Child Development: Your guide to the first five years: part 1 - A holistic view

There is something timeless about the face of a newborn baby, and as they gaze intently at a carer's face, it is hard not to think about what their future might be. At the same time, while we may think about this baby's future in an abstract way, it can be quite hard to really see the child as a future adult, just as it is sometimes hard for us to remember being a child - let alone a baby.

Yet that journey from infancy to adulthood is one we all make, and the person we become rests in so many important ways on the early stages of that journey. There is so much 'growing up' to do mentally and physically, so much to learn. There are so many things we know in our day-to-day life and take for granted - about people and ourselves, our environment, including the shape and colour of things, the way we can recognise someone by their walk or their voice as well as their face, or know how someone is feeling by their facial expression and/or tone of voice, the way we know a cup is still a cup whether it is seen from the side, the top or upside down, the way we know that a sparrow and an eagle are both birds. All this and so much more are discovered through the care, opportunities provided and the interventions of the adults around us.