What kinds of things do you do with an 18 month old?

Question

I live in Ohio and its very cold and snowy, but my son gets so bored if he has to be in the house all day. I dont know what we can do to pass time. We play with play doh and he has a tent that he gets in but it seems like nothing keeps his attention for more than 5 minutes at a time. I dont know what to do, any suggestions? thank you!

Answer 1

- playdough
- painting
- bake holiday cookies together and decorate them
- make a paper chain to count down to Christmas
- build a fort with all the pillows in the house
- take all the pillows in the house and lay them end to end to create a train track, then the 2 of you pretend to be trains
- let him play with the laundry baskets; climb in them, use it as a basketball or soccer goal, etc.
- put on some music and dance
- get a big cardboard box that he can decorate and play in
- involve him in household chores like sorting laundry by color
- take him online to the PBSKids website, Disney, NickJr, or http://starfall.com
- make handprint ornaments out of salt dough
- fill the kitchen sink with water and let him "wash" plastic dishes

Answer 2

I agree with #1...but that's a little harsh. He's still young, so I don't see a big problem with you playing with him and spending time with him, even though being able to play on his own for longer than five minutes would be a big plus.

You can put on some good educational cartoons. My kids loved "Kipper the Dog" at that age...and they still do!

You can have him help you (in little ways) around the house. I know he can't do much right now, but he might get a kick out of helping put something away or trying to use a broom.

You can put on some music and dance around with him.

Naps are always good too! ; )
Good luck!

Answer 3

I live in Ohio, too so I feel your pain. I have a 3 year old daughter and a 14 month old son.

We make trips to our local library about every other week. We check out books and videos. Both of my kids like books. Our library has a story time. My son likes Elmo so we check out a lot of Elmo videos. We also go play at the play area at the local mall from time to time.

In the house, we build things with Mega Blocks (the 14 month old mostly knocks them down), play hide and seek or just chase, roll a ball back and forth, build a car ramp with something long and flat and race cars down the ramp. We use coffee cans as drums. We sing a lot. The people who mentioned the kitchen set and plastic food - both of my kids spend hours playing with ours. We found the kitchen set for $5 at a church rummage sale. Another option is if you have plastic cups, bowls, etc. that you don't use much, put them in a low cabinet that he can reach or a box. My kids love getting stuff out of the two kitchen cabinets that we don't have child locks on that they are allowed to play with. And my kids love to climb in and out of cardboard boxes and laundry baskets. Do you have a rocking horse or anything like that? - that's another one that my son will spend a lot of time on.

Good luck!

Answer 4

crayons washable markers plenty of paper

play with toys in bath tub without any water

basement toys that he will only see if he's in the basement

read books

sing songs

run

try to hop

look at different photos of cats, dogs, etc and make animal sounds

put him in his highchair and let him play with about 2 or 3 tablespoons of flour or sugar.

practice opening and closing doors. you'll open he'll close

let him bang on the keyboard. (I let my daughter do this and as she hits keys I say the letter. She now recognizes the letter M and she's 18 months old)

Answer 5

When my daughter was that age she loved to play with dry rice. You just buy a bag of it and put it in a pan or some other container. (put the pan on a blanket for easy cleanup, and teach him not to throw it or it's put away) Give him spoons, funnels, measuring cups, etc. My daughter had a very short attention span but would play with rice forever.

Answer 6

Find a fellow Buckeye with a kid at a similiar age, and plan some play dates the kids can play with each other, and you may have some adult conversation. Go Bucks

Answer 7

Many various activies. Boys attention spans are always short no matter what the age. Try craft projects, coloring, lego blocks, My kids loved to play kitchen with pretend plastic food, puzzles.

Answer 8

he is old enough to start working with crayons. He can learn colors as well as learning how to color and draw. Blocks and shapes are fun too. The rice is a vey good idea( from above remark)

Answer 9

try painting with fingers and hands and stuff. messy but my son loves it. also make drum kits from old saucepans and wooden spoons. try giving hi fun books too and start teaching him to talk etc

Answer 10

Then it's you who the problem is, he should be left alone, but supervised sometimes to teach him that he can play by himself and expand his attention span.