Pregnancy & Birth
Helping your newborn establish new brain connections is an important developmental step. Our Baby TALK Newborn Encounter program is a national model for supporting families with training, consultation, curriculum and parenting materials and information to promote early engagement and discovery.
The goal is to positively impact child development and nurture healthy parent-child relationships during the critical early years.
Our trained volunteers visit new moms during their stay at OSF Little Company of Mary and observe the family interact.
They teach parents about tracking and how it promotes the baby’s sensory brain experiences – hearing, seeing, touching, feeling and tasting.
Our volunteers teach parents how infants can track a rattle or a red ball with their eyes. Infants can also hug your fingers if placed on the palm of their hand or even foot. These are important experiences for an infant.
The Baby TALK Newborn Encounter program is a national model for supporting families with training, consultation, curriculum and parenting materials to promote early engagement and discovery.
They assess and provide families with the educational training resources to engage parents in a healthy encounter. Important training techniques are passed on to the new family to promote building a relationship from the time of birth and beyond.