Creating a Safe Environment that Helps them Learn…then Giving them Space to Grow
"Once we had created a space that is this safe, we could just say "yes" to any of the activities within it, which encourages independence, curiosity, experimentation, and confidence as the twins get used to making their own choices."
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(TG = Twin Girl, TB = Twin Boy)
Creating a safe environment for them to independently explore was critical for us. Particularly once the twins were able to roll about, and usually having only one of us parents around, it was impossible to keep track of both at once if they headed in separate directions! We initially used a playpen for this, and eventually cordoned off a room we are lucky enough to be able to dedicate to them.
The idea is to create a space that is so safe, in theory it's where if your baby was left on her own all day (obviously never do this!), she would be hungry, upset, and need a new nappy when you returned, but she would be physically unharmed. Once we had created a space that is this safe, we could just say "yes" to any of the activities within it, which encourages independence, curiosity, experimentation, and confidence as the twins get used to making their own choices.
Practically we needed to ensure that there is nothing available that they could harm themselves with, or pull down on themselves (so we had to check shelving and furniture that we might otherwise assume would be fine). In the UK the plug protectors that you push into the sockets are not considered safe by some, and while it seems UK plug sockets are fairly safe by design, for the childproof rooms I used protectors that cover the entire socket to be on the safe side. It wasn't just the physical space though that we made appropriate, we matched the toys and activities we were doing with the twins developmental needs at a given age, for example starting with munari mobiles which are designed to help develop an infant's senses and concentration, then as they grew moving on to toys that helped them with their gripping and hand dexterity, of course ensuring they were safe if they were left in the twins reach.
Our natural instinct was to be there all the time and “help” them with whatever they were doing. However, with twins, this is immediately a practical issue when you are on your own and they both want attention at the same time! We also knew that if the twins got into the habit of being entertained by us, they would expect it all the time (physically not possible!), along with negative impacts to intrinsic motivation and creativity of us essentially "distracting them" form their internal curiosity. The key for me was to understand that babies are absolutely incredible, are naturally curious, and will do a sterling job of exploring and learning for themselves as the world is such a new an exciting place for them. Of course, showing them how things work and role modelling is important - a basic understanding of what they are trying to do was important to underpin intrinsic motivation, but I can’t think of a time I needed to show them something more than once or twice, then I could then leave them to it! Sure, it took them many attempts to master an activity, but they got the concept straight away, it’s pretty mind blowing when you see this in action! I still often have to place my hands firmly in my pockets so I don't interfere when they are working through the process of learning and failing, but there is no feeling quite like watching your child persist and master something for themselves, they get so happy and proud of themselves!
We also had to be really careful about “dictating'' play - in order to “follow the child” we would prepare a small selection of appropriate toys and activities, and then leave them to choose and work with that toy until they decided they wanted to change, rather than us being responsible for deciding what was played with when. We started this really early by placing a selection of toys within reach of the twins so they could grab the one that they preferred, rather than just handing them one.
Overall, there was a big mindset change here, that our job was not to "entertain" and make life easy for the twins, but was to create a safe and comfortable environment for them to grow and learn (including being challenged and experiencing failure), and then intervene as little as possible.
That all said, there was still plenty of interaction with the twins, helping hem setting up new activities, role modelling and of course providing lots of love and reassurance just through your presence. Over time though, I became really conscious of when I might inadvertently be robbing the twins of a learning opportunity, and should back off. In coaching we ask ourselves all the time "why am I asking this question, for myself or the client?", I found it helpful to ask myself the same thing when interacting wit the twins "am I doing this for myself, or the twins?". It became a real pleasure to spend time sat in their playroom observing them discovering things for themselves, with a little narration and open ended questions when they seemed stuck or frustrated and the odd cheeky cuddle when they wanted one.
What went well?
This change in mindset certainly had its moments and I found it was almost impossible to get 100% “right” in terms of judging what too much, or too little intervention was. The rewards of seeing the twins explore, learn and grow on their own terms, way more quickly than I would have expected, made the occasional frustration absolutely worth it.
I think this is one instance where having twins was actually helpful in terms of forcing us to follow the principle - it’s just not possible as a single adult looking after two babies to give them the same level of focus we would one on one. Once we saw how capable they were, and gave them more space it became obvious that we could and should step back and let them crack on! It is of course still hard not to want to bundle in and show them how to do everything and correct them, but honestly the reward of watching them get it for themselves (way quicker than we expected) is like nothing else!
I certainly don't think measuring how quickly a child develops is massively important (who remembers comparing walking ages with schoolmates or chucking it on your CV? No, didn't think so!). All children are individuals and progress at their own speed, but I wouldn't have been surprised if ours had been a little behind the typical curve due to our approach. I honestly think that all things considered, the twins actually progressed well, and had a fantastic grasp of what they were learning through the low intervention approach. I believe that this is because they had better intrinsic motivation and through allowing them to fail and learn, they developed in a very rounded and self confident way.
Finally, self directed play (i.e. leaving them to it for a bit) not only gave them some real time to focus without us as a distraction (I often find them focussing on single toy/task for 30 mins+ now), but also gave us a bit of a welcome break/time to keep on top of other chores and demands (loo anyone?! 🚽🤣).
What was hard and what would we do differently?
Keeping them safe, especially as they become more mobile and ambitious is probably the biggest challenge - should you let them stand and then fall, and how much...🤔 There is no right answer, and the best answer we found was creating a really forgiving environment for whatever task the are attempting, without reducing the challenge. Similarly, as they became stronger, pretty much anything was moveable (chairs, bookcases, shelves, everything!), and/or useable as a climbing frame, so we had to watch out for them finding new and novel ways to use things that had previously been "safe", and if necessary remove that item and reintroduce it later when we thought they had moved on from that type of play and exploration, or were just big enough for it to not be an issue anymore. With furniture we realised we always needed to consider how things might be slid around and tipped over, trying to position it so that this not possible (thick playmats are great to stop sliding!) or even better securing them to a wall (also needed to be done in a child safe way!).
As the twins tried new things, or got themselves into challenging positions, I found the most important thing was not to overreact, as the twins would react to your reaction, which was pretty much guaranteed to knock them off a precarious perch! In fact, I felt like our job as the adult was to be a beacon of calmness and reassurance, not jumping in whenever the twins did something novel or made us feel a little nervous. This helped them take the time to figure out how to un-pickle themselves and then, if they were still stuck, they would usually actively ask for help. I got into the habit of having my hands in my pocket so that whenever I felt the need to intervene it just took a few more seconds and a bit more of a conscious effort, during which time often the twins would often sort themselves out independently. Where there isn’t immediate danger or urgency, just talking them through the situation and giving them plenty of time to figure it out before I intervened is also something I tried to master, albeit a real hand clincher at times 😧
1. A safe environment was critical both in order to allow the twins freedom and independence to learn and experience things on their own terms, and also so that practically when a single adult was looking after both twins, there was a safe way to contain them!
2. The idea is to create a space that is so safe, in theory it's where if your baby was left on her own all day (obviously never do this!), she would be hungry, upset, and need a new nappy when you returned, but she would be physically unharmed. Physically this meant ensuring there were no hazardous furniture or toys, and that the twins were safely contained. This allows you to say "yes" to every activity within the space, encouraging curiosity, confidence and independence.
3. We matched toys and activities to their developmental stages, so for example initially we gave them things that were simple and easy to see and handle, to help with gripping and hand eye coordination.
4. Babies are absolutely incredible, they will do an absolutely sterling job of exploring and learning for themselves as the world is such a new an exciting place for them! We showed them how things worked and role modelled, but they usually got the concept straight away and would slowly over time master the activity with minimal input from us.
5. I still often have to place my hands firmly in my pockets so I don't interfere when they are slowly but surely learning and even failing , but there is no feeling quite like watching your child persist and master something for themselves, they get so happy and proud of themselves!
6. We would leave them to decide when they wanted to change activity, and what to, rather than us being responsible for deciding what was played with when and trying to “entertain”.
7. Despite this low intervention approach, the twins seem to be developing at at least an average rate, if not faster.
8. Judging what level of intervention was "right" was really tough, as was assessing how much risk was ok for them to take and have available to them in their "safe" environment. Getting it right was almost impossible, so we found the best approach was to really double down and make the environment as age appropriate and forgiving as possible, whilst still containing enough to challenge and aid their development.
9. We tried to remain calm and use narration to get the twins to work their way through any really sticky challenges, reminding ourselves that how we reacted would set the tone for how the twins reacted, maybe forever...no pressure!