Clare Passed

With every big age milestone in a child’s life, like turning 15 months old, there seems to be an associated check-up. Being 15 months old not only meant a health check-up with our family physician (including vaccinations) for Clare but also her first ‘report card’. The daycare workers used the Nipissing District Developmental Screen to assess Clare’s physical, emotional, cognitive, and verbal development.

She passed.

Stats from the Physician:
Height: 30 inches (50th percentile)
Weight: 20.7 lbs (20th to 25th percentile)

The doctor didn’t give us quite the same ‘talk’ as last time. She’s been in the 20 – 25th range now for long enough that he thinks she’s likely just going to stabilize there. He did warn though that it would be best if she didn’t drop any percentile points in weight. I spoke to him about the new WHO recommended growth charts for populations of breastfed babies (Clare is stable at 50th percentile on these charts). He looked at me a little bit like he thought I was ‘cute’. Anyway, I didn’t get any lectures from him and he’s not suggesting we do anything any differently. So – whatever.

Clare’s eczema has really been flaring up lately. He’s prescribed a stronger hydrocortisone and Rob and I are considering some other options as well.

The Nipissing District Developmental Screen

The way the screen works, mostly, is that there are 17 skills that Clare should be able to demonstrate by now. Accomplishing them is an indication that her development is proceeding in the ‘normal’ way. (Evey, any comments from someone who actually knows about this stuff?)

Here are the few that I can remember -

1. Point to pictures in a book;
2. Try to say two or more words (even if those words aren’t clear);
3. Use noises/gestures to try to get something;
4. Simulate animal noises (moo, woof);
5. Use a sippy cup to drink;
6. Pick up and eat finger food;
7. Make appropriate gestures when getting dressed;
8. Crawl upstairs;
9. Walk sideways when holding on to furniture;
10. Squat to pick up a toy;
11. Stack two or more blocks;
12. Show affection toward transitional objects;
13. Repeat an action that makes you laugh, look at you to see how you react ex. after falling or when a stranger enters the room
14. Take off her socks and try to take off her shoes
15. Recognize body parts on herself, others, or a doll

Incidentally, just this week Clare has been getting better at repeating sounds and saying words. She’s been saying ‘Kakarow’ (Mackerel), ‘Up……tare’ (upstairs), Joos (juice) in addition to her usual list of cat, hi, mama, dada, ta ta, up, and uh oh. Rob’s heard her say turtle but she doesn’t repeat it much. And I think she’s trying for ‘all done’ but it’s pretty weak right now – more like ‘ah duh’.

One thing about Clare, is that she’s not much for performing. It’s sometimes hard to tell if she can repeat things (or if what she just did/said was an accident) because she won’t repeat on command. It also makes it almost IMPOSSIBLE to get good video of her!

Talk to you soon,

B.