After your child celebrates their second birthday, they will experience major intellectual, physical, social and emotional changes that will help them make sense of the world.
Looking for ways to entertain your little one and to teach your little one? Check out our recommended indoor activities that will enhance your 2-year-old's development.
- Play Dress Up
Haul out a pile of old clothes and let your child play dress-up. You can also participate, but it’s great to encourage group play with two or three other children their age. This activity is fun, but also helps your toddler be creative using their imagination, developing their language skills and promotes social development.
- Make An Alphabet Train
Make an alphabet train to put on the wall. An alphabet train has been a great resource to have in the house because it gets your toddler talking about alphabet letters a lot! This activity definitely helps encourage creativity but also helps their language skills too.
- Hide Toys
Hide a toy somewhere in the house, and ask your child to find it, for an easy indoor activity for 2-year-olds. Explore with them to guide her with signs like "warmer" and "colder." You can also search for flashlights, or hide multiple objects at once. Your kid will learn competencies such as listening, problem solving , social skills and memory.
- Make a Mailbox
Build a mailbox by decorating an old cardboard box or shoe box and cutting a slit in the top of it. Fill that with your kid's junk mail to open. It not only teaches fine motor skills by opening the envelopes and extracting what's inside, you can use it to teach your child basic concepts, talk about objects, colours and letters; help them sort by size , shape or colour; or count the pieces. You can also layer in imaginative play by playing post office, or playing store with the coupons.
- Trace Their Body
Lay down your child on a large sheet of paper, and draw his body outline. Because the child still has to lie down to be traced, they'll learn to control themselves. You should show your kid where the two eyes, nose and mouth are going, but if your kid just wants to draw it all over, that's okay. Make no judgement on them, just let him have fun with it.
- Scavenger Hunt!
A frequent walk in nature provides fun adventures, promotes healthy habits, and helps you to create a stronger bond with your little one. A fun way to get your child moving in nature is to incorporate a scavenger hunt into your playtime. It’s easy to do with an egg carton or a paper bag to collect small natural treasures into. Simply print and laminate this scavenger hunt printable, glue it to the top of an egg carton or on the outside of a paper bag and off you go on our adventure!
- Simon Says
Start with clear directions ("Tell Simon, touch your toes"). Then graduate into dumb, more complex routines ("Simon says, tug the left ear, then the right ear"). You may also inspire your kid to run, skip, catch and more. And don't forget to drop "Simon says" to 2-year-olds every now and then during this learning activity! This encourages your child to follow directions, helping them gain motor and language skills.
- Collage making
Cut out and give your child different noses, eyes, hair and other features from old magazines. Encourage her to make funny creatures or silly faces with the features, then glue them onto a piece of paper. Talk about the pieces and how to stick them down to your child, but don't be too direct with it. Ask a lot of 'wonder questions’ such as, "I wonder what will happen if you put the pieces down without the glue?' Childhood is about learning new facts and applying them to theories, so help them make theories.
- Pass a Ball
To those 2-year-olds, this enjoyable activity includes a play tunnel. Standing with your child at opposite ends, take turns raising each end to roll back and forth with a softball. "It will take some trial and error for your kiddo to get the hang of, but it's great practice in motor planning and it takes teamwork.
- Initiate Conversation
Place a doll or plush toy over and allow your child to carry, speak, dress, and take care of that. Speak to the doll the way you'd speak to a child, and inspire your child to do likewise. This activity for 2-year-olds teaches creativity and imagination in addition to the language skills.
