The Everything Toddler Activities Book (18 page)

Can your child identify other family members by just looking at a nose or other facial feature?
This activity develops visual discrimination and problem-solving skills.

1. Cut out each family member’s facial features (eyes, nose, and mouth).
   
2. Glue all of the eye sets to one index card, all of the noses on another, and the mouths on a third.
   
3. For each card, challenge your toddler to identify the owner of the facial features.
   
4. To extend this activity, omit the step of gluing the pictures onto the index cards; instead, tape them on temporarily. Let your child remove them and create a new person by jumbling the facial features into a new face.
   

This traditional finger play is a great way to help your toddler learn about
family titles while she develops fine motor control.

1. Show your child how to hide her hands behind her back.
   
2. Teach her this song with the corresponding motions. Use the tune “Frère Jacques.”
   

   Where’s the father? Where’s the father?
   

   Here I am
   

   (extend one hand with thumb out)
   Here I am.
   

   (repeat motion with other hand)
   How are you today, dear?
   

   Very well, I thank you.
   

   (wiggle fingers as if they were speaking to each other)
   Time to hide.
   

   (put hand behind the back)
   Time to hide.
   

   (repeat motion with other hand)
   

   Additional verses:
   

   Where is the mother? (index finger)
   

   Where is the brother? (middle finger)
   

   Where is the sister? (ring finger)
   

   Where is the baby? (pinkie finger)
   

   Where is the family? (all fingers)
   

From the moment your child discovered his own toes, he has been learning about his body and how it works. Toddlers are often eager to learn about the body and will show pride and share their knowledge as they explore and identify their body parts.

This fun activity will help your child learn about different parts of his
body and will enhance his verbal skills, too.

Teach your child the following rhyme and encourage him to act out the words:

My hands upon my head I’ll place
On my shoulders, on my face.
At my waist, and by my side.
I will raise them way up high
And then make my fingers fly.
Then I will clap one, two, three,
Then rest them gently on my knee.

Promote your child’s problem-solving skills with this game. You can play it anywhere, any time.

1. Ask your child to try to guess the answer to simple riddles. All the answers should be a part of the body. Here are a few examples:
   

   You use me to hold a crayon. (Hand)
   I am the part of the body that eats food. (Mouth)
   

2. Vary the complexity according to your toddler’s ability. You may even encourage him to think of some riddles for you.
   

Your child develops his fine motor skills and problem-solving ability as he pieces together a person.

1. If you are using construction paper pieces, be sure to keep them very simple, such as a torso, arms, legs, and head. If you use magazine pictures, consider involving your child in the search for appropriate clippings.
   
2. Assist your child in gluing the body-part pieces to the poster board to create a person.
   

Your toddler will delight in seeing a life-size copy of himself.
If you cannot get a large enough roll of paper, you can use an old sheet and fabric paints instead.

1. Have your child lay flat on his back on the paper. Experiment with different positions of his arms and legs. Trace an outline around his body.
   
2. Point out to your child the different body parts on the outline. Label them if you wish.
   
3. Let your child color the outline with crayons.
   

This silly game will help your child learn body-part identification.
(For older children, you may wish to talk about private body parts that other people should not touch.) This becomes like a simple game of Twister!

1. Call out different parts of the body. You touch that part on your child while he touches that part of you.
   
2. Let your older child take a turn calling out body parts, too.
   

As your toddler grows, she develops a self-concept. She is becoming increasingly aware that she is an individual person with her own tastes, interests, and personality. Early on, she will have experiences that will shape her self-concept and esteem. Both directly and indirectly, she will be receiving messages about her worth and competence. You can plan specific activities that will reinforce the message that she is indeed very special.

Have your toddler do a self-portrait a few times a year.
This is a great way to measure her progress in self-image as well as motor control.

1. Provide your child with a paper and crayons to create a self-portrait.
   
2. If desired, let her glue on yarn for hair and scraps of fabric for clothes.
   

Your child can create a lasting memory. She will enjoy “reading” it as much as she did creating it. You can bind the pages together with a stapler or by punching holes in the sides and attaching the pages with a yarn bow.

1. Label each page of your child’s book with a title, such as “My Favorite Foods” or “Toys I Play With.”
   
2. Help your child find appropriate pictures in the magazines to cut out and paste onto the pages.
   

Enhance your child’s self-esteem with this project. This also makes a great gift for grandparents.
Simply put it into a box labeled, “I love you to pieces.”

1. Glue the photo of your child onto the poster board and cover with the clear contact paper.
   
2. Cut the photo into puzzle pieces. You can make the puzzle simple with fewer pieces, or more complex with more pieces.
   
3. Give your child the new personalized puzzle to complete.
   

Young children are often fascinated by mirrors and their own images.
Your toddler may enjoy simply making silly faces in the mirror.
Don’t worry—the dry-erase ink is easy to remove with a glass cleaner and a paper towel.

Have your child stand in front of the mirror and show her how she can use the markers to trace over her image. She may also want to give herself a hat or other accessories.

Your child will be aware that he is small. He will probably start to show an interest in being a big boy as he becomes more independent and competent. You can capitalize on his interest with these activities. These activities will also be teaching your child the math and science concepts of comparison, growth, and measurement.

Here is a concrete way to show your child how his size compares with others.

1. Have your toddler stand with his back to a wall. Run the yarn from his head to his toes, and cut it to the length of his body.
   
2. Show your child that the yarn piece represents his height. Take the yarn and hold it up to yourself and other family members to compare. You may also wish to compare the yarn with household furniture and other things in his environment. Is he taller than the fence? Is he shorter than the refrigerator?
   

Your child will enjoy reviewing photos of himself. You may also wish
to share photos of yourself from when you were growing up.

Assist your child in putting the photos in sequence from youngest to oldest. Point out to your child the physical differences that are observable in the photos.

Your toddler relies on her senses to learn about the world around her. She is not yet able to learn about abstract concepts. She only knows about the concrete, real world, things that she has experienced directly. Engage your toddler’s senses, and you engage her mind!

This activity will help your child use problem-solving skills. She will also be practicing auditory memory and discrimination skills that will help her later with reading.

Play the tape and have your child guess what is making the sounds that she hears.

Stimulate your child’s senses with this activity, which also helps develop vocabulary.

1. Saturate each cotton ball in a different substance.
   
2. Have your child try to describe the scent and guess its source.
   

This is a fun project that will let your child explore different scents and textures while being creative.

1. Help your child spoon a small amount of water onto the paper.
   
2. Let your child sprinkle the Jell-O powder on the wet patches.
   
3. Your child can then finger paint with these colors. She needs to be gentle so as not to rub through the paper. As she works, she will find that the consistency of the “paint” changes from gritty to sticky to slimy.
   

Young children like to touch things, and this activity provides an opportunity to explore different textures.

1. Place your child’s hands on the poster board. Trace around them, and then cut out multiple paper hands.
   
2. Let your child glue the various materials onto the hands. Talk about how each hand feels.