Your young child is rapidly developing in many ways. In just a few short months, you will see her exhibit many new skills. From crawling to walking to running, these changes all happen in short time. Your toddler needs many opportunities to develop her motor and coordination skills. The activities in the chapter will make skill development fun for both you and your child.
Dancing
Your toddler does not have to take lessons and learn fancy steps to dance. Encourage your child to be free with her movements. Let her use her body to express herself. Don’t be shy! Why not kick off your shoes and join in the fun?
Dancing Statues
This game will help your child develop listing skills and self-control while she has fun.
Activities for an individual child or a group.
Age group: 18-40 months
Duration of activity: 15 minutes
Play music and encourage your child to dance. Randomly stop the music and ask your child to freeze a pose. As your child improves, you can ask her to hold the pose for longer periods of time.
Traffic Light
Your child can learn how to follow direction and develop self-control while she dances.
Activity for an individual child or a group
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 15 minutes
What you need:
Scissors
Construction paper in red, yellow, and green
Paper plates
Stapler
Popsicle sticks
Music
1. Cut construction paper the size fo paper plates. Staple paper to plates and attach popsicle sticks. These are your traffic signals.
2. Play music for your child to dance to. Hold up the different coloured signs as she dances. When you hold up the green signs she should dance fast. Th yellow sign means dance slowly, and when you hold up the red sign, she should stop.
Dance with Me
Dancing with a parent takes extra skill and coordination Why not pair up your child with someone her own size?
Activity for an individual child.
Age group: 18-40 months
Duration of activity: 10 minutes
What you need:
Music
Large doll
Play music for your child to dance to. Provide her with a large doll to serve as her dancing paper. Judt about any doll will do, but a large rag doll works best.
Sock Hop
Turn back the sands of time and have an old-fashioned sock hop!
Activity for the whole family.
Age group: 18-40 months
Duration of activity: 20 minutes
What you need:
Oldies music from the 1950s and 1960s
Poodle skirts and leather jackets and other timely apparel (optional)
Kick off your shoes and play some oldies to dance to. You can even show your children how to do some of the classic dances, like the twist or the swim.
Hula Dance
Start by making your own grass skirt. Hula dancing is great exercise too!
Activity for an individual child or a group.
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 25 minutes
What you need:
Colored crepe paper; streamers, or newspaper
An old belt or ribbon
Masking tape
Recording of Hawaiian music
1. Help your child tear the paper into long strips. Attach them to the belt or ribbon. The more you use, the better the effect.
2. Put the skirt on your child and have her remove her shoes.
3. Play some Hawaiian music and show your child how to sway her arms and hips to the music.
Action Plays
Action plays are popular with young children. They are a great way to engage your child’s imagination. Just about any story or rhyme can be adapted. Let these activities serve as an inspiration—maybe you can think of the ways to get your child to act out stories.
Birds That Fly
This is a follow-the-leader activity. Much like Simon Says, the object is to fool the player(s). For younger toddlers, just stick with the true directives.
Activity for an individual child or a group.
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 15 minutes
1. Call out an animal and an action for your child to imitate. For example, when you call out, “Birds fly, your child should flap his arms like a bird.
2. There are many possible directives, such as frogs that hop snakes that slither, or horses that gallop.
3. Try to fool him once in awhile by calling out a silly directive. For example, say, “Fish hop.” If you fail to trick him, he gets a turn being the caller.
Jack-in-the-Box
This short-action play is sure to get your child’s attention and bring some laughter as well.
Activity for the individual child.
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 15 minutes
1. While your child crouches on the floor, repeat the following rhyme in a slow and suspenseful way.
Jack-in-the-Box, so quite and still. Will he come up?
2. The child springs up and shouts, “Oh , yes, he will!”
HINT: For younger age groups, you can instead play the song “Pop! Goes the Weasel.” When the song gets to “pop,” everyone can pop up. You may need to cue the children when it is time to do this by yelling, “Pop!” or raising your arms.
Rescue
Engage your child’s imagination while helping him develop balance and large motor skills. You can change the theme of the rescue to suit your child’s interest. Perhaps he can rescue the kitten from the dogs or the princess from the dragons.
Activity for an individual child.
Age group: 18-40 months
Duration of activity: 15 minutes
What you need:
Assorted rags and stuffed animals
1. Place a bunch of rags in a small bag or basket.
2. Have your child scatter these around the floor.
3. Choose an object/prop to be rescued. This can be another rag, a stuffed animal, or something else . Toss this object into the center of the others.
4. Challenge your child to walk in and retrieve (rescue) this object without stepping on the others. You might tell him that the dragons are sleeping and that he needs to tiptoe in carefully.
Jack and the Beanstalk
This is a fun activity to do right after reading the classic fairy tale by the same name.
Activity for an individual child.
Age group: 18-40 months
Duration of activity: 15 minutes
While reciting parts of the story, have your child imitate different parts of the action. Stomp around like the giant and tiptoe quietly like Jack.
Once I Saw a Bird
The cute action includes a nice variety of actions.
Activity for an individual child.
Age group: 18-40 months
Duration of activity: 5 minutes
Teach your child the following rhyme and corresponding movements:
Once I saw a little bird come hop, hop, hop. (hop aroun)
So I said, "Little bird will you stop, stop stop?" (hold hand in front of body)
I was goint to the window to say, "How do you do?" (wave)
When he shook his little tail and away he flew. (wiggle rear end, then flap arms)
Exercise Activities
Many adults view exercise as an unpleasant chore. This is not so for young children. You will find that your toddler enjoys exercise just as much as any other movement and dance activities. In fact, she may be even more enthusiastic if she feels that she is doing a grown-up activity.
Hopping Home
This exercise activity will also help your child learn to follow directions. If your child is learning how to count, you can as her to hop a specific number of times toward the home base.
Activity for an individual child or a group.
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 20 minutes
What you need:
Area rug or chalk
1. Define a home base area. You can use an area rug or draw a square on the sidewalk with chalk. Also define a starting place for your child.
2. Your child mush ask permission to hop to the home base. Each time she gets to hop or jump once.
Track and Field
These trie-and-true games have been modified for even the youngest of athletes.
Activity for an individual child or a group
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 30 minutes
What you need:
Carpet squares or paper bag
Tape or chalk
Frisbee or beanbag
1. Add challenge to running race by adding hordes. For the very young, us flat markers instead of raised obstacles to jump over. A carpet square remnant or even a paper bag can be used for this purpose.
2. Masking tape or chalk lines can be made to indicate a long or broad jump challenge.
3. Be creative. An old Frisbee can come a discus, and a beanbag make a great shot put.
Pumping Cardboard
Toddlers love to imitate. Here is a chance for them to pretend to be bodybuilders.
Activity for an individual child or a group.
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 10 minutes
What you need:
Scissors
4 paper plates
2 toilet paper tubes
Crayons or markers
1. Cut small holes in the center of each of the paper plates. Fit the plates on the ends of the paper tubes to make barbells.
2. Let your child decorate her barbells.
3. Show your child how to imitate some bodybuilding poses as she lifts her “weights.”
Creative Movement
Who says you need music to get children moving and grooving? Creative movement activities help your child develop motor skills as well as balance and coordination.
Sticky Balls
This silly activity encourages cooperation and helps develop motor skills.
Activity for a group.
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 20 minutes
1. Have the children all bounce around in a defined area.
2. When 2 children meet, they stick together and bounce together.
3. Continue until all the children are stuck in 1 large ball.
Fun Walk
Children of all ages will want to try this activity. What other surfaces can you think of to include?
Activity for an individual child.
Age group: 18-40 months
Duration of activity: 10 minutes
What you need:
Clear contact paper
Bubble wrap
1. Tape a strip of clear contact paper onto the floor, sticky side up.
2. Stick a path of bubble-wrap packing material onto the contact paper.
3. Have your child remove his shoes and socks before stepping on the bubble-wrap path. You may need to hold his hand to help him with balance.
Buzzing Bee
This activity is meant to help children with separation issues. You can dream up many potential variations. For example, you can be the moon and your child can be a spaceship. Or perhaps you are a as station and your child is a car.
Activity for an individual child.
Age group: 18-30 months
Duration of activity: 10 minutes
You are the flower so you sit or stand in one place.
Your child is the bee who can buzz all around you and return for pollen!
Flying
This activity is best when your child has lots of room to move.
Activity for an individual child.
Age group: 18-40 months
Duration of activity: 10 minute
Chant the following rhyme, and teach your toddler the movements to go along with the words:
The airline has great big wings (arm outstretched)
Its propeller spins around and sings (spin arms)
The airline goes up (arms up)
The airplane goes down (arms down)
The airline goes through clouds all over town (“fly” around)
Punchinello
Try this monkey-see-monkey-do activity the next time you have a bunch of young, restless children to entertain.
Activity for a group.
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 15 minutes
1. Have children form a circle. Ask one child to stand in The Center as the leader, Punchinello.
2. The children in the circle sing the following song.
What can you do Punchinello, funny fellow, funny fellow?
What can you do Punchinello, funny fellow, funny fellow?
3. The child in the center makes a movement. All the others imitate him while they sing.
We an do it to Punchinello, funny fellow, funny fellow. We can do it too, funny fellow, funny you.
4. The child in the middle picks a new Punchinello. Continue until everyone has had a turn.
Using Props
When you add props to movement and dance activities, you enrich the activity and add interest. Also, by using props, you give your toddler further opportunities to develop fine motor skills as well.
Go Team!
No need to have a favourite sports team to cheer on—your child can b a cheerleader at any time.
Activity for an individual child.
Age group: 18-40 months
Duration of activity: 20 minutes
What you need:
2 sections of the daily newspaper
Masking tape
Scissors
1. First, create the pompoms. Roll a section of newspaper into a tube shape. Tape the bottom securely and then cut the top half into strips.
2. You may wish to teach your child a simple cheer, such as “Go, team!” or “Two, four, six, eight, who do we appreciate?” Or you can jut play marching music and let her swish and swirl the pompoms.
Stick Horse
Watch your child’s imagination take off when you help him Mae and then ride this easy stick horse.
Activity for an individual child.
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 25 minutes
What you need:
Scissors
2 sheets poster board
Crayons or markers
White craft glue
Yarn
Masking tape
3 paper towel tubes
1. Cut the poster board into 2 horse-head shapes.
2. Have your child decorate or draw a face on each piece of paper. The let him glue on some yarn for the mane.
3. Using tape, attach the 3 towel rolls together to create the body. Put the 2 heads together back to back and attach them to the “body.” Let your child finish decorating his horse and he is ready to gallop away.
A Thin Line
A piece of rope is all that is needed to help her child practice balance and coordination.
Activity for an individual child.
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 15 minutes
What you need:
Approximately 5” of rope
1. Stretch the top out straight on the ground. Have your child practice walking along it like a tightrope walker. If you wish, you can have him use a balance bar.
2. Hold one end of the rope. Keeping the rope on the ground, wiggle it around and encourage your child to jump over it. If you don’t think it will frighten your child, you can pretend that the rope is a snake.
Hula Hoop
It will be a few years before your toddler can use a hula hoop the way it was intended. However, there are many fun movement activities you can still do with this toy.
Activity for an individual child.
Age group: 18-40 minutes
Duration of activity: 10 minutes
What you need:
Hula hoop
1. Lay the hula hoop on the ground, show your child how to walk around the circle with on foot in and one foot out of the hoop.
2. Hold the hoop vertically and help your child crawl through it back and forth.
3. Join your child, or get a group of children in a bunch inside of a hula hoop. Work together to walk and change directions.
Parachute Activities
Parachute activities are a great way to promote social interaction and cooperation. Children and adults can easily play together in these fun games. You can use a large sheet or light blanket if you do not have a parachute.
Popping Ball
This activity requires children to cooperate to get the ball to do what they want.
Activity for a group.
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 20 minutes
What you need:
1 parachute or bed sheet
Tennis or ping pong balls
1. Have the children hold onto the edge of the parachute.
2. Drop one or more balls into the center of the parachute.
3. Have children work together to get the ball(s) to move. Can they make the ball roll back and forth or around the edge? What do they need to do to get the balls to pop up in the air?
Up and Down
Your child will be developing large motor skills as he works together with the rest of the group.
Activity for a group.
Age group: 30-40 months
Duration of activity: 20 minutes
What you need:
1 parachute or bed sheet
1. Have the children hold onto the edge of the parachute.
2. Instruct them to work together to pump the parachute up and down and to create a billowing cloud.
3. Have them please the parachute when it is fully extended to see which way it will float.
4. Alternatively, after the parachute makes a bubble, hat the children squat or sit and tuck the parachute under their bottoms to create a mushroom.