The bear in the square. When should toddler be able to find the bear??

[snadaska]

Hi,

I am wondering at what age a toddler should be able to point at pictures like in a book such as The Bear in the Square. When did your dc do this?

[Chamomile Girl]

My kid does it, but mostly with cats . He can spot the cat on just about any page (and IRL)...and its his favorite part of Goodnight Moon. He's been doing this since about 13 months.

[thehighernest]

I have NO idea what's "normal." I'm sure like with so many other things, there is some range? I would say that my son has been pointing to objects in books in response to "Where's ______?" since about 15 months probably? But he's barely verbal now at 18 months, whereas my friend's DS was speaking the words at 15 months. I'll try to see if I have any books that name what the usual range is for this.

[St. Margaret]

There's gotta be a big range. DD loved doing that with that book well before a year, but a friend mentioned her son starting to do it on his own at around a year and everyone agreeing it was a fun time... it also depends on the thing. DD could find moons crazy early, but she's my moon-baby I always say. Always interested in them.

[ellemenope]

It is an 18 month milestone.

But, according to this only 50% of 19 month olds can point out two pictures.

[ASusan]

Not sure of the book and the exact task it requires. Is it finding the bear? The square? or the combo of the 2 (like there are 2 bears, but only one is in the square)?

In any respect, DS was 24 mos when he really got into the first "I Spy" board books. Complex picture on the right, simple picture on the left which is to be found in the more complex picture. So, find the football in the larger picture.

http://www.scholastic.com/ispy/image...image1/120.jpg

He would not be able to find a square, as he did not know his shapes at 24 mos. But, if there were a picture of a bear in a square, he could do a visual search for that exact same image, if that makes sense.

[thehighernest]

OP, ellemenope beat me to the same source I was looking for! Looks like anywhere from 18 to 24 months is in range?

[CassnBeth]

Wait...do you mean simply pointing to a clear picture in a book? Or do you mean an abstract image ie. a picture made out of tangrams? Or visual discrimination like the I Spy books where the picture is in a very visually busy context?

For my daughter these were all separate skills -- she got clear photos around ten months or a little earlier, the I Spy books as soon as we bought one for her first birthday and she still can't identify any kind of item made out of tangrams or blocks or anything like that.

[snadaska]

The book has a bear on each page in different scenes (bear in a swimming pool, bear sleeping in a cave, etc). One activity to do with the book is to ask your dc "where's the bear?" I was just wondering at one point should dd be able to do this.

Thanks for the link showing that it is an 18 month milestone.

[physmom]

Originally Posted by snadaska

The book has a bear on each page in different scenes (bear in a swimming pool, bear sleeping in a cave, etc). One activity to do with the book is to ask your dc "where's the bear?" I was just wondering at one point should dd be able to do this.

Thanks for the link showing that it is an 18 month milestone.

DD's been able to point out objects in a book since she was well under a year old. However, I looked on amazon at that book and the page it showed was "can you find the diamonds on the crown?". While she could find the crown there is no way in the world she'd pick out the diamonds. In general she really loves I Spy sort of games but she doesn't know her shapes yet besides circles.

[crunchy_mommy]

I think DS was around 8 mos old when he could point to something like that -- but at that age, only very familiar things like a puppy or a kitty. Now at 19mos he can point to pretty much anything you ask him to (and also can find some shapes like triangles, in fact pointed some out to me that were part of these little tiny 1cm houses in his book, I was shocked, but he always seems to shock me with things -- like he picks up a shape from his shape sorter & says "pentagon", he's very into shapes and numbers and technical stuff)... I'm curious about the bear in the square, I like the title lol!

[colsxjack]

My DD is 14 months and just started doing this for objects she is familiar with but not obsessed about. But has been doing it for her obsessions like "teddy" "dog" "cat" and "book" for a about 4 months now.

[Blessed_Mom]

My DD has been pointing to various shapes (animals, balls, aeroplanes etc.) from 8 mos old too. We have an alphabet book with about 7-8 shapes for each alphabet (a has aeroplane, ant, apple, axe, accordion etc.) and so on. When she was just under an year she could accurately point to about 50 shapes in the whole alphabet book. We thought it could be just learning by heart (without really understanding what a horse was for example)....
When she was 13 mos old we went to my sister's place and my niece had different books of animals and shapes (different shaped horse, lion etc.). She pointed out the ones she knew accurately again. Everyone was amazed.
I think she exceeded in that milestone maybe....

On the other hand ..she is 15 mos now and only speaks about 20 words LOL.

[ellemenope]

Originally Posted by thehighernest

OP, ellemenope beat me to the same source I was looking for! Looks like anywhere from 18 to 24 months is in range?

He he.

I know. It kind of blows my mind. I looked and looked for a list that had it as an earlier milestone and could not find a single one.

I can't remember when DD started pointing out things in a book (at the time I did not know this was a thing,) but I do have a video of her at 10 months 'reading' Goodnight Gorillaby pointing to the gorilla on each page and saying "gorilla".

Maybe MDCers read to their kids more than the general population?

[mckittre]

My son started pointing at things at around 10 months. Which is pretty much the same time he could start pointing to pictures in books when asked. But his repertoire was fairly limited - he could have pointed to "bear" when asked, but wouldn't have known "bear in the square". Moon was his first word (at 13 months) and he loved finding the semi-hidden moons in Goodnight Gorilla. Now he's 19 months and could do most tasks of this sort, provided he's looking for something he recognizes (knows colors and animals, but not shapes or letters). Though he doesn't point much in books any more, since he speaks fairly well and just talks about the pictures.

[thehighernest]

Originally Posted by ellemenope

He he.

I know. It kind of blows my mind. I looked and looked for a list that had it as an earlier milestone and could not find a single one.

I can't remember when DD started pointing out things in a book (at the time I did not know this was a thing,) but I do have a video of her at 10 months 'reading' Goodnight Gorillaby pointing to the gorilla on each page and saying "gorilla".

Maybe MDCers read to their kids more than the general population?

I wonder the same thing, too! Plus the milestone is just for pointing at 2 pictures it seems. Of course, it could just be false pride on my end, too, LOL. I notice at day care that DS is one of the few who surrounds himself with books and needs special time at the beginning and end of the day to work on puzzles. But it may be because we do so much of that at home.

Like I mentioned earlier though, he's just now starting to talk a little, so no way could he have actually said the words for anything in his books up until now. But he can point to countless objects. Shapes...only sometimes, mostly circles. Colors, mostly just yellow still.

I think the other thing to remember is that just because they CAN doesn't mean they WILL. Plenty of times he looks at me like "okay, enough with asking me where things are. I know what the stupid bicycle looks like, okay?" And I should add that he has one particular book which is specifically meant to help them locate an object, in this case, a duck, and he just has no interest in the book. So he'd find a duck in other books, but not in that one.

I'll have to look into the aforementioned I Spy books...

[redvlagrl]

Hmmm, I think DD was pointing out dogs in books for about a year, maybe earlier. She also found things on pages that were really tiny that I hadn't noticed. But she was always really into books.

I think there is probably a wide range as with most thing. For instance, DD has known all her colours from about 19 mths (slightly 'early' I think) but it's because she's obsessed with colouring. On the other hand, her knowledge of vehicles is definitely worse than vehicle obsessed toddlers I know. To DD they are all cars, trucks, buses or tractors (not bulldozers, diggers, steamrollers etc)