One minute your sweet baby is cooing and babbling, eating mashed peas, kicking their little feet, and relying on you for every single thing.
And the next minute, you’ve got a walking, talking, opinionated — ahem —independenttoddler on your hands. What just happened?
You blinked, and your baby grew up. Your child is in a whole new phase of life and you’ll need to step up your game to meet their changing needs.
But when, exactly, is the big transformation from baby to toddler? Here are 13 signs that your baby is no longer a baby. (Spoiler: It’s probably sooner than you expect.)
根据这一点
Up next for those who simply go by age? Turning into a preschooler, or a child aged 3 to 5.
Do you know why they’re called “toddlers”? Because their uncoordinated movements while they’relearning to walklook like “toddling” (which, coincidentally, also looks like stumbling around as if they’ve had too much to drink… have we mentioned toddlers are a handful?).
Seriously, though, one of the biggest indicators that your baby has taken the leap into toddlerhood comes with some literal leaps — off the couch, down the stairs (putone of these baby gates在你的购物清单上！），穿越操场，走出你的手臂 - 探索自己的两英尺。
Toddlers will also perform more complicated总动力技巧, like jumping, climbing, squatting, and throwing a ball.
Coincidentally, this and other indicators below may happen before或者after the age of 1 year.
Oh, your baby used to happily wear whatever you picked out, eat whatever you served, and go wherever you wanted them to? You can kiss those days goodbye now that you have an independent-minded toddler.
The word of choice for kids in this developmental phase is “no,” and they willneverget tired of saying it right to your face.
It’s all totally normal — as kids start to realize they have their own preferences, they learn that saying “no” sometimes means they get more of what they want and less of what they don’t. Again, normal… but annoying.
No, notthatkind (we hope!). Thinkwaving, clapping, and pointing对象作为与您沟通的手段。您的小孩可能无法说他们才能刚刚将黄色卡车上的黄色卡车刚刚搁浅，但他们正在学习，如果他们指出某些东西，它仍然可以得到他们的信息。
We’ve used the word “independent” a few times already, and that’s because there’s no better adjective to describe just how badly toddlers want to set themselves apart from their parents and figure out their role in the family.
They want to put theirownshoes on. They want to buckle theirowncar seat. They want to choose their own clothes and brush their own teeth and carry their own snack to the living room, and they do not want your help at all.
Don’t feel offended — learning how to take care of themselves is an important developmental milestone.
Speaking of your little one learning to take care of themselves, thereisa bright side: You’re going to get a bit of a break.
Remember how you used to have to sit next to their high chair and feed messy spoonfuls of applesauce into their mouth? No more! Your toddler can sit (supervised) at the table andfeed themselvesnow, freeing up your hands.
您的幼儿可能开始做的其他事情包括穿好衣服，避开他们的玩具，并获得自己的饮料或小吃。
Toddlers still partake mostly in平行游戏(比如一起玩而不是真正的国际米兰active cooperation), but you might start fielding more requests for playdates as your toddler develops preferences for certain peers and their socialization skills start to take off.
Your child may ask for other children by name, wondering what Benjamin from day care or Hazel from down the street is doing today.
Naptime, bedtime, bathtime, dinnertime… really any “time” of day your kid is supposed to be doing something is an opportunity to argue. Why?
Toddlers don’t have a lot of control: We tell them where to go, what to do, what to eat and wear, when to sleep — and it all flies in the face of their growing autonomy.
In an effort to gain even just a teensy bit of power, toddlers may fight about literally anything and everything, no matter how insignificant.
By the time they’re 12 months old, most kids don’t need a bottle or breastfeeding session during the night. That means they may actually be sleeping for one gloriously long block of time (anywhere from 8 to 12 hours) every night.
幼儿也需要每天一两次;根据这一点American Academy of Pediatrics, their total sleep per day should add up to 11 to 14 hours.
While your toddler’s actively growing independence and curiosity may make napping a little trickier, uninterrupted nighttime sleep should be much easier to come by in the toddler years.
Language skillsabsolutely erupt during the toddler years, with most 1-year-olds adding about 50 words to their vocabulary before their second birthday (and anywhere from200岁到200岁到近1,000!).
Where your baby might have only been able to say “Mama,” “Dada,” “baba,” and “up” on their first birthday, pretty soon you won’t be able to do anything or go anywhere without hearing a nonstop stream of descriptors.
最喜欢的毛绒动物，食物和物品 - 以及熟悉的人和地方 - 都有名字，让你和你的幼儿比以往任何时候都更加沟通。
One of the coolest things that develops in the toddler years is an active imagination. Your toddler may start:
- 告诉你愚蠢的故事
- drawing colorful pictures
- practicing their dance moves
- engaging in dramatic play involving lots of pretend scenarios
记忆是幼儿学习的一个关键方法 - 并且重复通常是纪念的最快路线。您的幼儿每天都有几种方式练习数字和信件：
- 唱歌
- 计算玩具
- playing hands-on games
One caveat about relying on screen time to teach numbers and letters. If you want to introduce classics like “Sesame Street,” try to watch with your toddler. TheAAP recommendslimited “co-viewing” from 18 to 24 months, and then just 1 hour of high-quality screen time daily.
当然，婴儿有个性的人 - 但与幼儿相比，他真的让他们的真实颜色在1和3年代之间闪耀。你的孩子更加愚蠢或严重吗？内向或外向？运动或艺术，脉冲或观察者？
All the nuances of personality begin to make themselves clear during the toddler years, as kids not only understand their place in the world but develop ideas about what part they want to play in it.
The toddler years sneak up on you, so once your baby is inching close to their first birthday, get ready!
This phase is full to the brim with challenges, but watching your squishy, immobile little baby turn into a personality-packed tiny human with a mind of their own is worth every power struggle (trust us).