What is Tinybeans?
Tinybeans is website that helps parents identify their children's strengths and weaknesses.
By tracking a child's progress in five developmental categories we help parents discover which area they should focus on.
On top of this, Tinybeans makes it easy for parents to keep a journal of their children's progress.
What age group is Tinybeans suitable for?
Tinybeans is designed for children from birth to 5 year old.
All kids are different, shouldn't parents just let kids be kids? They'll be alright when they start school, right?
Whilst it is true that children develop very differently and by school-age most of the kids will have caught up, there are milestones that all children should hit at age-appropriate times.
More often than not it is not a cause for concern if your child is late in hitting a few of the milestones. However if your child is behind in numerous milestones you may consider seeking medical advice.
A lot of developmental issues can be easily be remediated with early intervention.
After all, it's better to be safe than sorry.
Children develop at different rates, won't monitoring them cause more worry and unnecessary stress to the parents?
Tinybeans is definitely not about generating paranoia in parents. Quite the contrary, the real intent of Tinybeans is to reassure parents their children are progressing normally.
You see, children develop very differently and at different rates.
Whilst one child may be weak in one area, they may be strong in others.
Parents often focus on what their children can't do ('my child still isn't talking yet", "my child still can't crawl", etc.) and disregard the things their children are good at. As a result, parents are constantly worrying if their children have developmental problems.
Tinybeans helps by showing parents a holistic view of their children's development. We represent a child's development in terms of five categories. Chances are that if a child is behind in one area she will be ahead in others. If indeed your child is behind in numerous categories it may be a symptom of a pervasive learning disorder and that you should seek advice from medical professionals.
Why should I keep a journal?
Apart from the obvious sentimental value, keeping a journal is important for a more serious reason. If in the unfortunate event that your child needs medical attention in the future for whatever reason, often times you are asked when your child reached certain milestones.
As a matter of fact the Tinybeans concept was born when one of its founders was seeking medical help for his son's speech delay. He did not keep a journal and was at a loss when asked details of when his son completed certain milestones.
How much does Tinybeans cost?
Nothing! Tinybeans is free for parents to use. We are funded by advertising.
What is a "beta"?
Well you see, Tinybeans isn't fully finished yet. There are still some key features under development.
What you see here is only a fraction of the total Tinybeans vision.
Instead of waiting for everything to be finished we thought we'd release a beta version to all the parents out there so that we can get their feedback sooner.
We'll be eternally grateful if you could help us out by popping us an email with your feedback and suggestions!
