Two-year-old kids are restless, curious and open to everything new. Their favorite pastime is a game. Through it, you can teach kids to distinguish colors and shapes, to introduce them to various animals, natural phenomena, and seasons. It is not necessary to attend group classes and circles in specialized centers. Parents are quite capable of organizing educational games for children of 2 years in their own apartment.
Is not it too early?
Not all parents are convinced of the advisability of teaching classes at such a tender age. It seems to them that premature education robs kids of a carefree childhood. This is not entirely true.
A two year old child is a born researcher. He, on his own initiative, studies the objects surrounding him, sets up experiments. Parents usually take them for pranks. Why do you need to draw on wallpaper, break toys, pull a cat by the tail? Uncontrolled experiments can cause others a lot of problems. Developing games for children of 2 years will help direct the energy of the little researcher in the right direction. It’s easier to organize them at home, since mom and dad know their child’s interests better, can adapt to his mood, interrupt or change occupation in time.
Outdoor games
Children of this age learn the world through movements. In no case should they be seated at the desk. On the contrary - active classes should be held daily both in the apartment and during walks on the street. What kind of home educational games for children 2 years old can adults organize?
The following is an indicative list:
- Games with objects: balls, pins, fitball.
- Walking. Teach your baby to walk quickly and slowly, with the help of ropes, draw curved paths on the floor, place obstacles that you need to step over.
- Run. The kids love catch-up games, salki. Teach your child to change the direction of running, placing obstacles in the form of toys on his way.
- Jumping Two-year-olds only learn this skill. Learn to bounce to music holding hands. Then you can hone the acquired skill, moving along the paths with letters, colors, numbers.
- Dances, round dances. Teach your kids to move in accordance with the music.
- Hide and seek, blindfolds, and folk running games (for example, "The Bear in the Forest") will bring a lot of joy to children.
Exploring the world
It is very important to encourage the child’s cognitive interest , put together practical experiments, study animals, natural phenomena, and the simplest patterns. The following educational games for children of 2 years are very useful:
- Get a touch box at home. Fill it with sand, pebbles, cereals, pasta, coffee grains, small pieces of paper, rags, buttons or a serpentine. Periodically change the content, focusing on a new topic. Create a layout of a vegetable garden, a farm with pets, a zoo, a forest glade, a winter edge, a seabed, etc.
- Play with water. Pour it into containers of different sizes and shapes, tint with paints, turn it into ice and vice versa, arrange a "rain" for toys. Learn which items are drowning and which are floating on the surface.
- Arrange competitions of cars, airplanes, checking which model will fly further or travel the distance faster.
First math
The children of two years learn to distinguish between primary colors and shapes, count to three, get acquainted with the concepts of "little, lot," lay out objects in size. All this happens in the form of educational games. For children 2-3 years old, it is important to make the learning process as interesting as possible, to repeatedly repeat the same material.
Favorite games, fairy tales can come to the rescue. After reading the story of Three Bears, stage it. Let the baby lay out plates for the bears, make cots from the designer, focusing on the size of the characters. When playing in the store, ask to sell you three carrots, two potatoes. When laying the table for the dolls, arrange the dishes according to the number of guests.
Useful card games. Let the child run to the table and bring you the image of a circle or square. Guess which color card has disappeared or, conversely, appeared magically. Such special classes should be short-lived and stop as soon as the baby begins to lose interest.
Speech development
By the age of 2, children already speak separate words, simple phrases. Most kids have not yet learned to pronounce all sounds, make grammatical errors. To improve pronunciation, encourage your child to imitate the sounds of animals and objects. When playing bears, growl loudly (like a daddy bear) and quietly (like a teddy bear). When reproducing the sounds of a car, change the rate of pronunciation (we drive fast and then slowly).
To replenish your vocabulary, read simple tales, short verses. Based on their plot, you can organize many children's educational games. For children of 2 years old, it is useful to gradually learn to retell read stories, playing them with toys, taking on the role of Kolobok or lost Masha.
Role-playing games
Transforming into a doctor, a bunny or a mother, children model life situations, learn to understand the relationship between the characters. At the same time, imagination develops. Such activities are much more important for a preschooler than memorizing letters or numbers.
Properly organized educational games for children in 1.5-2 years old will teach them to reproduce adult actions, use substitute items (candy wrappers instead of money, a chair instead of a car cabin). Parents first show the child a toy, introduce them to it. At the doll you can find body parts, at the typewriter - body, wheels. Then, one action is performed with the toy (the bear is rocked, the truck is carried on the floor).
The next step is to perform actions with several items. The doll must be fed, undressed, sing a lullaby and put in a crib. First, the details of the designer are transported on a typewriter, and then a bunny house is built from them. Kids just learn to plot, so parents should take an active part in such fun. Then by the age of 2.5, the child will learn to play independently with his toys.
Creative activities
At 2 years old, children already understand mother's explanations, strive to imitate adults. This is a great time to do drawing, modeling, design, application. Of course, the first crafts will be simple. Kids are invited to roll sausages, balls from plasticine, flatten them, pinch off small pieces during the developmental game. Classes for children 2 years old should have an understandable plot: we feed dolls, make sausages for dogs, roll grains for hungry chickens, decorate the Christmas tree for the New Year.
Drawing can also be turned into an interesting game. Children depict rain jets to water flowers, fill a cat’s glass with juice, and shade a hare, hiding it from a fox. From the designer houses, garages, furniture for toys are created. Making an applique, the kid decorates the dress with a doll or collects mushrooms for a hedgehog. An adult can fully express his imagination, creating another craft with the child.
Useful toys
Thanks to them, your classes with your baby will become more intense and exciting. To organize educational games for children 2-3 years old, you will need:
- Constructor with large parts.
- Building set of cubes.
- Toys for the development of logical thinking: sorters, pyramids, labyrinths, nesting dolls, puzzles from 4-6 parts.
- Mosaic.
- Soft toys, dolls, cars, dishes. All should look realistic.
- Ball, pins.
- Bucket, molds, scoop for games in the sandbox.
- Children's musical instruments: pipe, piano, drum and others.
- Game sets "Doctor", "Shop", "Tools", "Barber".
- Plasticine, paints, colored paper, glue, pencils and other materials for creativity.
It is not necessary to buy expensive interactive toys, sounding posters, children's computers. Materials made by parents are no less useful for a child of 2 years.
DIY educational games
To make them, you do not need special skills. You will find all the necessary materials at home. You are required to: look around and ask yourself how you can use familiar things.
We bring to your attention several options for educational games for children of 2 years:
- "Save the mouse." Fold sheets of colored paper in half to make “books”. Inside they are white. Cut the circles on the front side. In the resulting windows draw mice. To save them from the cat, you need to close the mink with a circle of the correct color.
- "Pick up the lid." Paste jars of different sizes with multi-colored self-adhesive paper. Stick mugs of the same shade on the lids. Remove the covers and invite the baby to close the jars correctly.
- "Learning to count." Attach shoelaces to numbers cards. Invite your child to string as many beads on them as indicated on the card. Caps and cut cases from empty felt-tip pens can also be worn on the cord.
Simple games in 5 minutes
To organize useful fun at home does not require much time and effort. The following are educational games for children of 2 years that any parent can play without much difficulty:
- "Who hid?" Tie a pencil to one end of the rope, and a toy to the other. Hide it under a cabinet or in a drawer. The child must wrap the rope around the pencil and pull the toy towards him.
- Clothespins. From them you can make the rays of a cardboard sun or the legs of a centipede.
- "Foamy fun." Put a little liquid soap in a bowl of water. Let the baby whip the foam with a whisk. You can also blow bubbles through a straw.
- "Winding paths." On the sheet, draw straight and curved lines. Let the child lay buttons or pasta along them.
- "Find from whom." Plant soft toys around the room, attach a card with a picture, a geometric figure, etc. to each chest. Ask them to bring you an animal with a snowflake or a square.
Independent games
Parents do not always have free time for classes with the baby. If you have no time, invite your child to play educational games. For children in 1-2 years the following classes are extremely interesting:
- Washing dishes or washing doll clothes in a basin of water. Cover the floor with oilcloth to avoid troubles.
- Cleaning. Give the crumbs a spray bottle and a cloth, let the door or refrigerator wash outside.
- Games with toilet paper. It can be torn or wrinkled, making balls for throwing.
- Sort outfits. Give out a big bag with old clothes and offer to select all winter items.
Educational games for children 2 years are very diverse. Being engaged with the kid, pay more attention to the development of creative abilities, imagination. You will have time to master reading later, but now you need to learn how to create your own worlds and populate them with funny characters.