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ADVICE RATING

4.75 (Highly recommend) from 68 votes (2017 Visits)

Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

by Izzy

(October 2006) (rank 8th)

One of the dangers for infants and youngchildren at home is the possibility of getting burned from touching hot things. How do we teach the word “hot” and “cold” so as to avoid potentially serious accidents in the future?

When my son was about 6-7 months old,

even before he could crawl, I introduced the word “hot” by letting him touch something warm. When I warmed up his food, I let him touch the bottom of the bowl (while it’s still warm but not quite hot enough to burn) and said, “it’s hot”. I did the same thing with cold drinks and let him touch it while saying "cold". Sometimes I touched the cold food or drink to his face, which always got either a laugh or a giggle. Through this process, my son also learned the word “touch”, which is also important during times when I need to say “Don’t touch!”

One sunny day during an outdoor play session when my son was 12 months old, he took interest on the cover of our septic pump and wanted to climb on it. It’s a big round thing that looks like a manhole cover. I already knew that this cover gets warm when the sun beats down on it, so when I was too far to run to him in time to grab him from touching that cover, I yelled out, “Matthew, don’t touch! It’s hot!” He immediately stopped and reached out his hand to touch it cautiously. He found that it was warm to the touch and retracted his hand. Success!

So next time, let the wee little ones touch things that are hot (actually, warm, not hot) or cold while telling them the word. It may just be the difference between getting burned or burned too many times!

Copyright © 2006, username: Izzy @ www.minti.com. All rights in all media reserved. The content of this article may be forwarded in full without special permission provided it is used for nonprofit purposes and full attribution and copyright notice are given.

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ADVICE RATING

4.75 (Highly recommend) from 68 votes

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	October 6th \| cazza

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

Was great to read this and bet you would be going through this now with the twins..

xx cazza

Reply

	June 26th \| nabutters

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

this is great advice izzy!! i have been doing this with myah in the last few mths and seems to be paying off now as we have a wood fire... thanks for sharing!

cheers naomi

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| November 2007 \| blackwidowkate

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

Hi
Awesome
I never thought about teaching cold as well apart from when we are actually cold
We taught Jalan hot with her food as she liked to just grab it off our plates.
She is funny with her cob of corn now she will say hot as in questioning us and we say yes hot then she will sit there and blow on it like we do. Every so often she tests it with either her finger or her tongue to see if she can eat it yet or not
Each time it still feels hot she says hot and after a while she says little hot then later she will go no hot and eat it.
Just got to teach her now to stop stealing my milo when i forget it and it goes cold.
Luv Deb

Reply

	4.86 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| emmie

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

great advice

cheers

emz

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| Kellzacar

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

Hi Izzy,

Teaching our little ones the difference between hot and cold is so very important and like you i also started early. . . As parents we can never be too careful . .

cheers Kellz

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| Ngairi

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

I did a very similar thing with all of mine. Leisa

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| ellamia

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

My 18 month old knows the difference between hot and cold its an important thing to teach your child. Great article Izzy.

Love Kelly

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| hermy

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

a very important point to teach our children and so well taught.......thanks for sharing.....regards Sandra xxx

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| LibbyS

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

Thanks for sharing! Great idea!

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| HarrisonsMommy

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

This is excellent advice. I have tried to teach Harrison that things are hot but not so much focused on cold. Is good idea to teach both! Great suggestions and well done. Thanks for that!

Angela

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| Izzy

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

Sometimes it just makes it easier to get the idea across by teaching opposites.

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| llmunchkin

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

I have to tell you Izzy - this is one of the first pieces of advice that I read before I actually joined Minti. I think Jaydee would've just started walking, so I was introducing him to the word 'DANGER'. I immediately followed your advice, and because he couldn't talk, we made up signs for hot, cold, and warm... He picked it up in a matter of days - and now he points to things and tells us what is hot and cold... When he is cosy and particularly comfy - or the bath is just right etc... He tells it's warm. If we say something is hot - he doesn't even want to feel it when we offer to try - he just says no and runs away.

Thanks heaps for this excellent advice!

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| Izzy

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

Thank you. I'm glad this helped you out.

When I taught my son "hot" I always exaggerated my reaction. And to this day, my son does the same, especially when he sees smoke. It's so funny to watch!

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| llmunchkin

Re: Teaching Infants about “Hot” & “Cold”

Same - we give visitors a cuppa and our wee clown runs out and points at it blows on his fingers, shakes his hand, screws up his face - does a funny dance, than says HOT HOT! It really has been one of the most valuable pieces of advice I have had.

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| March 2007 \| MadMel

hot and cold

this is so important. Chase burnt his hands when he was 9 months on the oven because I had not taught him yet...

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| March 2007 \| KathrynR1402

Great advice

wonderfully intentional!

I'm a big one for miming/signing, and with "hot" I used to mime pulling my hand away quickly and screwing up my face in pain while saying "ouch, hot, dont touch!" It seemed to work! I've also taught her to hover her hand above things to see if they feel hot BEFORE she touches them.

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2007 \| llmunchkin

Re: Great advice

The old hand hover is a good one - starts as a game, then you see that little light in their eyes that tells you they understand.

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| December 2006 \| jmrmumstheword

well done

this advice is great, i also taught my girls colours, red being hot and blue being cold, but ofcourse this is something you do when their a little older, they now know when it comes to the taps in our house that they are not to touch for starters and that red is hot etc, they son learnt one day when mackenzie didn't listen and she slightly burnt her fingers on the tap, so she now says to me red is burnie's mummy, yes baby so i will also use your advice to teach rhyleagh about hot and cold good work on the advice!

Reply

	4.86 (Excellent) \| December 2006 \| chargehand01

hot

i do a similar sort of thing with my son (13 months). he hesitates and then very quickly touches and pulls away. Myself being an RFS firefirefighter i know what burns can do.

Reply

	4.80 (Excellent) \| December 2006 \| duritz

hot/cold

Good idea. I aslo found associating the red tap with hot and the blue with cold was good. My daughter is 2.5 now and has known since very young that the red tap is a no-no!

Reply

	4.71 (Excellent) \| November 2006 \| westivan

hot & cold

We did this with DS1 and it's fantastic - when I'm sitting on the couch with a coffee or cooking in the kitchen & he comes too close, I just have to say "no, it's hot" and he backs off straight away. It also helps him understand why he has to wait a couple of minutes for his dinner while it cools down in the freezer. Before he could say "hot" himself, he'd copy us and purse his lips & inhale to make that hissing noise (like when you've burnt your hand).

Reply

	4.90 (Excellent) \| November 2006 \| PeppermintDream

Hot and cold

I also taught my daughter about hot and cold at an early age too, and i did similar things to you. It's worked out great that they understand about hot and cold at a very early age.

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| November 2006 \| Aidansmom07

I haven't really done this...

don't know why i wouldn't have thought of doing this, it's perfectly logical. Thanks Izzy, will start now before he does end up burning himself!!

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2006 \| elizabeth

Great tip

I did this with my kids too and because they spend alot of time in the kitchen with me, I got them to touch the oven door as it was heating up. Both of them are excellent with hot stuff. Once they know what hot is, it is also easy to explain the dangers of electricity. My friends thought I was nuts when I suggested they do something similar.

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2006 \| mcm

Show

Show or give them the experience - the best way to learn. Great advice!

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2006 \| Kristen

This worked for us too!!!

We did the exact same thing and Ethan won't even go near the stove anymore. We tried to do something similar with "danger" but he says "hot" instead. Same effect, right? LOL

Reply

	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2006 \| TheMentorMom

Works well.

Great tip, Izzy. We did this as well and it was amazing how quickly our kids picked up on it. We've not had a burn incident to date!

Reply

	4.72 (Excellent) \| October 2006 \| Rachall

Too late??

I am only just teaching my son this now and he is 17 months old. Is he too old to learn this quickly?

Reply

	4.73 (Excellent) \| October 2006 \| exquisite-flower

Too late??

Actually it is never too late until they do something that you in hindsite think maybe I should have done this or that. Hindsight is great. LOL

Do it as it is relevant or appropriate. I never remember things that are taught to me unless I can apply them.....
Peace
EF.x

Reply

	4.73 (Excellent) \| October 2006 \| wildrose

Hot hot ouch ouch!

Thanks for sharing. We also taught the kids early. Did the same thing like yours but we added saying 'hot hot ouch ouch' on the hot one. So the kids knew if we said 'ouch or aww' that would be hurt. If they near the oven we said 'hot hot burny, don't touch'. Eventhough the glass isn't that hot, but still might give a little hand a shock. I just afraid of kids get burn hand.

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	5.00 (Excellent) \| October 2006 \| dolphins30

I did this also

I did this also with my daughter. Nothing worse then them going up to an oven and touching it and burning them selves. I think the younger they are, the better to teach them about hot and cold. then their wont be too many or no accidents at all later on in life

Reply