Postnatal Motor Skills Development
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Motor skills are generally divided into gross motor
skills and fine motor skills . Gross motor skills refer to
those involving large muscle activities, while fine refers to more finely
tuned activities such as finger dexterity.
Gross motor skills
At birth the infant has no real co-ordination of the chest
or arms but by 1 month can lift its head from a prone position. By about
3 months, the infant can hold its chest up and use the arms for support
after being in a prone position. At 3-4 months, infants can roll over,
and by 4-5 months can support some weight with their legs. At 6 months
most infants can sit without support and by 7-8 months they can crawl
and stand without support. At about 8 months, infants can pull themselves
up to a standing position and at 10/11 months they can walk while holding
on to furniture and the like. By 12-13 months the average infant can walk
without assistance (but uneasily and only a few steps).
It should be noted that these figures are for reference
only and these milestones can vary by 2 to 4 months. What is fairly uniform
is the order in which this sequence of events happens.
Fine motor skills
Infants have hardly any control over fine motor skills
at birth, although they have many components of what will become highly
tuned arm, hand and finger movements (cf. an ). The development of such behaviours as grasping and reaching
become increasingly more refined over the first 2 years of life. The maturation
of over the first
2 years of life is also reflected in the improvement of fine motor skills.
The information in this page is presented in summarised form and has been taken
from the following source(s):
1.
Child Development , 6th Edition (1994), J. W. Santrock, Wm. C. Brown
Communications, Inc.
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Introduction
