Wednesday, July 28, 2010

:: lil' man falls off his trike ::

My 14-month-old doesn't have much of an attention span. He wanders around from room to room, fiddling with something here and there, dumping things out, throwing them around, and then wandering off to the next object that catches his attention.

This morning, after a two hour epic screamfest, (we're weaning him from bottles and he's not very happy), he indicated that he wanted to go into the basement. I brought him down and he began to play on his trike.

He played for roughly 13 minutes. For him, that's a record breaker. But he took some risks, and fell off. Below I will post the video in double time, slowing down when I hit some key moments. Here are a few times to note:

  • 1:03- He climbs from the back of the bike to stand on the seat. Notice his face afterwards. He looks a little amazed at the world from this height, and very pleased with himself.

    • 3:47- I began to pull his bike away from the play station. I shouldn't have. I stopped immediately as I felt him use his legs to push himself away. I would have felt awful if I had denied him this moment of discovery. 'Rescuing' children is not good for their sense of self esteem and does not allow them to solve their own problems. 
    •  
      • 10:45- The inevitable happens. He slips off his bike (and I have a mini-heart attack). At first I thought he might have hit the table, but he didn't. He is not hurt, but he is very angry with the objects around him and tosses them about. I don't make a big deal about the fall, and after about 30 seconds he gets back on his bike.




      I'm not going to lie, the way he was climbing on it made me nervous. But I believe that children won't learn their own limitations if they are not allowed to take risks. Now he knows that if he stands on the bike seat, it may fall over if he looses his balance.

      It's still scary. I wouldn't have let this happen on the pavement for sure, but it's too hot outside to play on a metal bike and the basement is carpeted, and it was a controlled environment. Next time (when he is not stuck) I will scoot the bike away from the table a little farther (a little too harrowing for me).

      As I write this, he is taking a nap and I may go have myself a nip of liquid courage...

      The end!

      No comments:

      Post a Comment

      Related Posts with Thumbnails