Do you need to encourage babies to crawl?

How can you encourage your baby to crawl?

Of course you can't make your baby crawl if it's not ready yet. But you can certainly create conditions that make learning to crawl easier and more appealing for your baby.

Provide incentives: You can encourage your baby to crawl, by rolling a ball across the floor or placing a toy out of reach. Children are curious and will try especially hard to reach the toy.

Tip: Also crawling rolls playfully stimulate babies' urge to move and support their early development in many ways: they can roll it away from themselves, crawl after it and discover many things along the way.

Create optimal conditions: Crawling on slippery floors or in clothing that is too tight/too warm is no fun. For starters, a carpet, tights or a soft cotton pants with an elastic waistband that allow freedom of movement.

Tip: With crawling shoes, babies are on their first exploratory tours on all fours and the first little steps comfortable, warm and non-slip on the go. A perfect foundation for crawling attempts are crawling mats which – depending on their features – can be used indoors or outdoors and can be taken anywhere.

Open your arms: Sit down on the floor and spread your arms invitingly or call your child, so that it can crawl straight into your arms – this makes crawling a shared goal.
Crawl along: What may seem odd at first glance is, from a baby's perspective, a great thing: Mom and Dad are practically at eye level and demonstrate the movements. In addition, when parents crawl with their baby, they can keep potential danger situations well in view and the extra movement isn't bad either.

My baby doesn't crawl: When do I need to help my baby crawl?

When same-age babies are already energetically zipping around but your own child still shows no interest in crawling, many parents feel uncertain. In most cases there is no reason to worry. Some babies begin to crawl as early as 6 months to crawl, others only start at 10 months when they can already sit up independently.

It happens that babies don't crawl at all,but instead move forward by scooting or rolling until they pull themselves up and begin to walk.

Motor development proceeds individually in all children, therefore the following information about when a child reaches a particular developmental milestone should only be understood as guidelines.

Overview of developmental stages:

Scooting	at around 7 months of age
Crawling	at around 8 ½ months of age
Standing freely with help	at around 11 ½ months of age
Walking independently	at around 13 months of age

When and whether your baby crawls is up to them

You can support your baby in learning to crawl, but you should not force anything and certainly should not despair if your baby is not yet crawling.

When help may be necessary

In rare cases, a blockage in the neck or shoulder area may be the reason why a child does not crawl. One sign of this can be that the baby moves in a very atypical way, for example rolling across the floor instead of scooting or crawling. Often such restrictions are the result of a complicated birth and go unnoticed until a baby becomes more mobile. A visit to an osteopath clarifies whether your baby has a restriction or simply needs a bit more time to start crawling.

Tips to encourage crawling: What to watch out for when your baby starts to crawl

Give time and space: You don't learn to crawl in a day. A baby needs time and quiet, to develop their muscles and gain the necessary coordination.
Have confidence: It does little good if you give your child support; in the worst case it can even be harmful if you put them into a crawling position when their muscles are not yet strong enough. Trust in your child's abilities and allow them their own pace.
Be there: Don't let your child crawl around the house alone. Even if everything seems childproof, there is a risk of accidents. Also, crawling is much more fun when the parents are there to give plenty of praise.
Secure the home: With crawling age, everything comes within reach: room doors, cupboard doors, pet food bowls, sockets and unfortunately stairs. Make the home childproof in time, e.g., by securing or removing wobbly shelves and decorative items and installing a baby gate at the stairs.

More help and tips on how to best support your baby's crawling can be found here: