Fun and Engaging Activities for Two Years Old | tried and tested by moms

Read on for comprehensive list of fun and engaging activities for two years old. Each child is unique but we have brought a variety of toddler activities that you can try with your toddler. Try these and pick up the ones your 2 to 3 year old likes. These activities for 2 years old are also great for improving fine motor skills and hand eye coordination.

It’s really hard to keep the two years old occupied as their attention span is very low and they get distracted very easily. The good idea is try to understand their likes and dislikes and plan the activities for them accordingly. At two years kids are more mobile, active and curious. Thus, we need to really work hard to select the activities to grab their attention and interest and keep them occupied in something they enjoy.

So the most commonly asked question is – how do we understand what our 2 year old likes doing ?

The answer is just notice your toddler for e.g. does he/she likes pouring things, or likes taking out stickers, or likes to play with colours or likes music and rhymes or likes to throw things around. Based on what they currently enjoy doing we can design an activity  for them.

Our aim as a parent is to expose our kids to a variety of activities without expecting them to like what we have designed.

There are times your 2 year old will want to do again and again what you have made but there are times when they will not show interest at all. So if they don’t show interest try it again after some time.

So below is a list of activities for 2-3 years old that you can plan and try doing with them. Some of them are really interesting and are loved by toddlers and preschoolers.

Fun activities for two years old

Now let us discuss some toddler activities.  These activities for two years old will not only keep them engaged and busy but also will help in their overall growth and development.

Finger/Hand or foot Painting

This is a wonderful toddler activity to make your kids familiar with colours and art. Just take a paper and water colours dip your finger, hand or foot and leave an impression on paper and make whatever you want to make.

It is bound to get messy so be prepared for clean up but you will definitely enjoy the hand prints for years. You can even get them framed for a wall decoration.

The activity also helps in the improvement of fine motor skills and sensory skills.

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Pouring and Tranferring

I am yet to come across a toddler or preschooler who does not like pouring things and its the easiest activity to set up. All you need is two containers and some water. Let your kid transfer the water from one container to another. If you want you can also use funnel to transfer the water.

If you want to make it more fun you can try doing it with bowls of different color or add some pom poms in water.

This activity is good for developing hand eye coordination and understanding the concept of full and empty.

If your kid likes the pouring activity you can also play the transferring activity. For this you need a spoon, a bowl full of pulses and an empty bowl. Show him how to fill the spoon and transfer the pulses into another bowl and then let him do the rest.

You can do this activity with small blocks and tong. Keep the blocks in a basket and show your kid how to pick the block with tong and then keep it into another basket or leave it on floor. Then let your kid keep the rest of the blocks out of the basket with the help of tong.

A wonderful activity loved by kids of this age, helps in the improvement of fine motor skills and hand eye co-ordination.

Match It

As your toddler is learning the shapes, alphabets, numbers and familiar about various other things around him, you can play this game with your kid. This game can be played by kid of any age depending on the complexity of items that we are matching.

You can paste or simply draw various objects or alphabets or numbers on both sides of page in a irregular manner and ask your kid to find the same object on the right side of page. Ask him to first recognize the thing and then find the similar one.

If you don’t want to draw you can get ‘Match it worksheets’ for your kid. You do not necessarily have to do this activity using paper, you can do it using blocks, shapes, utensils, patterns, socks, flowers, stones, leaves or anything else that you want to us.

Kids love to play this game.

This game helps in the improvement of problem solving and thinking capabilities of kids and also required for developing visual discrimination skills.

Colours Recognition or Sorting

By now your kid may have started recognizing some of the basic colours.

Usually kids start recognizing the bright and basic colours first like – Red, Blue, Green and Yellow.You can teach your kid colours while playing with balls or blocks. Keep showing him the colourful objects and repeat the colour name each time you show him some object.

Like, while playing bat and ball you can ask your kid to get that red or blue ball. Same as playing with blocks you can ask your kid to keep the pink or green block first. Same as if your kid is having apple you can say “We are eating red apple”.

With regular practice your kid will start recognizing the colours.

You can do activities with your toddler that requires him to identify and sort a colour. Again, you can do it using paper or worksheets or you can do it with things easily available Balls, cars, flowers, blocks, toys, socks, utensils, paper or foam cut outs.

This is another activity that will help your kid in developing visual discrimination skills.

Vegetable Painting

Isn’t interesting we can make a painting with the help of vegetables we eat!!

Onion and lady finger are best vegetables you can make a painting with. Just cut the vegetables, dip them in a colour and leave an impression on paper.

Another activity that may turn a little messy, but messy is fun. You will love the master pieces that your toddler creates with vegetable painting.

Spray Painting

Spray painting with the help of old toothbrush is a fun loving activity. This activity helps in the improvement of fine motor skills and is a good way to keep your kids engage in art work.

Just take an old tooth brush and dip it in colour and with the help of index finger your kid can do the spray painting. With the help of spray painting you can make a birthday card or invitation card with your kids.

You can also try painting with cotton balls or poms poms or leaf etching with your kid.

Stamping

You can also try out stamping with your kids.

This activity can be done using foam or wooden stamps available in market or you can make some stamps of your own using vegetable like Potato or foam.

Cut and Paste Crafts

As your kid is getting familiar with shapes to make him more comfortable with shapes you can just cut the various shapes and ask your kid to recognize the colour and shape and then take his help in pasting them. With various shapes like circle, heart, triangle, stars you can make different animals or objects.

Or you can just paste this cut outs on drawings or worksheets.

It’s indeed a fun activity loved by all kids as they like applying glue stick and sticking cut outs. Don’t be surprised if they start removing the cut outs after pasting them .

Sensory Play

Sensory play is an activity that stimulates the young child’s senses like touch, taste, smell, see and hearing.

Kids should be given opportunity to touch and feel and observe the real things. This gives them a chance to explore a lot. With sensory activities Toddlers and preschoolers get the chance to investigate and play. You can create a sensory bin for your child using materials available at home and let him explore.

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Sing Rhymes

I started singing rhymes for my kid when he was just 3 months old. It may sound funny but yes, instead of lullaby I preferred to sing rhymes for him. Through rhymes they get aware of many new words and they also like the rhythm of rhymes.

To make it more interesting you can use some props or finger puppets and can act while singing rhymes for your kid.

Trust me, try this your kid will love to hear rhymes in your voice. Here are a list of some of the favourite rhymes for kids.

Story Time

Books are the best friends and best companion.

Books play very important role in everyone’s life. If you have not yet started, you should start reading to your baby. He or she listens to you and tries to understand the world through your voice. It is the best way to spend quality time with your kid and through stories he can connect himself with real life situations and can learn life lessons too.

To make this time more interesting you can use some props or finger puppets or act.

Reasons why you should read for your baby.

If you are not sure what books to buy we will suggest you to read How to Choose books for babies and toddlers ? Also you can read books reviews from other moms.

Sticker pasting

If your toddler likes to take out objects or scratch things using index finger. You can get stickers from markets and just let him remove and add them.

Either you buy the stickers from the market or you can make your own cut outs and then paste on a sheet of paper and create master pieces with your kid.

This is one activity I have seen most of the kids enjoying.

Beading

You can also try beading activities with your toddler or preschooler. With smaller kids we can try beading with bigger beads or pasta or even Toilet rolls. As they grow older you can do the same activity with finer beads.

Puzzles

You can also do puzzles with your toddler at this age. You could get puzzles from market based on a theme – alphabets, numbers or animals. Or you could create your own puzzles using printouts (two piece or three piece puzzles) and Popsicle sticks or printouts stuck on card boards.

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Did you find this article on mom recommended activities for 2 year olds useful ? Do you want to add anything to this list of toddler activities. Do let us know using comments below. We would love to hear from you.