Games for toddlers: the best ideas

Games for toddlers from 1 year old

• Ball pit: From around 18 months, children can not only grab balls, but also throw them. This makes it a lot of fun to play with balls. When buying the ball pool, however, pay attention to the specified minimum age, the size of the balls (in order to avoid a risk of swallowing) and to dimensionally stable, tested and certified material. Do not let your child play in the ball pit unsupervised.
• Building blocks: Building blocks can be piled up to form pyramids or figures and new games can always be invented. This is never boring for toddlers!
• Noise games: Many objects make funny noises that children can discover. Use, for example: drums, rattles, music boxes, tonewoods, glockenspiel etc.
• Puzzle: Large wooden puzzles or cardboard puzzles provide employment for a while and are a nice toy for the first few years.
• Vehicle toys: Everything that can be dragged behind is fun for children … Be it the large wooden car on a string or the toy duck on wheels.
• Mating games: A stacking tower made of different colored rings, a plug-in game train or a wooden box with figures to plug in … these games also promote motor skills in young children.

Games for toddlers from 1.5 years old

• Painting with children: Children can be incredibly creative! Give them safe, tested finger paints, put on old clothes and protect the table with an old tablecloth … and off you go with the mud and blobs!
• Plasticine: Build figures, form snakes and balls … with plasticine, children can let their imaginations run wild. In addition, the motor and sensory skills of the little ones are encouraged. For the little ones, the plasticine should be particularly soft. From the age of 3, children can also use knitting accessories, such as molds, in their games. However, make sure that the plasticine is harmless to health, since many children could put toys, and in this case the plasticine, in their mouths. Plasticine can also be easily made from water, wheat flour, salt and vegetable oil plus the appropriate food coloring, so you can be sure that your kids are not exposed to any dangerous substances while playing.
• Threading items: Colorful utensils (large wooden beads, painted toilet paper rolls) can be threaded onto a cord, which your children should be busy with for a while! However, make sure that the individual items are large enough so that they cannot be swallowed.
• Dolls, cuddly toys, cars, children's phones: It doesn't always have to be the newest toy, usually there is a cuddly toy or a car that the little ones prefer to use for all games!
• To catch: As soon as your child can walk well, catching is really fun and also gives you a good push!
• Play hide and seek: Playing hide and seek is very exciting for toddlers! Whether outside or in the apartment – there are countless hiding places to discover. Adapt the games to the age of your child: the little ones are not yet able to do many movements with their motor. Even if the hiding place is obvious, search a bit until you "find" your child, it will be a lot more fun.

Games for toddlers over 2.5 years

• Dress up: Slip into different roles, be a pirate, merchant or princess for a day – such a box with old clothes offers so much potential for fancy costumes and role-playing games!
• Obstacle course: A small course can be set up in the children's room or in the garden and can be made up of blankets, chairs, table, rope, etc. The children can crawl, jump or hop. Make sure that your child cannot bump or hurt anywhere.
• Build a cave: Caves under the table, from blankets or upholstery – these little retreats offer pure adventure! The children's imagination will keep creating new games, as the little ones will always come up with new scenarios.
• Build a cardboard house: Here mom or dad have to help at the beginning and cut windows and doors into a large box. Then the kids can paint the house.
• Ride a bike: A nice game of movement and at the same time the balance bike promotes the child's sense of balance and his coordination skills.
• Blob pictures, push-through pictures, stamps: All afternoons can be filled with creative game ideas! Put blobs on half a piece of paper with plenty of water-based paint, then fold the paper in half and look forward to the beautiful butterfly! For press-through pictures, you use thin, structured things that you put under a white sheet of paper for your child. Then it can rub over it with crayons or crayons and look forward to the exciting result. Stamp what the stuff holds, it works wonderfully with potato printing!

You are looking for more games for your little ones: Here we have listed nice games for indoors and here you will find games for children's birthdays.

If you want to talk to other parents about child development or creative games, have a look at our community.