What’s Lulu doing?
These yogurt containers are great for stacking. A wide neck and narrow bottom mean they easily fit into one another. They are quite large but still easy for small hands to manage, and the sound and feeling of one sliding inside another is obviously very satisfying.
This video is really fascinating because it shows so many different kinds of development. Stacking looks easy but involves a lot of sophisticated hand-eye coordination. Lulu has to correctly perceive the changing position of her hands on the cups in three dimensions, and use this visual feedback to guide her hands. Some of these movements are large—lifting and moving the cup—and some require fine control—grasping the edge of the cup and tilting it to the correct orientation.
How is this helping her development?
Lulu has reached quite an advanced stage of motor skills because she can hold one cup with one hand while using the other hand to fit another cup inside it. Her motivation is strong. When she stacks a lidded cup and can't fit another on top of it, she doesn't give up or simply bang them together. She takes it off and restacks until she's done. This shows great problem solving skills. Lulu sees there's a problem and works out how to get round it (by putting the lidded cup on last). Lulu also shows her persistence—she's determined to reach a goal, and doesn't give up even when the cups fall over or one cup doesn't fit.
So what’s next?
The video is a great example of how different skills develop in unison. Lulu isn't just playing with cups, she's learning about relative size, precise movements and forward planning. The next stage would be to give Lulu some blocks to stack. Remind her of how she stacked the cups and then watch as she uses that information to build a tower. Let her work it out on her own but be sure to give her lots of encouragement and praise.
Send us a video of your children using building blocks and we may use it to illustrate how children progress from stacking to construction.
