Toddler

Tell or read a familiar story and pause frequently to leave out a word, asking the child to “fill it in.” For example, Little Red Riding Hood said, “Grandmother, what big ____ you have.”

Teach somersaults by doing one yourself first. Then help child do one. Let him or her try it alone. Make sure furniture is out of the way. You may want to put some pillows on the floor for safety.

Give a cup to child. Use bits of cereal or fruit and place one in child’s cup (“One for you” and one in your cup (“one for me”). Take turns. Dump out child’s cup and help count the pieces. This is good practice for early math skills.

Put an old blanket over a table to make a tent or house. Pack a “picnic sack” for your camper. Have child take along a pillow on the “camp out” for a nap. Flashlights are especially fun.

Get a piece of butcher paper large enough for child to lie on. Draw around child’s body to make an outline. Don’t forget fingers and toes. Talk about body parts and print the words on the paper. Let child color the poster. Hang the poster on a wall in child’s room.

Children at this age may be interested in creating art in different ways. Try cutting a potato in half and carving a simple shape or design for child to dip in paint and then stamp onto paper.

Add water to tempera paint to make runny. Drop some paint on a paper and blow through a straw to move the paint around the paper, or fill an old roll-on deodorant bottle with watered-down paint. Child can roll color onto paper.

A good activity to learn location words is to build roads and bridges with blocks. Use toy cars to go on the road, under or over a bridge, between the houses, and so forth.

Trace around simple objects with child. Use cups of different sizes, blocks, or child’s and your hands. Using felt-tip markers or crayons of different colors makes it even more fun.

Have child help you set the table. First, have the child place the plates, then glasses, and then napkins. By placing one at each place, he or she will learn one-to-one correspondence. Show child where the utensils should be placed.

Collect empty boxes (cereal, TV dinners, egg cartons) and help child set up his or her own grocery store.

Help child learn new words to describe objects in everyday conversations. Describe by color, size, and shape (the blue cup, the big ball). Also, describe how things move (a car goes fast, a turtle moves slowly) and how they feel (ice cream is cold, soup is hot).

Make your own puzzles by cutting out magazine pictures of whole people. Have child help glue pictures onto cardboard. Cut pictures into three pieces by cutting curvy lines. Head, trunk, and legs make good pieces for child to put together.

Dribble different color paint in the middle or on one side of a paper. Fold paper in half. Let child open paper to see the design it makes.

A good game for trips in the car is to play a matching game with a set of Old Maid cards. Place a few different cards in front of the child. Give him or her a card that matches one displayed and ask him or her to find the card like the one you gave him or her.

Cut pictures out of magazines to make two groups such as dogs, food, toys, or clothes. Have two boxes and put a picture of a dog in one and of food in the other. Have child put additional pictures in the right box, helping him or her learn about categories.

Cut a stiff paper plate to make a hand paddle and show child how to use it to hit a balloon. See how long child can keep the balloon in the air or how many times he or she can hit it back to you. This activity helps develop large body and eye-hand coordination.

To improve coordination and balance, show child the “bear walk” by walking on hands and feet keeping the legs and arms straight; and the “rabbit hop” by crouching down and then jumping forward.

Encourage him or her to try the “elephant walk” bending forward at the waist and letting your arms (hands clasped together) swing freely while taking slow and heavy steps. This is great to do with music.

Make a poster of child’s favorite things using pictures from old magazines. Use safety scissors and paste or a glue stick to allow child to do it independently yet safely.