What next now?

[preetij22]

Hi Everyone,

I have been teaching my toddler since he was 7 months old and he now knows his shapes, colors, sight words, letters, counts upto 20 and is almost beginning to speak clear words.

I am now at a loss as to how to keep him engaged. I don't know what activities to do with him to keep him stimulated. I fear I am losing precious time since he is two now and is at a prime age for learning.

He gets bored with the same Preschool Prep sight word dvds and roams around the house bored and trying to engage himself by pulling out pots and pans and going near the stove!

Please give me ideas on how to engage him. I don't give him crayons on his own since he scribbles the walls. Don't do playdough either since he might swallow it when I'm not looking. Any ideas to keep him busy?

Thanks for your input!

[mom2bee]

Is the outdoors an option? You might find that he loves to play out doors.

If not, try and find or make a large space in the house to do a little horse play with him regularly.

Is it possible to cover a large portion of the wall in paper and let him color? Can you get him active in any other way, even running up and down the yard can be great exercise. You just need to find games that he is ready for to play.

Are blocks an option? What about different color bits of paper that have been cut into several shapes and squiggles that he can use as a sort of quite time toy?

If you're a stay at home mom, you have more options available to you.

Read stories, but also get up and act out the story, get silly and active with it. (For example, play Little Red Riding Hood, you be little red and the granny, let him be the wolf...and the wood cutter, play super heroes, play race cars. Let him play in baskets and while the stove is a no-no, always. Whats wrong with taking some pots and pans into the family room and letting him bang around with them?

Of course glass lids aren't safe, but I can say every child in my family has had a grand old time with pots and pans. Give him the pots, mixing bowls and large mixing spoon. Hide a few "surprises" in the pots every now and then.

Look up videos on youtube and dance and sing together, have FUN.

Since your on this website, I'm assuming you have Internet access. Use it to your advantage. Play hand clapping and rythym games, dance, sing, and listen to They Might Be Giants songs.

Play with toys with your boy, laugh with him. Tell him jokes and puns that are corny, tell him quotes and tell him you love him.

At 2, he's more than old enough to begin learning how to behave in the kitchen. When you make his lunch, let him help, when you are storing left overs, let him him,

Engage him, involve him and he should respond positively.

Good luck.

[mom2bee]

Oh, teach him more words. Just get a big bold marker, a 1 subject notebook and write the words on the pages clearly, flash them to him. Teach him the words he want's to know.

Teach him other things too, big things, important things, unimportant little things. Teach him 15 shapes, don't just stop at square, triange and circle. Use big words and describe things all the time for him. Things don't NEED to be bought to be quality. Get inventive and use your greatest resources (your brain and your creativity) and have confidence in yourself that you can do what it takes to give your little man what he needs, no matter what.

Read with him constantly. There are a lot of good power points around that you can use to share more words with him, it doesn't have to be just PreSchool Prep. I used those videos with a 2 yo and he wasn't interested AT ALL, but he also watches TONS and TONS of Cable TV, so I knew something like PSP was a long shot, but wanted to try...
PSP might work with a child who has less TV, or not. I myself found it was boring and I might try it again in a few months, when I've had time to make some manipulatives to go with them, or I might skip them all together and just use something else to teach reading.

At 2 years old, he doesn't NEED large, 11x11 flash cards. You can accomplish a lot with a pack of 3x5 index cards and a bold faced sharpie marker.

[linzy]

What about puzzles, stringing large wooden beads (like Melissa and Doug), magnetic shapes that you arrange to make pictures (also melissa and doug), throwing/rolling a ball back and forth while counting, lots of read alouds, swim lessons, gymnastics (either lessons or get books from the library and teach at home), sorting any variety of things from laundry to beads to blocks.

[Sammie09]

These are great ideas. Mom2Bee and Linzy , indeed there are so so many things that can be done at home with your child.

[2010BEBES]

At that age my grandson like:
Blocks that can be nested. Especially he enjoy building a tower and then threw away the blocks. You can see them in:http://www.amazon.com/Melissa-Doug-10-Piece-Alphabet-Stacking/dp/B000GIL2DU/ref=sr_1_1?s=toys-and-games&ie=UTF8&qid=1298524713&sr=1-1

Puzzles, there are many options for different ages.

Cards, we had group of cars that relate to each other.

Books, he like me to read for him.

[TracyR4]

Blocks, puzzles, books etc are good.
Crayons, well he does need to learn how to color. If he still sits in a high chair then put him in there to color.
I wouldn't let him roam around the house but then that's what Mr. Clean Dry Erase Markers are for, cleaning off crayon off the walls. LOL They didn't have those around when my 13 yr old was little.
He is old enough to learn to sit in a chair ,and coloring needs to be a mommy and toddler time together. That way if he isn't sitting in a high chair that he isn't roaming around the house either.

[preetij22]

Thanks so much for the wonderful ideas! I'll get the big MegaBlocks set for him and also encourage coloring. Thanks again! Any more ideas??

[efmumsgirl]

Just show some learning CD to him.. so you can sing and dance together with him.

[kmum]

Have you tried sensory type activities?   My daughter loves playing with a tub of unpopped popcorn(you could use any number of other materials).  We put little plastic animals in it for her to find, count, etc.  Playing in shaving cream is great fun too.  You can do it in the bathtub so the clean up is easy.  We are in a fairly cold climate, so this time of year if it is too cold to go outside, we often bring in a tub of snow for dd to play in.  A tub of water & cups for pouring is a great activity too.

[shaman]

My son is 2 years 3 months old now and very active. I just read about a great idea: Take a cheap vinyl shower curtain and write large numbers on it with a permanent marker- you can use it as a number line to teach him 1-20 forwards and backwards (one of the JG steps) or make it like a hopscotch mat and ask him to jump on the numbers you call out while you are working in the kitchen. I am going to make one for my son today.

I'll make one for lowercase alphabets too and ask him to jump on it when I sound out the letter....

[kmum]

Awesome idea shaman!

[Plarka]

Some Montessori fine motor skills activities like picking up pom poms, cotton balls, etc with tweezers..... pouring water from a kid sized pitcher into cups...  My kids are 12 months and 3.5, so I can't exactly remember if 2 year olds can do this stuff!

http://prekinders.com/fine-motor-skills/

[shellychan2008]

Bring the child to the beach, and introduce second language now at age of 2:

http://hk.myblog.yahoo.com/shellychan2008/article?mid=8332

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