Students in the Early Lifespan Development/Parenting class are putting together all of their caretaking skills they have learned so far this year for their new challenging project: taking care of baby simulators. Throughout this project, students will learn firsthand what it is like to take on the responsibility of a child and truly learn what it takes to parent children. All the students will have different parenting tasks depending on their baby’s needs.
“One of the biggest challenges of this project is the way the babies are simulated. It’s as close to an infant as we can get but we need to remember that it’s not a real infant, so it may eat back to back or burp back to back and other things that a real infant may not necessarily do,” Early Lifespan Development/Parenting teacher Ahren Wagner said.
Many challenges can occur while the students are taking care of their baby. Most of these challenges can be resolved by the student in one way or another but sometimes an error can occur with the baby simulation itself.
“The biggest challenge for me was definitely when my bracelet would not connect to my baby’s sensor and it cried for 1 hour and 30 minutes straight,” Emily Powell (9) said. “I had to not harm the child but still find a way to quiet it down, not being able to stop the crying,”
Taking care of the baby simulators can be incredibly stressful as all students have their different strengths and weaknesses with parenting so it is important for them to look back on what they were taught for them to successfully take care of their baby.
“This class has helped prepare me to get to this point by making sure I know how to handle my own stress when taking care of the baby,” Powell said.
While this project can frustrate students, by the end of the project many students enjoy the bond they created with their baby and enjoy what they learned about the care for their baby.
“I think the students don’t love the project while they are in the middle of it but afterward they have funny stories to tell and have a better understanding of the care needed for an infant,” Wagner said.
Many students even found that they have benefited from this project and that this has prepared them for the future.
“I really enjoy how this project will help me feel more prepared in my future or when I handle other people’s children,” Powell said.