This study examined how change occurs in infant gestural communication. Five infants were videotaped once a week from 10 to 12 months and twice a week from 12 to 15 months during play sessions with their mothers in a laboratory playroom. These sessions consisted of 10 minutes of a structured play context in which infants were seated at a table at right angles to their mothers, who had access to a set of standardized toys. This context was followed by 10 minutes of an unstructured play context in which infants and mothers sat on the floor in variable positions with equal access to toys. It was hypothesized that these two contexts would be associated with differences in gesturing due to differences in freedom of movement and access to toys. Results indicated that structured sessions were associated with more infant requests for toys and more gazing at mothers by infants when infants offered toys to their mothers than were unstructured sessions. Infants gestured more and made more requests for toys from their mothers in the unstructured context after they began to walk independently than before. The results suggest the importance of physical context and independent upright locomotion in the development of gestural communication. (MDM)