All sorts of everyday tasks are now becoming possible for your child to manage by herself, so give her every opportunity to do things by herself. More complicated toys, especially construction or craft toys will help her practice and develop her skills.
Dressing By the age of two, your child will be able to cope with a number of dressing skills, though putting on her socks, shoes, and gloves will still be tricky, so let her choose her own clothes and practice getting dressed. Clothes with snaps and fairly large buttons, provided the holes are not too tight, will also help her to develop new finger skills. Continue to encourage her dressing ability and she will soon be able to put on and take off underpants, pants, and T- shirts. Once she can cope with all her buttons, including the smaller ones, she will be able to dress and undress herself completely.
Construction toys
Interlocking building blocks are always popular toys and are ideal for developing hand movements.
Improving dexterity As soon as your child can turn a doorknob with two hands and open a loose- fitting screw- top jar, give her toys that need to be fitted together. Washing and drying her hand will also be a favorite pastime so encourage her in this. Ensure that your two- year- old has plenty of colorful picture books on hand as she can now turn the pages of a book one at a time by herself. Your child can now build a tower of four blocks and with encouragement she’ll make more complicated structures. Building blocks that need pressing and fitting together will help develop the small movements of her hands. Intricate tasks, such as threading large beads on a piece of string or fitting together jigsaw puzzles made of large pieces, will boost her manipulation skills.
Arts and crafts
Children enjoy drawing at this age, so give your child plenty of drawing materials, including a range of different crayons, and start her off by showing the effect of all the different colors. She will also enjoy using paints, especially if you allow her to be messy and paint with her hands. You can also help her relate her drawings to the world around her by naming the colors of the crayons and then pointing out the same colors in everyday objects. She will soon be producing images of familiar objects, and by the age of two and half, her pictures will become more recognizable.
