies begin to recognize by three months Blue colour, and then yellow and red, are able to focus on objects located near and far.

For the active development of the child after three to four months, more complex color images will already be required.

The mobile above the baby's bed with black and white elements can be made not only from paper, but from fabric.

conclusions

So, when babies begin to see, distinguish lines of clearly defined objects, i.e. By about 2 weeks after birth, parents can use black and white pictures to develop their newborn's vision. It is easy to download them on our website or draw them yourself.

How many pictures are needed?

The more images the baby sees, the better. Of course, this does not mean that images should flash before your eyes. Let the child stop looking, examine what he saw: he himself will make it clear that the images have become uninteresting to him. Look closely at the expression on the face of the baby, follow his emotions, and you will understand what else is needed for the development of your child.

More than 80% of the information from the outside world a person receives through vision. Therefore, for the full and harmonious development of a small child, it is necessary to stimulate his visual perception. How younger child the more intensively he learns. From birth, children need new experiences, food for brain development.

If the brain processes only sound stimuli, it does not work in full force This means that it is very important to give the child the opportunity to see different objects as early as possible. The child's vision develops gradually. Up to two or three months, he does not distinguish colors.

For this age, clear, contrasting black and white pictures are best suited, which are installed at a distance of 20-30 cm from the child's eyes. You can use them for as long as the child likes them and arouses his interest.

Sarah Brewer's Super Baby describes the role of black and white images in the development of children aged 0 to 3 months.

Excerpts from "Super Kid" by Sarah Brewer

Vision plays an important role in the development of a child. Seeing various objects in front of him, the child wants to know what they are. The desire to reach for objects, crawl, roll over comes from natural curiosity and the desire to explore everything that the child sees around him. In the first two months of his life, he sees best at close range.

The field of view of a newborn child is more limited than that of an adult. Presumably, objects that are no more than 30 degrees to the left and right of him, 10 degrees above and below and at a distance not exceeding 90 cm from his eyes fall into the field of view of the child. When he suckles his breast naturally focuses vision on objects that are at a distance of 15 - 20 cm.

Usually by two weeks, the baby begins to recognize the faces of the mother and father. His visual acuity is 10 to 30 percent less than an adult, so it is more difficult for him to recognize fine lines that he sees as a blurry gray mass. The retina of the human eye contains photoreceptors such as rods and cones. Rods are cells that are sensitive to weak light and movement and can only distinguish between shades of black and white.

Cones are cells that are responsible for daytime vision and allow you to see different colors and shades. Newborn babies like contrasting black and white drawings more than colored ones, because at this age their rods work better than cones. All other colors are seen as shades of gray.

Because black and white colors are most easily recognized by children, the use of black and white pictures stimulates the formation of connections between neurons in the cerebral cortex, develops attention, stimulates natural children's curiosity and calms down during periods of overexcitation.

Also, newborns like straight or broken lines more than curved or wavy ones. In addition, they are attracted to simple, sketchy images of human faces.

By the sixth week, the baby can clearly focus on various objects at a distance of about 30 cm from him. He is especially attracted to simple images of faces and concentric circles in different options. The child studies the outer edges of the drawings more closely than their middle.

The human brain is fully formed during the period prenatal development. The number of neurons after birth does not increase, the brain develops due to the formation of new connections between neurons. The number of contacts between neurons in the area of ​​the cerebral cortex responsible for visual information begins to gradually increase in the first 2 months after birth.

Between 2 and 4 months, the number of connections between neurons begins to grow sharply and increases by at least 10 times. At this time, the child's vision improves dramatically, he can follow objects with his eyes and turn in the direction where the sound comes from. He begins to like more complex drawings, rounded lines and shapes, rather than straight and broken ones. From the behavior of the child, you can see that he remembers what he saw.

Many babies begin to see colors by the age of two months because the cones begin to work in the retina. But until three months old, they supposedly don't see blue as well as yellow or red.

By four months, a child can see all colors and can focus on both near and far objects. He enjoys watching parents and other people, especially children. He still prefers curved lines to straight ones and turns his attention to more complex drawings. At 4-5 months, the child begins to reach for the objects that he sees, at 7-8 months he can grab objects and try to put them in his mouth.

A child whose visual perception is constantly stimulated is usually calmer and more attentive during wakefulness than a child who is deprived of such stimulation.
The number of connections between neurons in the visual cortex peaks at 8 months of age, peaks until age four, and gradually halves over the next five years.

Therefore, binocular vision develops during the first four years of life, and is fully formed by the age of four. Visual acuity is practically established by the age of five and is finally formed by the age of ten.

You can draw pictures on a white sheet of paper yourself with a black bold marker, black gouache or ink, or print ready-made templates. Subject of drawings:

• geometric shapes (acquaintance with shapes),
• emoticons (study of emotions),
• vegetables fruits,
• silhouettes of animals and insects (wildlife),
• just broken lines, punctuation marks, etc.

The sizes of the pictures can be different, from ¼ A4 to A4 (a whole sheet), since the real objects that surround the child are also not the same size. It will soon become clear which of them are more interesting for the child.

You can place pictures on cardboard boxes, on boxes from perfumes, light bulbs, disks and cassettes, so that they can be conveniently placed in front of the child.

Pictures can be either flat (drawn on a sheet of paper) or three-dimensional (drawn on cylinders, cubes, etc.)

Cubes can come in handy in the future, when the child grows up and will not just look at them, but play with them, learn letters and numbers from them.

Pictures can be static (drawn) or moving, when cut black figures (stripes, circles, hearts, butterflies, etc.) are attached to a bar in front of a white background and move slightly from any light breath. Also, pictures can be placed in the form of an overlay on the side of a crib.

There are no specific recommendations on when to move from the simplest pictures (squares, triangles, straight lines) to more complex ones. The child himself will make it clear what he is interested in, carefully examining some pictures and quickly scanning others with his eyes. It is not necessary to cover the pictures with tape, as they are intended for an age when children will not put them in their mouths.

You can make a mobile (carousel), which is suspended above the bed, from black and white pictures pasted on cardboard. Some firms produce ready-made black and white toys (mobiles) and educational mats. From the age of four months, you can replace black and white pictures on your mobile phone with color ones.

There are also Wee See black and white cartoons for babies, in which geometric shapes move smoothly across the screen and flow into each other to beautiful melodic music.

In addition to using the above pictures, in the first three months of a child’s life, the following visual exercises can be performed:

• Face to face communication: talk to the child at a distance of 25-30 cm, smile at him, make "faces";
• Hold a rattle at the level of the child's eyes at a distance of 25-30 cm and slowly move it from side to side;
• Carry the baby around the house as often as possible so that he looks at everything around.

Color in nature is always in the neighborhood or surrounded by other colors. As a result, colors mutually influence each other, change in hue, lightness and saturation. This phenomenon is called by contrast. A necessary condition for the occurrence contrast- the arrangement of contrasting colors directly next to each other. contrasts are divided into two types: achromatic (light) and chromatic (color). In each of the named contrasts in turn, contrasts are distinguished: simultaneous, borderline and sequential.

The closer to each other are differently colored objects, the clearer and more definite their mutual influence. So, any color surrounded by lighter ones - darkens, and surrounded by darker ones - brightens. This phenomenon is called simultaneous light by contrast or by contrast by lightness. If, for example, mixtures of colors are selected on a dark tone palette, then they, surrounded by a dark tone of the background, may seem quite light. If the resulting mixtures of paints are transferred to a white background of paper, then they will “darken” compared to how they looked on the palette. The more the color of an object differs from the colors of surrounding objects in terms of lightness, the more its tone changes towards lightening or darkening.

Light (achromatic) contrast

This phenomenon is equally characteristic of chromatic and achromatic colors. The phenomenon of light contrast observed when both fields have the same color tone, but differ in lightness. In this case, not only lightness changes, but also saturation. In essence, with simultaneous light by contrast we are also dealing with a combination of chromatic and achromatic colors.

Light (monochrome) contrast

The contrast effect is affected by the area of ​​the background and the color spot lying on it. Contrast will be more noticeable if the surrounding background is larger in area than the color spot located on it. The contrast effect of the background will increase as its saturation increases. On effect contrast also affects the shape of the color spot. A circle or a ring, a square or a letter on the same background under equal conditions will be accompanied by different strengths. by contrast. The phenomenon of simultaneous light contrast accompanied not only by a darkening or lightening of the color spot, but also by an apparent change in size. A light spot on a dark background seems larger than it actually is, and, conversely, a dark spot seems to decrease in size.

Contrast efficiency depending on the magnitude and shape of the reacting field

Effect simultaneous color contrast occurs when two chromatic colors interact or when an achromatic and chromatic color. This is a more complex phenomenon than the light contrast, since changes in hue are accompanied by simultaneous changes in lightness and saturation, and the latter may be more noticeable than the actual color contrast. Bright strontium yellow against a dark ultramarine background to a greater extent causes the phenomenon of light contrast than color, and a bright red tone on a brown background seems to us most of all in saturation. If you want to define an action contrast in terms of hue, it is necessary that the contrasting tones be approximately equal in lightness and saturation. Then it will not be difficult to notice that the juxtaposition of different colors causes in them various additional shades and qualities. If we talk only about changing the color tone, then we should point out the trend of colors in contrast more distant from each other in their position on the color wheel. For example, yellow on an orange background will be paler, slightly greenish, orange on a yellow background will be more orange and have a slight reddish tint.

Color tone contrast

A somewhat special kind contrast complementary colors. If the color is in the neighborhood or against the background of its complementary color or close to it, then it is perceived as more saturated. If a small spot of the same color, but less saturated, is placed on the color plane, then the latter will lose saturation even more. The more saturated in color the surrounding background, the greater the effect it has on the color located in its environment. This is especially noticeable in cases where both colors have approximately the same lightness.

Complementary color contrast

To watch contrast by saturation, you need to take two color spots, the same in lightness and hue and different in saturation. To such contrast artists always resort when it is necessary to increase the purity of a particular color. Less saturated colors, both light and dark, give more effect. contrast than saturated. The contrast in saturation is also especially noticeable when comparing achromatic colors with chromatic ones. At the same time, on a black or dark gray background, the color lowers its saturation, and on a white or light gray background, it increases.

Contrast achromatic (black, white) with achromatic tones

Border (or edge) contrast occurs at the boundary of two adjacent painted surfaces. Most distinctly borderline contrast manifests itself when two bands are located nearby, different in lightness (border light contrast) or by color (border color contrast). In the first case, the part of the light area, which is closer to the dark one, will be lighter than the far one. One gets the impression of unevenness, uneven coloring of both fields, it turns out, as it were, a spatial vibration and a three-dimensional effect appears. If this impression is undesirable for the artist and does not correspond to the task set by him, then it is necessary to trim the lightness by applying a light semitone to the edges of the contacting surfaces in order to extinguish the effect of the boundary contrast. The action of the regional contrast will be weakened, and the object will be perceived as more voluminous, spatial.

With chromatic borderline contrast adjacent colors change in the same direction as in the simultaneous contrast, that is, the yellow spot near the red will be a little greener, but the farther it is from the red, the more this effect will weaken. Almost borderline and simultaneous contrasts they always act together, only in one case one is more noticeable, in the other - the other. If the spot on the background is small, then the border contrast almost absent, if the spot is large enough in relation to the background, then the phenomenon of borderline contrast. The action of the border contrast can be neutralized if a strip of white or black color (drawing) is placed between the colors.

borderline contrast

These patterns should be known to every artist and used by him as a means of achieving expressiveness and color unity of the work. Phenomena contrasts oblige the artist to find harmony between adjacent colors, strengthening or weakening the contrast interaction (for example, by increasing or decreasing the area of ​​mutually contrasting surfaces, placing cold-colored objects next to warm-colored objects; removing objects from each other or, on the contrary, arranging them nearby, lighting them, etc.)

If you look at the sun and then move your eye to a white wall, then a dark spot is seen for a while, representing a blurry image of the sun on the retina. If, after a long time looking at a bright light, you close your eyes, you can clearly see the image of a luminous body, the intensity of which will gradually weaken. This phenomenon is called consistent contrast. Consistent contrast also lies in the fact that when we look from one colorful spot to another, we observe on the latter a shade of color that is unusual for him. For example, when we look from a bright red surface to gray paper, we may notice a greenish tint in the gray. Thus, each objective color after a long examination leaves a trace of an additional color in the eye. An image of an additional color occurs after the object ceases to directly affect our eye. Consistent contrast is also expressed in the fact that the shape of the previous color spot is also reproduced. Low-saturated colors do not create consistent contrast.

Consistent contrast is the result of color fatigue to the eye from color and light exposure. This phenomenon is called adaptation . In general, the phenomenon of adaptation is associated with the adaptation of the visual apparatus to various lighting conditions. For example, in low light conditions, the apparent lightness of all objects, except for black ones, seems to increase. At the same time, the lighter the color of objects, the more its apparent lightness increases. In strong lighting conditions, objects, especially those with a dark color, are perceived as even darker. Thus, as a result of the adaptation of the eye to light or to darkness, the sensitivity of the eyes either decreases or increases. The sensitivity of the eye decreases when perceiving not only achromatic colors, but also chromatic ones. If, for example, a part of the blue drapery is covered with black cardboard and one looks at the drapery for a while, and then the black cardboard is removed, then in the place where the drapery was covered with cardboard, it will appear more saturated in color than the part that was not closed. Consequently, if a color stimulus affects our eye for a certain time, then the sensitivity of the eye to this color begins to decrease. There is a feeling that the colors have faded, become closer. Color fatigue is the stronger, the brighter and more saturated the color acting on the vision. Sequential action contrast matters in the artist's observation of nature and in the viewer's observation of the picture.

Why does a baby need black and white images

“Infants of the first two months of life are still learning to focus their eyes and are best at distinguishing high-contrast images. Among others, they prefer wide stripes, circles, broken and wavy lines in black and white. Newborns see best at a distance of 25-30 cm. - this is, in fact, a squeeze of the facts about the development of vision in infants, which are given in almost all books for new mothers.

I read all this just before the birth and made cards even before the birth of my second child. What can I do, I love all kinds of cards. With the first daughter, we skipped the “black and white” stage. Panic "develop, develop, develop!" I then started at 3 months old, and I decided to start right away with colored ones.

You can download my collection of black and white pictures for kids (there are a lot of things), as well as from the Vkontakte project group.

So, I prepared cards with the contours of animals (as it turned out, “for growth”: little is clear to the newborn in them), I made cubes with black and white ornaments. I attached some of them to the mobile (“native” pendants for a while), I also provided the rest with ribbons so that you could just put them on top of each other and hang them somewhere.

Finally, I remembered that I have a wonderful magazine from the Karapuz publishing house with geometric patterns for kids, printed out cards from there. By the way, they turned out to be the most demanded among us.

In all books, it is advised to place all this wealth in the crib, at a distance comfortable for the baby (these are the same 25-30 cm). With the eldest, I remember, I still tried to measure something with a ruler, but even then I was convinced that many recommendations from books are far from reality. And one of them - the baby does not lie in the crib. Therefore, we had a portable cradle for looking at pictures, which most often ends up in the kitchen (mother needs to cook, feed the rest of the household and eat herself) or in the nursery (mother needs to entertain her older sister).

By the way, the mobile soon also moved to the kitchen. The kid agrees to lie alone longer if there are other people nearby. And the crib is used only when I have things to do in the bedroom itself - its location, or when I read the older book at night (we all sleep in the same room).

Where to use, where to mount

By the way, attaching pictures to the crib is the easiest way: you can stick it with adhesive tape on the crossbars or hang it on the board, bent in half.

It’s not worth hanging as many pictures as in the photo, I figured out how it’s more convenient to look at, well, I took a picture of one. In the future, I plan to stick not the pictures themselves with adhesive tape, into several transparent A4 and A5 files, and insert cards there already, so that it is convenient to change the exposure.

When the baby and I walk around the apartment, special pictures for viewing are hidden in several more places: in the hall, on the wall for the TV (just at the level of the child’s eyes when he is on the handles), in the kitchen, in the nursery.

At first, I leaned them against the side of the cradle, and laid the baby on its side. When he grew up a little, I thought for a long time how to place them in the kitchen so that they were kept in sight. I accidentally found a way out: I didn’t turn freshly printed sheets (2 pictures per sheet) into double-sided cards, sealing the edges with tape, but simply bent it in half, and in this form the sheet hung very cool on the long handles of the kitchen set, just at the right level . You can probably hang it from tables, stools and chairs.

It was high time to write this - our Pasha really liked the pictures with geometric patterns, he looked at them for quite some time (his favorite ones quickly showed up), followed them with his eyes. In a month and a half, I was already looking at the figures and silhouettes of animals with pleasure.

A little about cubes (with ribbons). We have them spinning on a mobile, suspended in a cradle and on a rug with arcs so that you can push with your hands, into a stroller during walks, they are placed in a pyramid when the baby is lying on his stomach. The eldest daughter, Irina, loves to chat with them in front of the baby when she communicates with him, and he sometimes catches them with his eyes (he talks very quickly).

Some time later, I pasted the pictures on the box, it turned out voluminous toy with six faces, all with different images. The main thing is stable, you can put it anywhere in front of a lying baby. When the child's pictures ceased to interest, I glued new ones on top.

How to use?

So, what can you do with these cube cards, besides hanging them in places accessible to the baby’s eyes:

• To train tracking: we catch our eye on the picture and move it slowly to the right and left, up and down, then over time we complicate the trajectory: in an arc, diagonally, in a circle.
• Attract and switch attention, soothe. We have more than once managed to calm the baby down to “look, what a picture!”. When we get bored, we show the next one.
• Use as exhibits when walking around the apartment in the hands of adults. When all the rooms have already been walked around 3 times in a day and everyone has looked, how to entertain the baby with new things? New pictures on the shelves, and not just black and white.
• Use while lying on your stomach and crawling. The kid tries to raise his head higher and higher, and he will be interested to see something there that catches the eye (walls rarely fit, but if you lean a picture against them ...).
• Make it one of the means of showing the care of the older child for the younger. Irina really likes to arrange pictures for Pasha. Even if he is in this moment she cannot see them (mother does gymnastics), she is pleased that she took care of the baby.

Where to get?

Do it yourself (options: draw with a black marker, paints, make an application from dark and white paper, sew from fabric) - it would seem the easiest and cheapest thing, but you need to start before the birth of the child, after, in the first months, when, in fact, the materials and will be in demand, there may not be free time. Pictured is part of our

Print ready. If there is a place to print, the most suitable option for young parents, especially since printing is budgetary, without color. The necessary files are easy to find on the Internet, there are just a few sets walking around. You can download my collection of black and white pictures for kids (there are a lot of things), as well as