Disclaimer: Please try to accept the following critique in the not-bitchy way I mean for it to come across.
Did you do any research before you jotted down your opinion in the form of this post? Many children need additional support and help to build the muscles that promote walking. In my group of friends there have been several children adopted from foreign countries. Due to poor nutrition and spending most time in their crib, these babies and toddlers do not have the skills to teach themselves to walk before three years of age. With parental support they learn much faster. Additionally I also have a few other friends who have had babies with small medical issues that, while not requiring physical therapy, did require additional work from the parents to help their children walk and overcome bad habits.
Further, even with ‘normal’ children, having parents and other caretakers work and play with them to promote walking might not necessarily speed that process up, but will most probably help the babies’ communication and relationship skills.

That slideshow didn’t seem to show how to teach your baby to walk faster…seemed just to help them keep on the normal track. One thing I didn’t see them “suggest” was playing with baby’s feet- doing little kicks and stuff.

Well, children with medical or developmental issues aside, I see where you’re going with this. It feeds into this neurosis and, in some cases, the crazy mommy competitiveness.

Neither of my children walked until they were 16 months but I never really cared or did anything specific about it. I had read somewhere that children usually begin to walk somewhere between when their mother and father each started walking, so my mind was at complete ease: their father began walking at 22 months. (Don’t worry, he has lots of strengths!)

People do tend to get quite neurotic about milestones, but it’s a dangerous precedent to set. It’s so important to realize that just about EVERY aspect of development has a huge range of normal.

I think you are right when you say that they will get there on their own… and it’s so much better for them to be allowed to do so at their own pace. It’s sad to think that so many children are being made to feel that they aren’t walking/talking/eating/learning fast enough; it can’t be good for their developing self esteem.

I get that people like to coach and know people feel proud helping children get to the next stage of “enlightenment” but when I greet children I want to know who they are right now and if they are non verbal, I am going to need to watch to see who they are.

I call it stealing a child’s einstein moment~showing and coaching even with the most engaging of techniques is stealing that child’s moment of discovery and how many of these moments do adult steal in the name of their ego?

Now I have 3 special needs kids and have protected their einstein moments even if it meant delays in milestones. It is hard road with PT, OT and Early Start coaching a different philosophy “it takes a million steps to learn to walk” they would tell me and I would come back with “a child learns to walk in their sleep” from Maria Montessori.

Goals for myself~not to take away a struggle from a child to ease my tense, make time for einstein moments, limit hand over hand or direct teaching to short predictable times for a child (therapy) and help the therapist to “get out of their face” in every session to allow the child to just be self initiating again.