9 Months: Milestones in a Baby's Development

Babies never stop growing! A baby at 9 months is at a stage of real adventure and discovery. Human beings have such an enormous capacity for learning, especially with an environment that facilitates it.

As we’ve said before, these milestones in a baby’s development are approximate; they are not exact. It’s important to emphasize that each baby goes at their own rhythm. Some take longer to do things that others learn early on. But this shouldn’t alarm you or make you try to force it. Your pediatrician will be with you every step of the way, there to answer all your questions as your baby develops.

A baby’s development at 9 months

When babies get to 9 months, they will have become true explorers. They will constantly want to be exploring the house and people in his life. We’re in the presence of a little human that wants to see and touch everything, no stone left unturned.

They’re no longer very interested in being held. A 9-month-old now wants to investigate the world from the ground, touching it with their own hands. Crawling becomes their way of getting around — sometimes at surprising speed. But if they have too much freedom it could be dangerous.

We must therefore be especially careful in this phase of our baby’s development. You’ll have to be very attentive and vigilant as they explore. Make sure to  prepare your house to make it a safe place for adventures, because they’ll want to go absolutely everywhere!

Having a 9-month-old explorer: be careful

Since they can now pull themselves up with the support of different items around them, or sometimes even without support, we must exercise extreme caution. We’ll need to cover over the plugs, for one thing. We’ll also have to place our valuables well out of reach on top of furniture.

If we have stairs we’ll need stair gates. We’ll also need to be careful with drawers that are at their height, since they’ll be able to open them and remove their contents without any problem.

We’ll also notice them becoming real chatterboxes, happily imitating whatever they hear us say. It’s great fun to see how they mimic our voices! They’ll reproduce every sound in such a way that they’ll really seem to be having an interesting conversation.

First words and imitation

Our little one should be able to say their first word at around 9 months — if not before. Surprisingly, that word isn’t always Mom or Dad. But it’ll be a word that will make sense. Their “conversations” are sounds that imitate their parents or pets, shrieks etc. They like to play with their voice and all the possibilities it allows them. They appreciate sound and visual stimuli even more at this stage of their development.

Your baby is like a sponge. And we are their role models. What an honor and responsibility! We can help them in their growth by stimulating their senses and challenging their abilities.

How to stimulate your baby at 9 months

Regarding speech, we should be pointing to objects or animals and saying their names while they look at us. If they can see us, they can imitate the movements we make with our mouths and associate them more naturally with the object we’re pointing to.

They love any games that have to do with putting objects in containers and taking them out again. It helps them develop their spatial abilities. We will also be strengthening their understanding of cause and effect, which they’ll use to predict what will happen in certain situations.

As you can see, 9 months is a very full and interesting stage in your baby’s development. They have so much potential. Your little 9-month-old will never stop amazing you! And this is just the beginning…