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- Create a mystery grab bag for your baby. Place various toys or safe household items with different textures inside a paper grocery bag. Include things like pieces of fabric, blocks of wood, a zip-lock back with ice cubes, Play-Doh, stuffed toy, baseball cap, plastic shovel. As your toddler feels each item, ask her to try to describe what she feels.
- Use clean socks to make puppets. Slip white or colored socks over your hands and put on a "show" for your baby. Securely attach eyes (buttons, or cut out dark fabric) or ears if you want. Use silly voices for each puppet.
- Talk to your baby throughout the day using complete sentences. Say the names of objects as you use them. Pose questions and make statements. "Are these your socks?" "Here is your bunny." "Let’s read a book."
- Always have books available. There are bathtub books, chubby fabric books, large picture books and thick cardboard books. Have books in the car, diaper bag, throughout the house and in places where your toddler frequently visits like grandparents or the babysitters. Read to your baby every day.
- Put uncooked rice or corn meal in a large shallow container like a baking pan or sheet. Let your baby use her fingers to "draw" swirls and other designs in the rice or meal. You may want to play with this outside, be prepared for this game to be messy!
- As you read to your baby, help him to understand that books are read from front to back, top to bottom, and words are read from left to right. If you see your toddler "reading" a book, don’t be quick to correct him if he’s holding it upside down, or turning the pages backward. Always give positive, enthusiastic encouragement when you see him interested in books. Always make books and reading to be a happy experience and one your toddler will want to repeat.
- Make a big sign with your child’s name on it and attach it to her bedroom door or on the refrigerator or somewhere else that she can see it and know it is HER name. Point to it and say her name often.
- If you have a birthday party for your one-year-old, or are celebrating a holiday, suggest to gift givers that they bring books as gifts. Build a library for your baby so there is never a shortage of books to read.
- Play name games with your baby. Ask her, "Where’s Mama?" "Where’s the dog?" "Where’s your bottle?" At first, you will need to help him identify what you’re pointing to, and in time he will point as you ask the question.
- Blow bubbles for your baby to watch or try to catch. This will help her learn coordination. Older children love bubbles, too and can blow their own. You can make the bubble soap by mixing one cup of water with two tablespoons of corn syrup and four tablespoons of dishwashing liquid detergent.
- Repeat, repeat and repeat again. Repetition helps all babies and toddlers form a strong foundation for learning and good behavior. Don’t feel you always have to have a new story, new song or new activity. Children learn from repeated experiences.
- Encourage your baby to take turns and share. You can get him started with some simple turn-taking games. Give him a stuffed toy and let him hold it as you count to three. Have him pass it to you or someone else and count to three again. The act of sharing comes naturally to babies, but sharing as a learned behavior comes later, when a child is preschool age.
- Make a texture board for your toddler. Securely attach pieces of fabric – velvet, fake fur, corduroy, carpet, cotton – as well as things like sticky tape, a twig, rough sandpaper, a leaf, a stone or grass to a piece of cardboard. As he moves his hand to feel each item, describe the textures.
- Find ways to include your toddler with daily tasks. If you are sorting mail, sit your toddler next to you and let her look at colorful catalogs or large envelopes. Place a trash can or recycle box next to her so she can help throw unwanted paper away. If you are cooking, give her a plastic mixing bowl and spoon so she can "cook" with you. If you are cleaning, give her a damp sponge to help wipe cupboards or surfaces.
- Take two shoe boxes and fill one with rolled up socks. Leave the other one empty. Show your toddler the "full" box and the "empty" box. Describe the difference between full and empty. Place five pairs of socks in one box and two pairs in the other box. Describe the difference between "more" and "fewer."
- Make sure your baby has plenty of toys or containers with lids, like plastic margarine tubs or shoe boxes. Help him learn to "put on" and "take off" the lids. Show him the difference between on and off.
- Help your baby understand simple numbers. Count out three blocks, as you hand blocks to him, say; "Here’s one block, two blocks, three blocks."
- Play a reading game with your baby. Read a book that rhymes. If your baby likes it, read it again and again. Soon, if you stop before the end of a line, she will want to finish it while your point to the last word. This is an early part of reading.
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