My baby would come up to me and reach and tug to try to pull himself up on my lap. I’d then ask him if he wanted to come UP. He’d get excited so I would make him do the sign properly first by signing DAD to get my attention, then do the sign for UP to indicate to me that he wanted up. This story might end there, but there’s more. I had bookmarked a few images collections on the internet in various locations and he’d ask to see a specific thing or animal. At one point he was really into the MOON, FROGS and MONKEYS (an odd combo yeah for sure) so I found him a few image banks. We’d spend ten minutes, easily, scrolling from image to image. Best of all was that it was him calling the shots. None of the images but one were visible on the screen at a time, but he would call out what he wanted to see and I would scroll over. This made him bounce in delight! So we’d go from the moon and back to the monkey over and over again. I wonder what this sort of power does to a baby’s self esteem? He asks for something, it’s reasonable to give it to him, and he gets it! Brilliant! When he got keen on frogs, I found him a clip on YouTube of a bullfrog. That was a hit. We’d play it over and over again. At the end of the clip out came the MORE sign!
Yeah, it wasn’t all that stimulating for Dad, but for my son, it was everything he wanted in the moment and in the order he wanted it. Once satisfied, he’d always run off a busy himself with his toys or books. I sincerely believe that children need to be “topped up” every once. If they’re light on attention, they seek out Mom or Dad or whoever for that care. Once they are full on that, they move onto something else that they are light on. I really don’t see children as being any different than adults whom seem to also be constantly trying to keep all their different “tanks” full.