Is Crawling Really Important?

My little guy is just starting to show signs of being ready to crawl.  Just watching the process has me completely fascinated.  People keep telling me that I'm in for it once he learns to crawl, but I must say, I am excited for him.  Crawling might be one of the most amazing parts of a child's developmental process.  It's more than just a mode of transportation, it's a start to real independence.

For years, as a teacher, I have been expressing to parents how important crawling is.  I've told many people that it was an essential part of brain development and that parents of children who went straight to walking should not be excited by this.  I'd learned the information from multiple sources.  Many experts, including pediatricians feel that crawling leads to coordination between the right and left hemisphere of the brain, training them to work together (which has later implications on reading ability and comprehension).  There are some theories that crawling increases binocular vision, which allows the eyes to focus at a distance and then back to a place closer to a person.  This ultimately leads to better proprioception (awareness of one's body in space), vestibular sense (located in the ear and responsible for balance and spatial awareness), and visual sense (which is the ability to absorb and interpret visual information from the environment).  There are also theories on a strong connection between crawling and speech development.  There are muscles in the neck and back of the shoulders that connect the nerves under the tongue.  If you pull your shoulders and neck back (flexing the muscles so your shoulder blades are touching and your head is leaned back), you can feel the tension on your frenulum (the little piece of skin that connects your tongue to the bottom of the mouth and helps control its movements.  Crawling strengthens these muscles, and ultimately this impacts a child's use of his tongue in speech development.

It all makes a lot of sense, a baby definitely needs to coordinate both sides of his body to crawl, and after squeezing my shoulders together and putting my head back, I certainly felt the impact on my tongue.  But, as I watch my little guy start working on crawling, I began to wonder, what is the research that shows a relationship between crawling and stronger intellectual development?  Are babies who skip to walking or crawl less actual in danger of stunting their development?  I know that my little guy seems to desperately want to walk and once he gets up on his hands and knees, I wonder how long he'll actually stay there.  So the information seems pertinent.

And again, I hit the internet and every developmental book I have.  And I found nothing in the way of documented research.  No actual research study showing a relationship between crawling and stronger development.  Instead, I found research studies done in Papua New Guinea that showed an indigenous group who never lets their babies crawl (for health reasons of keeping the child's hands out of the dirt).  These children are not put on their tummies and they are only put down in sitting position on the ground.  And they all walk just fine.  And they all develop at a normal rate.  So, according to this study, crawling does not have an impact on later physical development.  However, it did not look at intellectual development.

I found other sites and research on gifted education suggesting that giftedness and intelligence is based on powering through the developmental milestones, which would meaning that going straight to walking would be a sign of more highly developed intellectual development.  And, while I don't believe this to be entirely true (that when your child hits a milestone is a predictor of intelligence), I did find a pretty strong link between earlier language development and higher intelligence in children.  But again, that all depends on whether or not the measurement of intelligence is really accurate (which is very difficult to do).

So, I got to thinking, if crawling boosts language development, then perhaps it does have an impact on brain development.  I looked for the research on that, and it appears, from what I found, that there definitely is a relationship, but I'm not sure that it's causal.  Crawling is certainly a sign that something is happening in the brain.  So, if there is a delay in crawling (and by delay, I don't mean going straight to walking), then this does signify that something is not going on in the brain that needs to be, both for locomotion and language development.  These delays are serious and should be looked at by a specialist.  However, if your child is on target or early with crawling or walking or scooting, then the research seems to support that your child is developmentally fine.

What I took from all this research is that crawling has an important role in a child's development in at least that it signifies an important aspect of brain development.  And, if you thinking about crawling from a larger perspective, the position the body takes during crawling is clearly an important one.  Even children who have mastered walking (I'm referring to those of elementary age) will still find situations to crawl.  If you take yoga, you have certainly found yourself in crawling position and you have certainly done activities that operate both sides of the body, legs and arms.  The one thing we know for certain is that movement is an essential part of brain development and learning, and all types of movement are beneficial in different ways.  And, at all ages.

So, it seems to make sense that if your child skips crawling or rushes through it, you should not be concerned (it might even be a sign of advancement if your child is hitting many other milestones early as well, if that research can be trusted), but it is always a excellent idea to find ways to encourage or support crawling.  This doesn't mean forcing it or trying to prevent your child from walking (which, believe it or not, I have heard anecdotes of pediatricians and specialists suggesting and I just believe that forcing is the worst way to encourage anything in children), but rather, find fun ways to incorporate crawling in your child's life.  Add it into play by crawling around like animals or going on an obstacle course that involves crawling under a table or under anything you can think of.  Get down on your hands and knees and crawl to see if your child will mimic you.  Buy one of those fun tunnels your child can crawl through.  Hold up a hula-hoop and let your child crawl through it.  Use your imagination, there are lots of ways to encourage crawling.  It also means, don't discourage crawling (unless it's an extremely inappropriate time), because maybe it's just what your child's brain needs.

Watching my little guy start to crawl is really becoming an amazing experience.  It tells me that his brain is really sparked and ready to go, and I must say that complex babbling is really going hand and hand with it.  But, more than language development and brain development, what excites me is that crawling (or any form of locomotion) is bringing him closer to independence.  And, to me, independence is the greatest achievement of all.

If anyone out there knows of any specific research on crawling and brain development, please let me know!