Your Baby’s Development: 5 months old
Your baby at 5 months is actively exploring the world around him/her. He/she is aware of the environment and enjoys exploring it visually. His/her eyes are moving together more consistently and the development of depth perception has begun. Through hand to foot play, he/she is continuing to develop body awareness and an understanding of how his/her body moves. Increased stability in your baby’s core and shoulders as well as advances in vision allows for improved coordination, resulting in a fairly accurate reach. Your baby can now grasp objects with a palmar grasp, explore them visually, and bring them to his/her mouth, even his/her toes!
Supine (On Baby’s Back)
Your 5-month-old has gotten much stronger in this position! He/she can easily maintain the head in midline, reach with fairly good accuracy, tuck the chin to visually explore toys, and bring toys to the mouth. Your 5-month-old is also able to play with the feet and bring feet to mouth, an important milestone in developing body awareness and providing tactile stimulation to the bottom of the feet. Hand to foot play also plays an important role in the development of your baby’s abdominals as he/she preps to roll and participate in more advanced motor patterns. Your baby may be able to roll from his/her back to the side and may briefly right the head (lift up the head against gravity) while in the sidelying position. Reaching usually occurs bilaterally, meaning reaching with both hands at once, however one hand usually reaches and grasps a toy before the other. Your 5-month-old may begin to manipulate toys or pass them between hands. He/she enjoys inspecting toys in multiple ways to figure out the best way to interact with them: visually, with his/her mouth, banging or shaking toys. He/she is able to adjust his/her hand based on visual information alone prior to grasping an object; he/she continues to make adjustments from tactile information once he/she has reached the object. Your baby can also reach arms upwards to you in preparation of being picked up and can hold a bottle, but may require assist to maintain a good position on the bottle.
Prone (Tummy Time)
Your baby’s head control in tummy time is almost completely developed! He/she can flex/extend, and turn his/her head in all directions during tummy time. He/she is also able to prop on the forearms and can push up onto extended arms with hands open. Reaching during tummy time has developed, as your baby can now shift their weight to one arm to enable reaching for a toy with the other arm; he/she can also play with a toy while propped on elbows. Your 5-month-old may be able to roll belly to back, however likely does so by “falling” rather than rolling in a more controlled manner. He/she continues to use the pivot prone position, also known as “swimming” or “flying”; in this position, your baby extends his/her arms and legs, rocks back and forth, and then returns to a forearm propping position; this demonstrates the 5-month-old’s early coordination of the muscles on all sides of the body!
Sitting
Your 5-month-old baby can maintain unsupported sitting for brief periods and may begin propping on extended arms. When supported in sitting, he/she can reach for toys and bring them to his/her mouth. He/she likely enjoys the sitting position, providing new visual opportunities and ways to connect with his/her caregivers. When pulled to sit, a 5-month-old can flex the head and lift it from the surface and no longer demonstrates a head lag.
Potential Red Flags in a 5-Month-Old
Inability to bring hands to the feet, flexed onto the chest
Rolling to the side using baby’s extensors (muscles on baby’s back) rather than flexors (abdominals)
Continued difficulty with tummy time
Inability to bear weight through the arms during tummy time
Absence of lower extremity dissociation (i.e., continued presence of legs in a symmetrical position during tummy time)