Patent Application
20240215737
The present invention relates to novel childcare support products. More particularly, this invention relates to a compact and portable device which caregivers can use to offer support to children that are learning to walk.
This is an ancient need and therefore an old field of invention. Almost every child born—as they learn to walk—requires a great deal of assistance in order to support his or her own weight and maintain his or her own balance. This support most often comes from a caregiver bending over, and either offering the child fingers to hold or holding onto the child, and then walking along with the child while bent over. The strain of walking so bent causes the caregiver to tire, often long before the child wants to stop.
“Leading strings” are some of the oldest known attempts to solve this problem, but are out of fashion and fail to help the child develop his or her grip strength or hand-eye-coordination. Many modern inventions have attempted to solve this problem through the use of harness and vest apparatuses, some of which do allow caregivers the ability to support a walking child while standing upright, but all of which require an inconvenient amount of storage space and setup. Other modern inventions, which need little space and no setup, offer no ability to adjust the device for different users and are too rigid to help the child develop his or her own balance. Still other modern inventions have attempted to solve this problem through the use of two ring-handles supported by rope suspended from opposite ends of a crossbar, but the use of a crossbar results in unnecessary bulk and creates the risk of sudden and significant torque if the child should let go of a single handle and thereby transfer his or her full weight to a single ring-handle. Such a transfer of weight would cause the crossbar to act as a lever and make it infeasible for the caregiver to hold the crossbar in a way which provides adequate support to the child.
Therefore a need exists for a novel device which not only gives support to children learning to walk without causing the caregivers to bend over, but which also requires minimal set up, takes up very little storage space, and is easily adjustable for different users. A further need exists for a support device which encourages the child's development of hand-eye coordination, grip-strength, and balance, and which allows the caregiver to safely support the child's weight from a central point rather than said weight being spread across a long lever which risks sudden and significant torque being applied to the caregiver's wrist.
The present invention comprises a novel support device for children learning to walk, comprising cordage descended from a compact handle held by a caregiver, with said cordage supporting a handle or handles grasped by the child. The child handle(s) may consist of a round rod or rods which have holes bored or set through their length and through which the cordage may thread. In such a case, the child handle(s) may have small notches in them at each end for the cordage to slip into, thereby preventing the child handle(s) from freely rotating around the cordage. The support device may additionally comprise an extra length or lengths of cordage which allows for the length of the descended, child-supporting cordage to be adjusted, as well as elements for securely holding the descended cordage at a set length.
Some embodiments of the present invention are illustrated as an example and are not limited by the figures of the accompanying drawings, in which like references may indicate similar elements and in which:
The terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing the particular embodiment of the invention and is not intended to be limiting of the invention. As used here in, the term “and/or” includes any and all combinations of one or more of the listed items. As used herein, the singular forms “a,” “an,” and “the” are intended to include the plural forms as well as the singular forms, unless the context clearly states otherwise. It will be further understood that the terms “comprises” and/or “comprising,” when used in this specification, specify the presence of stated features, steps, operations, elements, and/or components, but do not preclude the presence or addition of one or more other features, steps, operations, elements, components, and/or groups thereof.
Unless otherwise defined, all terms (including technical and scientific terms) used herein have the same meaning as commonly understood by one having ordinary skill in the art to which this invention belongs. It will be further understood that terms, such as those defined in commonly used dictionaries, should be interpreted as having a meaning that is consistent with their meaning in the context of the relevant art and the present disclosure and will not be interpreted in an idealized or overly formal sense unless expressly so defined herein.
In describing the invention, it will be understood that a number of techniques and steps are disclosed. Each of these has individual benefit and each can also be used in conjunction with one or more, or in some cases all, of the other disclosed techniques. Accordingly, for the sake of clarity, this description will refrain from repeating every possible combination of the individual steps in an unnecessary fashion. Nevertheless, the specification and claims should be read with the understanding that such combinations are entirely within the scope of the invention and the claims.
As is well known to those skilled in the art, many careful considerations and compromises typically must be made when designing for the optimal configuration of a commercial implementation of any device, and in particular, the embodiments of the present invention. A commercial implementation in accordance with the spirit and teachings of the present invention may be configured according to the needs of the particular application, whereby any aspect(s), feature(s), function(s), result(s), component(s), approach(es), or step(s) of the teachings related to any described embodiment of the present invention may be suitably omitted, included, adapted, mixed and matched, or improved and/or optimized by those skilled in the art, using their average skills and known techniques, to achieve the desired implementation that addresses the needs of the particular application.
Referring now to
The child handle(s) 1 may be made in various shapes, lengths and girths. In some embodiments, the child handle(s) 1 can consist of a bar or cylinder of such a girth as to allow the child to securely grasp the full circumference, and of such a length as to easily allow the child to grab hold. The child handle(s) would be connected to and/or be supported by the cordage descended from the caregiver handle. The child handle(s) 1 may include a hole bored or set through its length to allow the cordage 2 to thread through said hole. In such a case, the child handle(s) 1 may also incorporate grooves placed symmetrically at both ends of the handle(s) la into which the corresponding loop of cordage 2 would naturally be pulled and which would thereby deter the free rotation of the child handle(s) 1 around said cordage. The exemplary embodiment of the child handles have a diameter of 19 mm, this being large enough to allow for a hole through the center while being small enough for the average child learning to walk to securely grasp, and a length of 114 mm, with grooves 7.6 mm wide to allow easy acceptance of standard 0.25-inch cordage. In various other embodiments, the child handle(s) 1 can take the form of any of a number of closed figured shapes, such as a triangle or a circle, to which the length(s) of cordage 2 either securely connect or through which a loop(s) of cordage 2 thread. Additional embodiments may take the form of a single child handle being supported by a single length or loop of cordage. The child handle(s) 1 may be made from various materials, such as non-toxic plastics, wood, metal, rubber, silicon, combinations thereof, or the like. The child handle(s) 1 may include additional designs, textures, or grooves which function to increase the security of the child's grip upon the handle(s).
The caregiver handle 3 component of the support device may be made in various lengths and girths such as are ergonomically appropriate and allow the average caregiver to comfortably and securely grasp the caregiver handle 3 in a single hand. According to certain studies, the average person has a hand breadth of 79.4 mm. Given that the caregiver handle is most ergonomic when it lies lengthwise across the breadth of the caregiver's palm, the exemplary embodiment of the caregiver handle has a length of 140 mm, with 120 mm between the slip guards 3a to accommodate for outlier users with larger than average hand breadths. Studies also find an average human grip breadth inside width diameter of 38.3 mm and length diameter of 30.7 mm. The exemplary embodiment of the caregiver handle has a central column width of 32 mm and height of 20 mm. The caregiver handle 3 may include small slip guards 3a on the distal and proximal ends to deter accidental slippage of the caregiver handle 3 from the caregiver's grasp. Additionally, the caregiver handle 3 may include fillets or bevels for comfort and safety.
In the embodiments of the invention which include two separate child handles, in order to reduce the effects caused by the event of the child suddenly releasing one hand, thus transferring all of said child's supported weight onto a single child handle, the support device 6 centralizes the downward pull of the child's supported weight into a small area of the caregiver handle 3 by grouping the points where the cordage 2 connect with the caregiver handle 3 into a tight proximity. In the exemplary embodiment of the caregiver handle 3, the loops of cordage 2 exit the bottom of the distal end of the caregiver handle 3 from holes 3b directly in front of where the caregiver's hand will rest. The loops re-enter and pass through holes 3c directly in front of these exit holes 3b, thus focusing the downward pull of the child's supported weight into a small area and eliminating the risk of sudden torque being applied to the caregiver's handle. In the exemplary embodiment of the caregiver handle 3, the free ends of the cordage 2a, upon exiting the top of the caregiver handle 3 via the passthrough holes 3c, are permanently secured together, which may be done by the use of a knot, by fusing the ends, or by other appropriately secure methods. In the exemplary embodiment of the caregiver handle 3, the positioning of this group of holes 3b, 3c directly in front of where the caregiver's hand will rest ergonomically positions the downward pull of the child's supported weight for the caregiver's wrist and arm. Additionally, the exemplary embodiment of the caregiver handle includes a cavity 3h into which the permanently secured cordage ends 2a can settle, thereby further decreasing the storage space which the support device requires.
The support device may include an extra length, lengths, loop, or loops of cordage 2b to allow the length of the descended, child-supporting cordage length(s) or loop(s) 2 to be adjusted. To that end, the caregiver handle 3 may incorporate element(s) which allow the extra cordage 2b to pass through or interact with the caregiver handle 3 in such a way as to allow for the cordage 2 to be securely set to different lengths. In an exemplary embodiment of the caregiver handle 3, the two free ends 2a of a single length of cordage pass through a series of cavities 3e, 3f within the caregiver handle 3 by entering through proximal entry holes 3d, then exiting the distal exit holes 3b as described above. The first cavity 3e that the cordage ends 2a pass through contains a series of saw-tooth ridges, which correspond with a matching series of saw-tooth ridges on a piece 4 which pivots around an axle 3g and which can be locked closed using a simple snap-tension lock. When the piece 4 is snapped closed, the two sets of saw-tooth ridges compress the cordage, locking the cordage in place and securely setting the loops 2a at the current length. When the piece 4 is unlocked and pivoted open, the length of the child-supporting cordage 2 can be easily adjusted by lengthening or shortening the extra length of cordage 2b.
The cordage 2 loop(s) or length(s) may be of various lengths and comprised of various materials. In the exemplary embodiment of the support device 6, the cordage 2 is comprised of a single, 9-foot length of cordage and which enters, passes, exits, and threads through the caregiver handle and child handle(s) in the methods described above.
Referring now to
While preferred materials for some elements have been described, the device is not limited by these materials. Wood, plastics, rubber, foam, metal alloys, aluminum, nylon rope, cotton rope, elastics, cardboards, and other materials may comprise some or all of the elements of the support device for children learning to walk in various embodiments of the present invention.
Although the present invention has been illustrated and described herein with reference to preferred embodiments and specific examples thereof, it will be readily apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art that other embodiments and examples may perform similar functions and/or achieve like results. All such equivalent embodiments and examples are within the spirit and scope of the present invention, are contemplated thereby, and are intended to be covered by the following claims.
This application claims the benefit of priority to U.S. provisional patent application No. 63/296,916, filed Jan. 6, 2022, the contents of which are herein incorporated by reference.
