Where Is the Sound?

A young child's brain grows at a phenomenal rate in the early years of life opening windows of opportunity for learning that occurs only once in a lifetime.
These simple games will promote early brain development for Infants and toddlers.

FOR INFANTS

Learning Objective – Auditory Development

Where Is the Sound?

The newest brain research says that musical experiences enhance the future ability to reason abstractly, particularly in the spatial domains.

Auditory awareness is something that comes with age and experience.

Playing games to heighten your baby’s hearing awareness will help wire her brain.

Take a wind-up musical toy and put it out of your baby’s sight.

Wind it up and ask her “where’s the music?”

When she turns to the sound, praise her generously.

Repeat this game in different parts of the room.

 If your baby is crawling, you can hide the music under a pillow or elsewhere so that she can crawl to the music.

Ideas to take this activity to the next level:
For building confidence: Repeat the game several times and praise your baby.

For developing the idea: Put the musical toy at different levels: on a table, on a chair, on the floor, etc.

For moving forward: Put the toy next to the baby and clap hands and sing "la la la" to the music. 

FOR INFANTS

Learning Objective – Practicing Language

Speak with your body

When babies learn new words, they like to repeat them over and over because they enjoy the sounds. Practicing speech patterns is a wonderful pre-reading experience.

Start with simple words like “moon.” Say it with your mouth several times,’

Say it in the evening so that you can point to the sky as you say it.

Say it with your hands  Clap your hands as you say the word.

Say it with your head. (move your head up and down to the word).

Say it with your feet - (stamp your feet to the word.)

Say it with your eyes -(blink your eyes to the word)

Play the same game with another word or words.

Ideas to take this activity to the next level:
For building confidence: It's fun to say the words in different ways. Let's say the word and I will bounce you on my knee.

For developing the idea: Let's say a new word and clap our hands at the same time. Pick a name of a family member.

For moving forward: Tell me a word you would like to say with this game.

Color 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 pathways of their brains to make new connections.

Learning Objective - Developing motor skills

Color Songs

The children should be sitting in front of you in a circle.
Give each child a piece of drawing paper.
Have an array of crayons next to you so that all the children can see the colors.
Sing a song to your children that has a color word in the lyrics. Here are some suggestions.
"Skip to My Lou"
"Yellow Bird"
"Red Red Robin"
"Miss Mary Mack"
"Jennie Jenkins"

Ask them to listen for a color word.
Then, select a child to come and find that color crayon and draw a circle on his paper.

Ideas that take this activity to the next level:
For building confidence: The song "Skip to My Lou" has the names of two colors. What are they?
(Little red wagon painted blue.)

For developing the idea: Let’s sing some of these songs again.

For moving forward: Let’s make up a song with a color word in it.

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Learning objective – Developing motor skills

From infancy, as babies develop, the sounds of rattles and musical toys intrigue them. Toddlers begin composing their own rhythmic patterns by banging on pots and other surfaces. A tune on the radio or television can spontaneously inspire a toddler to respond by swaying and bouncing his little body.

Here is a rhythm action poem that children enjoy.

MY BODY HAS RHYTHM by Jackie Silberg
I use my brain to think, think, think
(touch your head with your index finger)
I use my nose to smell
(touch your nose)
I use my eyes to blink, blink, blink
(blink your eyes)
And I use my mouth to YELL
(yell)
I use my mouth to giggle, giggle, giggle
(touch your mouth)
I use my hips to bump
(sway your hips)
I use my toes to wiggle, wiggle, wiggle
(wiggle your toes)
And I use my legs to jump
(Jump)

1. Clap the rhythm of the poem. Notice that the rhythm is the same every other line.

2. Clap two lines and speak two lines

Ideas that take this activity to the next level:
For building confidence: Say the poem and do the actions with your child. Give her lots of praise.

For developing the idea: Clap the rhythm with your child as you say the words. She will soon become familiar with the rhythm changing every other line.

For moving forward: Give your child a stuffed animal and help her do the actions with the toy.

Recommended Products:
Find & Fit a Shape (TODFIT)
Chunky Mix & Stack Farm (MIXFARM)
Edushape® Train Set (TRAINBL)

Awareness of Sounds

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 pathways of their brains to make new connections.

FOR TODDLERS
Learning Objective – Awareness of Sounds

Body Sounds
Before there were pianos and guitars, people made sounds with their bodies.
Think of the different parts of your body that can make a sound.
Ask the children to do the following.

Rubbing your hands together.
Hitting your hands on different surfaces,
Stamping your feet against the floor.
Slapping – open your hands against your chest, slap your thighs, and your tummy..
Clap your hands together or against someone else’s hands.
Mouth sounds – click your teeth together, rub your tongue against your lips, gargle, smack your lips.
Whispering

Ideas that take this activity to the next level:
For building confidence: Do you have some favorite sounds? Can you make them now?

For developing the idea: Let’s find some pictures with people making different sounds.

For moving forward: What body sounds do you make when you are happy, sad, angry, and sleepy?

Tell Me What It Says

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 pathways of their brains to make new connections.


FOR INFANTS
Learning Objective– Developing language

The current brain research says: that young children develop a clear bias for words with first-syllable accents For example, the rhyme “Baa Baa Black Sheep” is good to say with your infant. Say the rhyme and put an accent on the first word of each line.

Baa Baa black sheep
Have you any wool
Yes sir, yes sir
Three bags full

Some other rhymes that work well with accenting the first word in each line are: "London Bridge," "Mary Had a Little Lamb" and "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star."

Babies pay closer attention to accented words.

Ideas that take this activity to the next level:
For building confidence: As you say the accented words, raise your voice to a higher level using a parentese voice.

For developing the idea: Holding the baby in your lap, each time you say the accented word, clap the baby’s hands together.

For moving forward: Sing familiar songs with your baby and pick out certain words to accent. When you sing the accented word, do a movement activity at the same time. For example, jump, walk very slowly and sing the word slowly, march, and twirl slowly.

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Activity: Tell Me What It Says

You will need a picture of a baby, a clock, a bird, a drum, and some water.

Point to one of the pictures and say to your your baby “Tell me what the baby says.”

Then answer the question – “Ma ma, ma, ma” or “Da da da da.”

Repeat the same question asking about each picture and giving the answer.

Tell me what the clock says
Tick, tock, tick, tock
Tell me what the birdie says
Tweet. Tweet, tweet, tweet
Tell me what the drum says
Boom, boom, boom, boom
Tell me what the water says
Gurgle, gurgle, gurgle, gurgle

Ideas that take this activity to the next level:

For building confidence: Make the sounds with the baby and encourage him to copy you. Praise all of his efforts.

For developing the idea: Look at books and magazines with the baby and find things that make sounds.

For moving forward: Show your baby different mouth sounds. Clicking, moving your tongue back and forth on your lips, the raspberry, and any others that you can think of. Babies love to look at faces and will try to copy you.

Sound Awareness and Creative Thinking

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 pathways of their brains to make new connections.

Learning Objective- Awareness of Sound

This game is like a scavenger hunt. Talk about all the different kinds of sounds you can listen to and try to find examples of these sounds.

Crunchy, funny, terrible, scary, scratchy, buzzing, humming, a sound that starts and stops, and metal sounds.

Here are some ideas to start with.
Carrot for crunching
Scary sound with your voice
A buzzing toy
Two metal spoons
Slide whistle

Pick up one of the objects and make the sound. When you make the sound, give the descriptive word.
“Oh, that is a loud sound.”

Take a walk outside and see what sounds you can identify.

Things to do to take this activity to the next level:
For building confidence - “Can you make your voice sound happy?”

For developing the idea - “You make wonderful happy sounds. Can a bird make a happy sound? Can a dog make a happy sound?" Continue asking about different animals and different sounds.

For moving forward - “I’m going to make a sound. See if you can tell what it is. (make a sound of a cat. Now you make a sound and I’ll see if I can tell what it is.” There’s a good chance that the child will copy your sound. That’s normal and should be expected.

Learning Objective – Creative thinking
A favorite song with toddlers is “Old MacDonald Had a Farm.” They love to make the animal sounds.

Talk about other kinds of places Old MacDonald could go. The children will tell you things based on their families.

Try singing the song using other ideas.

Old MacDonald had a cold, e,i,e,i,o
And with his cold he had a cough. Etc.

Think of sounds you have with a cold.

Old MacDonald could also have a yard, a house, a candy store, etc. Changing the words will develop vocabulary.

Things to do to take this activity to the next level:
For building confidence – “ Let’s sing Old MacDonald together.”

For developing the idea - “If Old MacDonald had a candy store, what kind of candy would he have in the store?”

For moving forward - “Let’s sing Old MacDonald had a car and make up sounds of the car.”

An excellent book to read for this activity is Old MacDonald in the City by Suzanne Williams.

Recommended Items:
Watch Me Crawl Tunnel (GOBABY)
Giant Plush Stacking Ring (TALLRING)
The Complete Book of Rhymes, Songs, Poems, Fingerplays and Chants (RHYMES)

Develope Your Toddler's Vocabulary

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

Learning Objective – Developing vocabulary
Sit the children on the floor gathered around you. If they understand sitting in a circle, that would be ideal.

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 the song giving the children an opportunity to tell about their houses.

Things to do to take 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 the table?

For moving forward - What does your mother do at the table? What does your grandpa do at the table?

Learning Objective – Growing motor skills
Cut out large apple shapes from colored paper. Laminate them and place them on the floor. If this presents a problem, you can cut out the apple shapes and tape them in different parts of the room.

Ask the children to hop from one apple to another as they sing to the tune of “Mary Had a Little Lamb.”

Hopping, hopping for my health
For my health
For my health
Hopping, hopping for my health
I am healthy.

Continue with other movements such as jumping, marching, turning, and running.

Follow with a conversation about exercise and health.

Things to do to take this activity to the next level:
For building confidence – Tell the children “hopping makes up feel good and is a lot of fun”.

For developing the idea – Ask “where are places that you like to hop”?

For moving forward - Can you hop like different animals? A rabbit, a frog, or a bird?

Discover Your Hands!

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 pathways of their brains to make new connections.

FOR INFANTS
Learning Objective - Discovering your hands
Babies love to stare at interesting faces and toys.

Take several colorful toys and, one at a time, slowly move it back and forth in front of your baby to stimulate his vision.

This is also the time when babies discover their hands. They watch and watch and finally discover that they can make their hands appear and disappear.
Take your baby’s hands and gently clap them in front of his face. As you do this, say the following poem:
Clap, clap, clap your hands,
Clap your hands together.
Put your hands on Mommy’s face. (substitute name of the person doing the rhyme with baby)
Clap your hands together.
Clap, clap, clap your hands,
Clap your hands together
Put your hands on baby’s face (substitute child’s name)
Clap your hands together

Things to do to take this activity to the next level:
For building confidence – Use encouraging phrases to tell the baby what a good job she is doing.

For developing the idea – Continue playing the game and adding new parts to touch. Hair, eyes, nose and lips are good to start with.

For moving forward - Say “I can clap my hands.” Clap your hands. Now say, “You can clap your hands.” Take the baby’s hands and clap them. Repeat this except the next time, clap the baby’s hands once and encourage her to do it by herself.

Learning Objectives – To strengthen your baby’s back and neck
Lie on your back and put your baby on your tummy.

With your hands firmly around his waist or chest, raise your baby in the air and up to your face.

Say the following and do the actions:
Where’s my baby?
There he is. (lift him up to your face)
Where’s my baby?
There he is. (bring him back down to your tummy)
Where’s my baby?
There he is. (bring him back up to your face)
Where’s my baby?
There he is. (bring him back down to your tummy)
Where’s my baby? Up high, high, high. (bring your baby up high over your face)
Where’s my baby? (bring him back down to your tummy

Keep repeating the high, high, high part.

Things to do to take this activity to the next level:
For building confidence - Each time you go high, add a fun sound like “whee” or “yay,”

For developing the idea -  Continue to play games with your baby where you hold him and take him high in the air. With older infants, sit on the floor with your baby sitting in front of you. While holding him firmly around his waist or chest, rock back and forth or side to side. Sing a song as you play this game.

For moving forward - Brain research says that developing strength and balance lays the groundwork for crawling and internal feelings of self-confidence.