Why are growth milestones important for children?

Growth milestones provide us important clues about the child's development and overall health. When your child reaches the milestones for his age, it shows that he is developing the way he is supposed to. On the other hand, not reaching milestones or reaching them much later than children the same age can be the earliest indication that a child may have a developmental delay.

A child's weight and height are the most important milestones. But, there are various other factors that are important to a child's growth.

Typically, growth milestones are divided into the following categories:

• Physical development: such as crawling, walking, catching a ball, or eating with a spoon.

• Mental/cognitive development: such as reaching for a toy, or exploring things by shaking or throwing them.

• Social/emotional development: such as smiling, showing affection, and cooperating with instructions.

• Communication/language development: such as babbling, trying to speak, imitating words, or remembering rhymes.

Over the course of the next few weeks, we will cover the growth milestones that are important for children of different ages, starting with two months and going up to 5 years. To know more about them, stay tuned, or reach out to me here.