10 Activities for Toddlers At Home 12months+

These 10 remarkable activities for toddlers at home will definitely keep them engaged with a purpose of learning. Children learn through everyday experiences and interactions.

1. Sensory Play
2. Toy Wash/ Water Play
3. Kitchen Helper
4. Edible Finger Painting
5. Dance Party
6. Laundry Helper
7. Bubbles
8. Basket with Books
9. Exploring Real World Objects
10. Putting Objects Into Small Openings

During the toddler years, young children are very curious wanting to explore just about anything, especially things that are in the real world.

Young children like to do things on their own and love to be included just about in everything while we are trying to clean, cook, and work.

They love putting small objects into containers and dumping the objects out of the container.

Young children language development is growing tremendously now so the more children are expose to words the better is for them.

^{A Reminder. Every child’s development is unique. With so much emphasis on milestones, it can be hard not to compare with other children but lets just not compare our children to others. If you have a concern on your child’s development, your pediatrician is a great resource for questions about your child’s development.}

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10 Activities for Toddlers At Home

1. Sensory Play activity for toddlers

Fill a plastic bin of pretty much anything you have at home like dry beans, dry rice, feathers, flowers, leaves, etc. Place spoons for digging, kitchen funnels for pouring through, add trucks, plastic animals, measuring spoons, small bowls, etc., in the rice and let your child dig and explore. For younger children or if you’re afraid of your child putting items in mouth you can make edible “sand” just blend any cereal and fill it in the plastic bin.

2. Toy Wash / Water Play activity for toddlers

Fill a sink, plastic bin, or bowl with water. Provide a towel, a sponge, and a box of toys that your child can wash. For instance, plastic animals, toy food, toy cars, etc., and let your little one clean away.

3. Kitchen Helper activity for toddlers

• When doing the dishes, let your child help you load and unload the dishes from the dishwasher.
• When prepping meals, let your child wash the vegetables and fruits.
• The next time you come home from the store, let your little one help you unpack the bags and put away the groceries. This can help them to identify a wide range of foods.

4. Edible Finger Painting activity for toddlers

• At this age, little ones love getting messy and like to explore with their hands. So why not just have a messy finger painting with rice cereal and add food coloring.
• Another edible finger painting favorite is the vanilla yogurt and adding food coloring to it.
• These are so much fun!

5. Dance Party activity for toddlers

Toddlers love to move around so why not have a Dance Party. Your little one will be able to move his/her body and will demonstrate increasing awareness of own physical effort, body awareness, spatial awareness, and directional awareness. Add a more fun dance party with dancing scarves and with the musical instruments.

When in doubt Dance it Out! -unknown

Favorite Children Singers

• Ella Jenkins
• Greg N Steve
• Raffi
• Shawn Brown

6. Laundry Helper activity for toddlers

• The next time you’re going to do laundry, let your child join you. Have them sort clothes by color or maybe have your child find all his/her socks, etc. Just make it fun as this activity opens language and cognitive opportunitites and responsibilities at a young age.
• Let your child help out load and unload the washer or dryer. They love to help out and gives them a sense of accomplishment and ownership.

7. Bubbles activity for toddlers

Blowing bubbles and watching bubbles is FUN! This is a great way to help and encourage your child’s gross motor, cognitive, and language. Engage your little one in blowing bubbles. Let your little one chase the bubbles and try to pop them!

8. Basket with Books activity for toddlers

Books are a number one in our house and Evelyn loves books. If you haven’t already, having a basket with books is really convenient because you can just pick up the basket of books and take it to the living room, kitchen when you’re trying to cook, and just anywhere around the house.

Tips:

• Rotate books every 1 or 2 weeks
• Bring out new season books
• Textured books are very engaging

More Literacy Tips: Early Literacy: Why is Reading Important?

9. Exploring Real World Objects activity for toddlers

Honestly this is my favorite! Just gather different random objects that you have at home and put them in a basket. For example, an old remote control, an old phone, kitchen utensils, real fruit and vegetables. Toddlers just love to explore with real objects as this activity gives young children an opportunity to stimulate their imagination and a real understanding of the world.

10. Putting Objects Into Small Openings activity for toddlers

When your child was a baby they first learned how to take toys out of their toy box but now that your child has mastered taking things out of containers, he/she will become fascinated with putting things back in. Therefore, to encourage your little one, try giving him/her a variety of things and many containers to put them in.

Examples

• Cheerios and an empty ice tray
• Kids piggy bank and paper coins, wooden coins, etc.
• Q-tips and a water bottle without cap
• Ball Drop. Small ball and make a whole in a shoe box
• Pom poms and a muffin dish

More Fine Motor Activities: Easy and Fun Fine Motor Activities for 9-12 Months old