Consider...Jillian

Jillian (10 months) is at a neighbourhood playground with her grandmother. She is asleep in her stroller when they arrive, so her grandmother sits on a bench under the shade of a large tree. Jillian wakes up and starts to cry. Her grandmother quickly leans over the stroller and strokes Jillian’s head, saying, “Good morning Jillian. I hope you had a good rest.” As Jillian looks into her grandmother’s eyes, her cries subside. Her grandmother lifts her out of the stroller, brings her onto her lap and gives her a comforting hug. Jillian soon hears the laughter of the children playing in the nearby sandbox. She twists her body so she can see what they are doing. Jillian stands on her grandmother’s lap and starts to bounce. Watching the children with a big smile, her grandmother says, “You look like you’re ready to run!”

Jillian is having a rich physical and emotional experience. Her brain is rapidly receiving and responding to sensory signals – the warm gaze as she looks into her grandmother’s eyes, being touched and spoken to in a comforting way, the sights and sounds of children playing, and the physical experience of standing and bouncing. Jillian already knows quite a bit about her world and is learning more about it, how to be in it and is feeling loved by an important adult – her grandmother.