Building towers at 16 months

[Kimmy050983]

Hi,

i am not a childminder yet but have got a 16 months old son.
His gross motor skills are actually delayed (he has diagnosed lax muscles (hypotonia) and we are working every day on that, he can now pull himself up and walk around furniture). He is VERY advanced in his fine motor skills though. At the moment (for the last 7 days) he is very very interested in building towers. It all accidentally started when we played with his lanka kade noah´s ark and I stacked up some wooden animals. he started stacking them up himself and in the course of 24 hours managed to stack up 18 (!!) animals all on his own (i dont help at all ) .he turns them around in both hands to get the right angle and he claps his hands after each one of them and is soo proud . it´s gorgeous! Today he stacked up all 10 pieces of his ELC shape sorter on top of the edge of the shape sorter itself :eek:
(it´s the old version of this one which has got 10 pieces: ELC shape sorter (http://www.elc.co.uk/toy/wooden-shape-sorter-new/))

I am still shocked how well he is doing this and he absolutely loves it. I am wondering what would be the next step here? He certainly is really enjoying the challenge so maybe someone has got an idea of a toy/activity which he would like :)

Thank you (and I don´t want to boast just a very proud mummy at the moment!!)

Kimmy x

[Mookins]

:clapping: :clapping: :clapping: :welldone: :magnificent: :goodjob: :excited:

(sorry love smilies)
well done thats brilliant loud and proud thats what I say

x xx

[Kimmy050983]

I can tell you love smilies :laughing: :laughing: they are great aren´t they? i love this one::idea:

[Mookins]

I love this one...so sweet:waving:
have yet to find a reason for this one though hehehe:cheerleader:

[cuddlybunny38]

My grandson also has a form of this, he is nearly 11 mths old and has just learnt to sit up unaided, cant be left though as after a while topples over. isnt crawling but will roll all over the floor. he has been to phsyio and has exercises to do daily.x

[Pauline]

You have every right to boast and be proud, well done to your little one :clapping::clapping:

[Heaven Scent]

Well done to him,

When it comes to next steps I'd suggest anything that involves developing his fine motor movements developing smaller and smaller movements - I'd also teach single words for the items he is stacking just the names of the objects - don't introduce 2 concepts as well as the name of the item e.g. just say things like square, triangle, etc - don't say green square, blue triangle etc.

He willl be developing these skills because his brain is not being used to develop his gross motor skills and unlike other children of his age he is sitting more so is in a position to concentrate so I would capitalise on this - later when he can walk he will be playing catch up on developing his gross motor skills so don't worry if he loses interest in this type of activity!!!!