What to Expect the Toddler Years (40 page)

Often, the first primary teeth are uneven, but straighten out as other teeth push their way through. If they don’t, the second teeth give a child a second chance. There is no direct correlation between crooked baby teeth and crooked permanent teeth. But if the irregularities in the baby teeth are due to lack of space (because the child’s teeth are large relative to the size of her mouth), it’s possible that the problem will recur with the permanent teeth.

If your toddler does end up needing orthodontic work (the decision isn’t usually made until age eight at the earliest), there’s good news. Orthodontics are much less expensive than they used to be, are worn for a much shorter time, and are much more esthetically pleasing. What’s more, the good news can only get better in the next seven or eight years as more advances are made in orthodontics.

“Our fifteen-month-old seems to be getting molars now. He’s a lot more miserable with them than he was with his other teeth.”

He’s miserable for good reason. Because of their large size and double edge, first molars (which usually make their appearance sometime between thirteen and nineteen months) are at least twice as hard to cut as incisors—and for many children that means at least twice as much discomfort. Providing your toddler relief from molar teething pain may be doubly elusive, too. He may be soothed by some of the same standbys that helped him through earlier teething episodes: rubbing the gum with a clean finger; a refrigerator-chilled teething ring (don’t use a liquid-filled one, which your child may be able to bite through using his incisors, or a frozen one, which could “burn” his gums) or a partially frozen bagel (once the bagel defrosts, make sure that your toddler can handle the chewed off chunks without choking). Other old standbys are unsafe now that your toddler has teeth: a chilled carrot, for example, because he’s capable of biting off a chokable chunk; and teething biscuits, because their high carbohydrate content could lead to tooth decay if they are mouthed all day long. Rubbing a bit of brandy, scotch, or other spirits on the aching gums, a popular folk remedy for
teething, is not recommended for children at any age. Even tiny amounts of alcohol can be toxic to a child and repeated exposure to the flavor of alcohol could give him a taste for the stuff. If teething pain interferes with your toddler’s eating and sleeping, speak to his doctor about the possibility of administering acetaminophen drops when the pain is at its worst. Don’t give your teether medication or rub anything on his gums without his doctor’s okay. The benefits of topical ointments last only a few minutes, and are not extremely helpful.

Though many children become cranky and feel out of sorts when teething, and may even exhibit mild signs of illness, report any symptoms (fever, diarrhea, cough, and so on) to the doctor; they could be completely unrelated to teething and may need treatment.

Often, night waking problems begin with molar teething: A toddler wakes with pain, cries out, and finds that waking brings him into Mommy and Daddy’s bed or vice versa—so he continues the practice long after the bouts of pain have subsided. If you’d like to avoid such a situation, respond to your child’s discomfort with comforting measures but not with extraordinary ones; though you may intend them to be temporary, your toddler almost certainly won’t. See page 65 for more on night waking.

Children learn more in the first few years of life than in all the years that follow. They learn about relationships and feelings (about trust, caring, and empathy; about anger, fear, jealousy, and resentment), about language (first learning to understand words, then to speak them), about how things work (throw a ball up and it always comes down, turn over a cup of milk and it always spills). One of the most important things they learn—or should learn—is to love learning.

Every child is born curious and this natural curiosity is what propels early learning. But in order for curiosity to continue its creative course, it must be cultivated. When parents encourage a child’s search for knowledge, the child will keep searching, as an active and eager participant in the learning process. When parents discourage the search, the child might be less likely to keep the search up—or, at least, to keep it up with the same eagerness.

To fertilize your toddler’s curiosity so it can blossom into a lifelong love of learning:

Accept, encourage, and answer questions. With so much to learn, it’s not surprising that, once they can speak, toddlers ask so many questions. And though it may be tempting to ignore or put off your toddler after the fiftieth “Wha dat?” of the day, try to resist. All of a young child’s questions deserve answers (though sometimes the best answer to a question is another question; see page 199). When toddlers don’t receive answers to their questions, or receive unsatisfying ones (such as
“Because” or “You’re too young to understand that”), they may stop asking them. Of course, your answers to your child’s questions should be tailored to his or her age; keep explanations short and simple.

Accept and encourage exploration. A toddler’s explorations may turn out to be a parent’s mess. But it’s through the exploratory process that toddlers make their discoveries; the world is full of fascinating things and events that your toddler has to experience in order to learn about them. So resist the impulse to restrain your little explorer in the name of cleanliness or tidiness. You may prevent important learning experiences. (Giving your child freedom to explore doesn’t mean putting home, hearth, and your toddler’s safety in jeopardy, however; see page 241.)

Accept and encourage experimentation. The inquiring toddler’s mind wants to know. What happens when I remove the leaves from the plant in the foyer? When I throw sand in a playmate’s face? Or when I throw a toy car across the room? Of course, while you don’t want to allow your budding scientist to destroy your home single-handedly while testing hypotheses, you don’t want to inhibit the impulse to experiment, either. When experiments take a turn for the destructive or the dangerous, stop them, but make it clear that you object to the result of the experiment, not the process. (“I know that you wanted to see what would happen if you poured water over the side of the tub, but the water has to stay in the tub.”) Then redirect the inquiring mind. (“Let’s see what happens when you pour water into this boat.”) To bring out the scientist in your toddler while saving your home, devise experiments that can be conducted under controlled conditions: Blow the fuzz off of a dandelion, pour sand through a strainer, mix food coloring with sudsy water in the kitchen sink. For more on experiments suitable for toddlers, see page 456.

Expose your toddler to a variety of environments. Museums, playgrounds, supermarkets, malls, toy stores, parks, zoos, a busy city sidewalk—almost any safe and appropriate locale can provide learning experiences for the young. Most toddlers pick up plenty through the power of observation; you can enhance what your toddler picks up by asking questions and adding some observations of your own.

Expose your toddler to a variety of experiences. Swinging on a swing, shimmying down a slide, splashing in wading pool, planting flowers, pulling weeds, playing ball, stirring flour into cake batter, scribbling with a crayon (see page 54), setting the table, ringing the doorbell, pushing the elevator button. The possibilities are endless and everywhere. The experience alone is valuable, but your commentary (“See, the harder you push the swing, the higher up it goes” or “Watch, when you push the button, the red light goes on”) can help make them more valuable still.

Expose your toddler to fantasy. For a toddler, there’s as much to be learned from fantasy—in books, movies, videos, and the occasional television show—as there is from real life. Encourage make-believe in your toddler’s play: In the world of fantasy, your child can be a grown-up at a tea party, a squirrel in the forest, the Cat in the Hat or Curious George—just about anyone or anything he or she would like to be (see page 365).

Discourage excessive TV viewing. The fastest way to click off a mind is to click on the television set. True, a child can pick up information by watching carefully selected children’s television programs (the alphabet, colors, counting), but the learning is passive. It doesn’t encourage children to learn on their own, as active participants in the learning process. Children who learn from TV
tend to expect answers to come to them in the form of glitzy, fast-moving graphics, dancing animals, and catchy tunes. They become complacent learners, their natural impulse to make their own discoveries is suppressed. So limit the television viewing, and when your toddler does watch, stay involved yourself (see page 162).