BABYGYM OVER 20 YEARS

Our founder is Dr. Melodie de Jager. Her interest in the young child led her through many schools of thought, in particular the school of education and the school of psychology. Additionally, she spent more than 30 years informally studying the nervous system. Some would call her approach applied neuroscience, which means one takes the latest findings from brain science and develops interventions to help improve human functioning. During her journey, Melodie founded the Mind Moves Institute and has several affiliated programmes under this umbrella. Melodie has authored more than 12 published books, several of which have been translated into Afrikaans, English, Danish, Hungarian, Italian, Mandarin, Polish, Russian and Spanish. Lastly, but in our eyes most impressively, Melodie is the mother of three children and the grandmother of eight grandchildren.

Our director is Cozette Laubser. Her career path has taken her through communication science, childbirth education and the role of a birth doula. Melodie and Cozette have been working together for 17+ years as mother and daughter. For Cozette, becoming a mother and experiencing two physiological homebirths and their full hormonal effect, has irrevocably changed her brain and, therefore, who she is and how she functions. Pregnancy, birth and close contact with a baby change you on a cellular, hormonal and brain level, and what is particularly encouraging to learn, is that interaction with a baby is just as beneficial to the new parents as it is to the baby. Cozette wrote about this in her book, Newborn Brain Essentials, that was published in 2024.

Since the establishment of the BabyGym Institute in 2005, more than 30 000 babies and their parents have experienced BabyGym. Some parents are not literate and do not speak the same language as the BabyGym Instructor, yet they can still benefit by following the demonstrations. Other parents are highly qualified professionals and find the explanations behind the teachings insightful. We are grateful that our parent testimonials include words such as “an overall impactful experience” and “highly recommended!”.

Not every parent needs to read a book or attend a parent-and-baby class to celebrate this phase of life. Many parents do a fantastic job without any books and classes. However, for those drawn to experiencing and learning this way, BabyGym offers a simple, contextualised framework that can be very helpful.

BabyGym becomes exceptionally effective when the principles taught are integrated as a lifestyle.