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Month at a Glance

At six months your baby may:

Sensory/Intellectual

• begin to use subtle hand and arm gestures to communicate

Physical

• sit up by herself

Social/Emotional

• start mimicking your behavior

Learning to Communicate

Amazingly, this month your baby may reach and gesture with her hands. It might be her way of imitating you or trying to tell you something. But you probably won't notice it. Her communication skills need lots of work. And you're not used to having a baby who says "Give me." Even if it's only with her hands.

Watch your six-month-old closely. You'll see she sometimes tries to use gestures, body language, and eye contact to get her point across. She will also start canonical babbling this month. By paying closer attention to adult speech, she is able to make sentence-like strings of vowels and consonants. It's up to you to guess what she means when she says "Ba ba ba" or "Da la da la."

Sitting Up

Sitting up takes a combination of strength, balance, and coordination. Your baby will probably start with a tripod pose. That means she'll keep her hands on the floor between her legs. Gradually, she'll learn to sit up straight and let go of the floor. By the end of the month, she'll actually play in this position.

Monkey See, Monkey Do

At six months, babies begin what experts call social imitation. Your baby wants to be like you. Open your mouth, and your little monkey will open hers, too. Bang a toy, shake a rattle, splash the bath water, and with a little encouragement, she'll delight in following your lead.