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Social & Emotional Development
Developing Relationships with Peers & Adults
WiseTip: SE-REL-M0818-P01C

Play games like “Peek-a-Boo” where your baby can imitate your sounds, tone of voice, gestures or facial expressions.

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  1. New Jersey Birth to Three Early Learning Standards. (2013). New Jersey Council for Young Children.

  2. Fiese, B. H. (1990). Playful relationships: A contextual analysis of mother-toddler interaction and symbolic play. Child Development, 61(5), 1648–1656. https://doi.org/10.2307/1130772 (Level IV)

8-18 months
Play
WHY IT MATTERS

Young children benefit significantly from having play partners.

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  1. Ginsburg, K.R. (2007). The importance of play in promoting healthy child development and maintaining strong parent-child bonds. Pediatrics, 119(1): 182–191. (Level IV)
By six months, infants can communicate with other infants by smiling, touching and babbling and can participate in group communication.
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  1. Selby, J.M., and B.S. Bradley. (2003). Infants in groups: A paradigm for study of early social experience. Hum. Dev. 46:197–221. (Level III)
 Playing games where they can imitate one another (with an adult facilitating) helps them to self-regulate, take turns and learn skills for social interaction in a free and fun manner.

Playing with others enhances children's development of social skills, language and learning abilities. When a child becomes a toddler, having an adult as a play partner helps the child develop self-direction, turn-taking and reciprocity.

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  1. Fiese, B. H. (1990). Playful relationships: A contextual analysis of mother-toddler interaction and symbolic play. Child Development, 61(5), 1648–1656. https://doi.org/10.2307/1130772 (Level IV)
Free, non-directive play, which allows the child to take the lead in play, was found to be most effective for developing these skills.
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  1. Kwon, K.-A., Bingham, G., Lewsader, J., Jeon, H.-J., & Elicker, J. (2013). Structured Task versus Free Play: The Influence of Social Context on Parenting Quality, Toddlers’ Engagement with Parents and Play Behaviours, and Parent-Toddler Language Use. Child & Youth Care Forum, 42(3), 207–224. (Level IV)

  2. Gardner-Neblett, N., Holochwost, S.J., Gallagher, K.C., Iruka, I.U., Odom, S.L., & Pungello,E.P. (2016). Guided versus independent play: Which better sustains attention among infants and toddlers? Society for Research on Educational Effectiveness (SREE). (Level III)