Baby’s First Year of Oral Development: What Parents Should Know
Babies begin developing oral motor skills long before birth, and these skills continue to mature well past the preschool years. Oral development influences feeding, sleep, and speech. When these skills lag, babies may experience feeding challenges, picky eating, speech delays, excessive drooling, teeth grinding, or frequent gagging.
Stacy Pulley, Clinical Director at Family Tree Therapies, explains that parents play a key role in fostering healthy oral development—and that thoughtful pacifier use can help. Pulley, a speech pathologist and feeding therapist who specializes in breathing and oral myofunctional development, uses the Ninni pacifier with appropriately aged babies to help strengthen the suck pattern.
The soft, breast-like design of the Ninni supports jaw, lip, and tongue stability. It helps newborns activate their natural sucking reflex. Around 6 months, however, babies begin pairing sucking skills with chewing as their oral abilities advance.
What a Healthy Resting Posture Looks Like
Lips gently closed
Tongue resting inside the mouth, lightly touching the roof of the palate
Quiet, effortless nasal breathing
Nasal Breathing
Nasal breathing is a strong indicator of healthy tongue posture. The tongue should rest against the soft palate, supporting a relaxed, open airway.
If you notice frequent mouth breathing, snoring, or difficulty keeping the mouth closed, consult your pediatrician or therapist. Conditions like tongue-tie can interfere with proper tongue placement and nasal breathing.
Tongue Movements
Babies should be able to elevate, retract, and move the tongue side to side. These movements help widen the airway and create the foundation for feeding and speech.
Mouthing
Between 5 and 6 months, babies naturally begin exploring the world with their mouths—hands, toys, and safe objects. This “mouthing” strengthens the tongue, helps with lateral movement, and prepares the mouth for chewing. From 9 to 24 months, mouth play becomes more intentional as babies learn to move the jaw, tongue, and lips independently.
Key Infant Oral Reflexes
Infants rely on several built-in mouth reflexes that gradually come under voluntary control as they grow.
Sucking
The first essential oral motor skill. Sucking helps coordinate the jaw, tongue, and facial muscles, supports feeding, regulates breathing, and soothes the nervous system.
Chewing
Strengthens jaw alignment
Supports tongue lateralization and elevation
Aids tooth eruption
Helps clear middle ear fluid, which may reduce ear infections
By age 2, children should be able to chew bite-sized foods with their mouths closed, using independent movements of the jaw, lips, cheeks, and tongue.
Mature Swallow Pattern
A mature swallow uses a chew–pause–swallow rhythm, with the tongue pressing upward toward the alveolar ridge. Younger babies use a forward “extrusion reflex,” which should fade by about 10 months.
Drinking from a Cup
Babies should be introduced to cup drinking around 12 months. Some mess is normal. Offer an open cup, recessed lid cup, or straw cup rather than a sippy cup, which can restrict tongue movement. Plan to complete bottle weaning between 12 and 15 months.
Additional Reflexes
Rooting reflex: Helps babies locate the breast or bottle.
Suckling reflex: A back-and-forth tongue motion that enables early feeding.
Hand-to-mouth reflex: Begins in utero and continues throughout infancy.
Phasic bite: Rapid jaw movements in response to pressure on gums or cheeks.
Transverse tongue reflex: Tongue moves side to side when stimulated; fades by 9–24 months.
Gag response: Protects against choking; begins to diminish around 6 months.
Birth to 3 Months
Breastfeeding, when possible, supports strong sucking and coordination of facial muscles.
Typical milestones:
Quiet nasal breathing with lips closed
Organized suck–swallow–breathe rhythm
Rooting reflex
Strong lip seal on the nipple
Coordinated tongue and jaw movement for feeding
Improved head control for future solid feeding
Relaxed, slightly chin-down position during feeding
Red flags:
Mouth breathing
Poor latch
Fussiness during feeding
Clicking sounds or shallow sucking
Excessive drooling
Coughing or choking
3 to 6 Months
Babies begin developing a “munching” pattern, practicing jaw grading and tongue movement. This also helps shift the gag reflex toward the back of the tongue.
Typical milestones:
More mature sucking
Beginning to take puree from a spoon
Lips close around spoon
Slight tongue protrusion when swallowing solids
Stronger lip and cheek muscles
Emerging munching pattern
Closed mouth resting posture
Reaching for and anticipating food
Red flags:
Open-mouth resting posture
Persistent rooting reflex at 6 months
Coughing or choking
Excessive drooling
Limited lip movement on the spoon
6 to 12 Months
Between 6 and 9 months, babies should start using their lips to clear food from a spoon and expand their diet to include soft solids. By 12 months, they should practice drinking from an open cup.
Milestones at 6–9 months:
Learns to drink from open cup
Comfortably takes purees
Introduced to soft solids
Picks up and brings food to mouth
More rotary chewing
Tongue moves up/down and side to side
Begins making lip and tongue sounds
Self-feeds soft solids
Milestones at 9–12 months:
Rotary chewing pattern
Continuous sucking or drinking from a cup
Holds a spoon
Enjoys varied textures and flavors
Moves food around the mouth without fingers
Drinks from open cup with minimal help
Uses a straw without suckling
Red flag:
Pacifier dependence beyond 6–9 months. Babies should be fully weaned from pacifiers by 12 months.
Smart Pacifier Practices
Pacifiers can be helpful—when used strategically and when the shape supports development.
Pacifier Shape Matters
Pulley recommends rounded pacifiers, such as the Ninni, because they mimic the shape of a nipple and encourage the same muscle use as breastfeeding. This shape helps stabilize the jaw and strengthen tongue posture.
The Ninni’s design naturally falls out once the baby falls asleep, encouraging proper tongue rest against the palate and promoting nasal breathing. Good tongue posture helps the palate develop wide rather than high and narrow.
Pacifier Weaning
The Ninni meets all U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission standards for babies of all ages. However, older infants may begin chewing on pacifiers as teeth come in. At that stage, replace the pacifier with safe mouthing and chewing toys.
Overuse of pacifiers—especially past 5 months or during all waking hours—can interfere with tongue posture and reflex development. Weaning supports proper palate growth and helps the tongue learn to move independently.
Set Your Baby Up for Healthy Oral Development!
With mindful feeding practices, intentional mouthing opportunities, and smart pacifier use, parents can give their babies a strong foundation for eating, speaking, and breathing well throughout childhood.