Babbles and Music & Rock-a-Bye Baby

These games will help to grow the brains of infants and toddlers. Whether it’s through singing, dancing, cuddling, rocking, talking, smelling, or tasting, you can encourage the brain pathways to make new connections.

Music Activities

Babbles and Music
When babies start to babble, they begin with open vowels (Ohs and Ahs).

Next are new sounds and combinations, with Ps, Ms, Bs, and Ds.

Sing a song using the same vowel sound for the words. A good song is Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.

Instead of “Twinkle, twinkle, little star,” it could be “ma ma ma ma ma ma ma.”

When your baby hears you sing with the same sound, he will try to mimic you. Current research is saying that babbling is a very important sign of good language development.

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:
For building confidence: Sing a familiar song with the same vowel sound. When your baby starts to copy you, praise her and give her a hug.

For developing the idea: While your baby is singing along with you, clap her hands together and sing with great enthusiasm.

For moving forward: Sing the same song and change the vowel sound every two lines. Starting with “ma ma” and “ dada” is familiar to your baby and is a good way to start.

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Rock-a-Bye Baby
Rock-a-bye baby in the tree top
When the wind blows, the cradle will rock
When the bough breaks, the cradle will fall
And down will come baby, cradle and all

Providing warm, responsive care to young children strengthens their biological systems and help them handle their emotions. A strong, secure connection with your child will help him withstand the ordinary stresses of daily life.

Hold your child in your arms and rock him back and forth as you sing lullabies and other soothing songs, such as the following:
            Goodnight, Irene
            Hush Little Baby
            Kumbaya
            Rock-a-Bye Baby
            Swing Low, Sweet Chariot
            By’m Bye
            Sleep Baby Sleep

Use a rocking motion to calm your child and develop trust between the two of you.

After the last line of the song, hold your toddler close and give him a big hug.

Brain research says that exposure to music affects spatial-temporal reasoning. Such reasoning underlies math, engineering, and other disciplines.

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:
For building confidence: Sing the song and rock your child in different places and at different times of the day.
For developing the idea: Sing the song while your child holds a doll or stuffed animal and rocks it in his arms.

For moving forward: Act out the song and fall down at the appropriate place.

Products from Discount School Supply® that I recommend:
Size and Shape Puzzles - Set of 6 (SSPS6)
Sound Puzzle Box (AP21J)
Indestructible™ Infant Books - Set of 6 (INDY)

Ordering a Pizza & Pass the Potato

These games will help to grow the brains of infants and toddlers. Whether it’s through singing, dancing, cuddling, rocking, talking, smelling, or tasting, you can encourage the brain pathways to make new connections.

Activities for Toddlers
Communication with a young child creates the patterns for understanding. Laughter, especially, helps in releasing feel good chemicals and responses in the body, thereby increasing attachment and feelings of self-worth.  

Ordering a PizzaYou will need pictures of pizza.

Ask the children if their parents have ever ordered a pizza by telephone.

Talk about what information you would give on the phone.

What kind of pizza?

What size pizza?

Your name.

Your address.

Your telephone.

Have a pretend conversation with the children and order a pizza.

After you have played this a few times, you will see the children start to play this game with their friends.

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:
For building confidence –Ask the child “what kind of pizza do you like to eat?”

For developing the idea –Tell the child that you are going to pretend to talk on the phone and order a pizza. As the child to tell you what he would like on his pizza.

For moving forward – Look at the pictures of different pizzas and talk about what others like to eat on their pizza.

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Pass the Potato  You will need pictures of potatoes and a large russet potato.

Talk about all of the ways that you can cook a potato…boil, fry, mash, bake, etc

Sit the children in a circle and sing the following to the tune of the song "London Bridges."

Round the circle, here it comes

Here it come, here it comes

Round the circle, here it comes

Pass the potato
As the children are singing this rhyme, they pass the russet potato from one to another. When the rhyme is finished, the child left holding the potato gets to come into the circle and pretend he is eating a potato. He can also tell what kind of potato he is eating...mashed, fried, boiled, etc.

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:
For building confidence – Let the children tell you what kind of potatoes they like.
For developing the idea – What sound does the word “potato” start with?

For moving forward – I’ll name some words and you tell me if they have the same sound as “potato.” Pig, party, happy, funny, pony……etc.

Cardboard Music & Animal Songs

These games will help to grow the brains of infants and toddlers. Whether it’s through singing, dancing, cuddling, rocking, talking, smelling, or tasting, you can encourage the brain pathways to make new connections.

Music Activities for Infants and Toddlers

Cardboard Music
Playing this game will develop rhythm and memory.

You will need a toilet tissue paper tube (ARTROLL) for each child.

Show the children how to make a musical sound by singing into the tube.

If you sing "toot, toot, toot" you will make an interesting sound.

Try "toot tooting" familiar songs like " Happy Birthday" and "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star."

Playing this game is a forerunner to playing a kazoo and later perhaps a wind instrument.

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:
For building confidence – Ask the child to toot a song and you sing along.

For developing the idea - Try tooting the songs in a high voice and a low voice.

For moving forward – Pick out three favorite songs and play them together. Let the child choose which song he will toot in the morning, the afternoon and the evening. 

If your child is enjoying this, change to new songs every few days.

This is a great pre-cursor to poetry and reading in general.

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Animal Songs
This activity encourages creativity, cognitive thinking and the joy of singing.

Young children are particularly fond of songs, games and books about animals. 

The more that you sing with your child, the better language he will have and the better reader he will be.

Here are some songs about animals. Can you think of some more?

Itsy Bitsy Spider, Five Little Ducks, Old Macdonald, All the Fish, Shoo Fly, Bingo, and Hickory Dickory Dock.

A wonderful website to find Animal Songs is Kididdles.com.

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:For building confidence –Sing an animal song with the child and praise him for doing such a good job.

For developing the idea - Pick an animal song and ask the child to make the sound of that animal. Now sing the song in the animal voice that the child made.

For moving forward – Make up a song with the child about an animal. It’s best to use a familiar tune like “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” Here is an example.

Bobby had a little dog, little dog, little dog,
Bobby had a little dog
It’s fur was black and white.

Products from Discount School Supply® that I recommend:
Indestructibles™ Nursery Rhymes Books - Set of 6 (INDY2)
Maestro Baby Instruments - Set of 4 (MAESTRO)
Circus Sorting Train Banner - 29 Pieces (CHUCHU)

Giggle Box & Sweet Little Bunny Activities

These games will help to grow the brains of infants and toddlers. Whether it’s through singing, dancing, cuddling, rocking, talking, smelling, or tasting, you can encourage the brain pathways to make new connections.
Activities for Infants
Communication with a young child creates the patterns for understanding. 

Laughter, especially, helps in releasing feel good chemicals and responses in the body, thereby increasing attachment and feelings of self-worth.

Giggle Box
Help your baby know how special she is by imitating and mimicking her sounds.
When your little ones begins to giggle, giggle right along.

Laugh often and show spontaneous joy at what your baby can do.
Bring a favorite toy to life. Take that teddy bear or puppet and have it dance, sing, and move about. Be prepared for lots of giggles.

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:
For building confidence – Let the favorite toy jump up and down while you laugh together.

For developing the idea - Do some more actions with the stuffed animal. Rock it in your arms and sing a song.

For moving forward – Give the stuffed animal to your baby and let him rock the toy or move it up and down. You may need to help him at the beginning.

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Sweet Little Bunny
You will need a toy bunny.

Hold the stuffed animal in your hands and say the following:

Sweet little bunny hopping on the ground - hold the bunny and hop it up and down
Sweet little bunny looking all around - turn the bunny around

Look up high - hold the bunny high in the air

Look down low - bring the bunny down to the ground

Run, run, run

Oh, Oh, Oh, - run with the bunny

Sweet little bunny, where did you go? - hide the bunny behind your back

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:
For building confidence – After saying the poem again, give the stuffed animal to your child. Ask her to hold the bunny high and hold the bunny low. Move her hands up and down as you ask these questions.

For developing the idea – Hold your child in your arms and say the poem letting her hold the stuffed animal. Move her arms accordingly with all of the actions.

For moving forward – Pretend you are the bunny and do the actions in the poem. Encourage your little one to copy you. 

Two books that go nicely with this activity are:
The Runaway Bunny by Margaret Wise Brown
The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter

Creating a Story

These games will help to grow the brains of infants and toddlers. Whether it’s through singing, dancing, cuddling, rocking, talking, smelling, or tasting, you can encourage the brain pathways to make new connections.

Activities for Toddlers
Creating a Story
This game will help develop vocabulary.

You will need a variety of small objects to put into a paper bag. For example, a set of keys, book, a small toy, or a spoon.

Remove each item from the bag one at a time, and create a story by adding one sentence for each item as it removed.

For example: Once upon a time there were some keys on the floor – Key
When I picked up the keys, I laid them on a book. – Book

Continue on making new sentences with each word.

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:
For building confidence – Use the same words again in a little story.
For developing the idea - Put two new objects in the paper bag. Take them out and use the words in your story.

For moving forward – Draw a picture with your toddler about the story.

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Can you Name?
Ask the children if they can tell you what is in their house…tables, chairs, lamps, tv, etc. 

Sing this song to the tune of "London Bridge" and leave out the last word for the child to fill in.

Tell us please, what’s in your house
In your house
In your house
Tell us please, what’s in your house
Tell us …..(Lakeesha)
(Lakeesha names something in her house)

Continue singing this song about trees, animals, flowers, food, and more.

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:
For building confidence – Can you name some of the things at your house?
For developing the idea - What do you like to do in your house at a table?
For moving forward – What does your mother do at a table? What does your grandpa do at a table?

Bumpin' Along

These games will help to grow the brains of infants and toddlers. Whether it’s through singing, dancing, cuddling, rocking, talking, smelling, or tasting, you can encourage the brain pathways to make new connections.

Music Activities

Bumpin' Along  Singing and moving together with a young child develops fun and bonding. We all have good memories that involved music.

Sit on the floor with your child on your lap.
Sing this popular folk song to the tune of "Ten Little Indians" as you bounce your child up and down.

Bumpin along in my little red wagon
Bumpin along in my little red wagon
Bumpin along in my little red wagon
Look out, here comes a bump!
(swing your child over to one side)
You can make up additional verses such as:
Oh, oh, the wheel is broken
Oh, oh, the axle's broken
I'm gonna get my hammer and fix it
Always end the song with the same words…look out here comes a bump!

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:
For building confidence – Sing the song and use the child’s name in the song. For example, “Betsy is riding in her little red wagon.”
For developing the idea - “Let’s pretend to ride in something different. Maybe a car or a tricycle.”
Let’s go riding in a pretty red car…etc.

For moving forward – Let’s pretend to ride on a train, or an airplane.(make up new words for the song)

Products from Discount School Supply® that I recommend:
Pull Along Zoo Animals (PULLZOO)
Toddler Movement Scarves - Set of 6 (MOOVIT)
Basic Rhythms™ Bongos (DESI)

Movement Fun and Watching!

These games will help to grow the brains of infants and toddlers. Whether it’s through singing, dancing, cuddling, rocking, talking, smelling, or tasting, you can encourage the brain pathways to make new connections.

Activities for Infants
The newest brain research says that early movement experiences are essential to the neural stimulation of an infant.. For healthy brain development, infants need to have many movement experiences.

Movement Fun
Sit on the floor with your baby sitting opposite you.
Play this game as you sing to the tune of “London Bridges Falling Down.”
Hold your baby’s hands as you follow the directions in the song.

Put your hands up in the air
In the air, in the air
Put your hands up in the air
Clap, clap, clap – clap your baby’s hands together.
Put your hands down to the ground
To the ground, to the ground
Put your hands down to the ground
Clap, clap, clap

Continue using different motor activities. Always end the song with “clap, clap, clap.”

When you feel that your little one understands the activity, add movement with another part of the body.

For example you can:

• Kick your leg into the air
• Move your arm from side to side
• Take your legs and shake, shake, shake

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:

For building confidence – Play the game and encourage and praise your little one.

For developing the idea - Ask questions using the words of the song. “Can you put your hands in the air?” “Can you clap your hands?”
For moving forward – Give your child a toy that has arms and legs. Show her how to move the toy’s arms and legs as you sing the song.

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Watching
Loving care provides a baby’s brain with positive emotional stimulation.

Think of all the different places that are good for watching.

When babies can watch things move, they are happy.

A front-loading washing machine or dryer is fun for babies to watch.

Windows that are near trees are wonderful watching places.

Sit outside with your infant for an amazing amount of stimulation. You can:

• Watch birds fly from one place to another.
• Watch cars moving down the street.
• Watch the branches of a tree blow in the wind.

Take time to sit with your infant and watch together. Having you next to him will give him the comfort and security that he needs to enjoy the wonders of the world.

 

Ideas for taking this activity to the next level:

For building confidence – As you watch things together, speak words of praise in a gentle voice. “The wind feels so nice.” “What a lovely flower this is.”

 

For developing the idea - Encourage your baby to move his head back and forth. Hold a small toy in your hand and when he is looking at it, move it back and forth.

 

For moving forward – Hold your infant and walk around the room or outside and talk about all the different things you are looking at.