What are the benefits of baby yoga for babies?

Mum & Baby yoga can be just as good for baby as it is for mum.

Even before they leave the womb, babies are primed to respond to touch before any other sense. “Babies born three months prematurely are sensitive enough to respond to a hair touch anywhere on the body,” Charles Fernyhough notes in his book 1000 Days of Wonder. Senses that adults rely on such as sight and hearing produce disorienting effects in young babies, as their brains struggle to process what they are experiencing. Touch, however, is an innate human sense, fully developed by the time we enter the world. “Holding her quietly in our arms,” Fernyhough goes on as he observes his daughter’s early months, “would have communicated more than any amount of visual or auditory stimulation.”

Baby Yoga requires the touch of an adult to stretch a baby’s limbs and gently move them into the poses. Engaging with a baby’s primary sense in this way while bringing in eye contact, positive facial expressions and massage is a simple but highly effective way to communicate and bond with them during the early months. This can in turn result in better sleep patterns for the baby; a 2001 study found that babies who were massaged for 15 minutes before bedtime “showed fewer sleep delay behaviors and had a shorter latency to sleep onset,” than the control group. It can also help to develop babies’ brains. “A baby's brain has 100 billion brain cells at birth, but not many connections (these are known as synapses) between them. These connections are wired up by love, affection and closeness.” It is incredible to think that even before the physiological advantages of baby yoga are considered, simply touching your baby produces so many benefits. 

Proprioceptive awareness is the understanding of and sensitivity to different parts of the body in space. It is a skill that begins before birth; “from about the fifth month of pregnancy,” remarks Charles Fernyhough of his daughter, “she would have known which way was up.” But it is also a skill that can be refined, particularly for babies and children. Baby yoga allows babies to explore their bodies in a safe, fun way that stimulates their proprioception and aids in development. According to the NHS, “our proprioceptive system has receptors located within our muscles and joints. These receptors or sensors are triggered when they are squashed or pulled apart during movement.” In baby yoga the asana is full of gentle encouragement for babies to be active in this way; to push their feet against their mothers’ hands, to reach for fingers to pull themselves up to sitting or standing and to push against the floor in a supported stand pose. “When proprioception is processed well, an individual's body position is automatically adjusted and this helps with every aspect of our day,” the NHS goes on to advise, but a regulated proprioceptive system also “helps us to modulate and calm our stimulation level so that we can focus.” Building up proprioception in babies can help them not only to develop physiologically, but to foster focus and concentration. 

Alongside proprioception is the build up of muscle and ligament strength in babies, which in turn encourages them to take the first step (pun intended!) in their development towards walking. “The central pattern generator for bipedal motion resides in the spinal cord, and it is an heirloom from a distant evolutionary past.” Remarks Charles Fernyhough. “We have the instructions for walking long before our higher-level control processes mature sufficiently to know when and how to implement them.” It is natural for babies to begin the chain of developmental events that will lead to walking, and baby yoga assists in this process through appropriate strengthening of the muscles, as well as encouragement of active, independent movement, such as tummy time. The World Health Organisation recommends that babies under 1 should “be physically active several times a day in a variety of ways, particularly through interactive floor-based play; more is better. For those not yet mobile, this includes at least 30 minutes in prone position (tummy time) spread throughout the day while awake.” Baby yoga gives mothers the encouragement and the skills to practice tummy time and active movement with their babies not only during class, but at home also. This provides an excellent foundation for movement, and a headstart for babies to develop their gross motor skills, leading to crawling, walking and the development of fine motor skills needed in life. 

References

1000 Days of Wonder, Charles Fernyhough

Sleep Problems in Infants Decrease Following Massage Therapy, Tiffany Field and Maria Hernandez‐Reif, https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0300443011680106

Building a close relationship with your baby, NHS website, https://www.nhs.uk/start-for-life/baby/baby-basics/bonding-with-your-baby/building-a-close-relationship-with-your-baby/

Proprioception (body awareness and body position), NHS Website, https://cypf.berkshirehealthcare.nhs.uk/health-and-development/sensory-processing/proprioception-body-awareness-and-body-position/

To grow up healthy children need to sit less and play more, World Health Organisation website, https://www.who.int/news/item/24-04-2019-to-grow-up-healthy-children-need-to-sit-less-and-play-more