The first thing your pediatrician will do, starting with your very first well-baby visit, is measure your child's height and weight, plus his head circumference through infancy. It's to ensure that he's being nourished enough to thrive and grow, plus to check for developmental delays or other health problems. Your doctor will plot your child's development on a chart and make comparisons at each visit. Until 2002, these charts were based on the rates of growth for bottle-fed Caucasian children. Now, there are customized charts for other ethnic groups and differently fed babies ; for example, Hispanic, Asian and breastfed babies tend to be smaller and therefore grow at different rates. In fact, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended that pediatricians follow the World Health Organization's growth charts to more accurately reflect children who breastfeed exclusively.
To get an accurate measurement, be sure your pediatrician is using the correct chart for his race and gender - boys and girls grow at different rates. And lend a hand - to steady a wriggly baby, for example - in order to get a good reading. For the various ages and stages, doctors tend to look for babies to double their birth weight and add 10 inches of height as they hit their first birthday. In the next year, growth slows to about 5 inches and 6 pounds. From there, kids grow about 2 inches and gain about 6 pounds per year until age 10, when puberty begins to hit. During this period, growth depends on sex - girls grow about 9 inches and gain 20-55 pounds; boys can grow up to a foot and pack on up to 65 pounds. Try to resist comparing your child with his peers' rate of growth and even your own childhood size - kids are individuals who grow at their own pace - size doesn't really matter; health does.