Use stacking cups or stacking boxes.
Put 1 or 2 blocks on to demonstrate and then allow your child to have his/her turn.
Once your child has had a turn at placing on a block, then you as the adult have another turn.
Encourage back and forth turn-taking throughout the activity. Have fun knocking it down together.
Turn-taking games give toddlers opportunities to learn important social and emotional skills. Turn-taking is a skill that needs to be learnt and practised. Waiting and taking turns can be difficult for babies and toddlers. Building towers, blowing bubbles, pushing a car back and forward, and putting shapes in a shape sorter can all be made into good turn-taking games.
Keep the turns short because babies and toddlers only have short attention spans. Turn-taking can be built into just about any play activity e.g. taking turns on swings and slides; stacking blocks; ball play; scooping sand into a bucket; stirring the cake mix etc.
Step Up – Continue to build on turn-taking by introducing it in all activities such as blowing bubbles with your mouth, making sounds, splashing water at bath time, turning pages of a book etc. This will help the child to learn about turn-taking and develop this skill over time. You can also add in more people such as a sibling or another parent so that the child has to wait a second or so longer for their turn.
Step Down – Keep turns very short and try to increase slowly. Provide a physical prompt whereby an adult helps give the book to Dad, so Dad has his turn and a verbal prompt “its Daddy’s turn, give to Daddy”. Fade prompts over time. Try to incorporate turn-taking with various activities during the day, so the child begins to learn the concept.
Social Skills
