Independent play is a life skill. It’s the kind of skill that helps children grow up with a full and free imagination, as well as the ability to cope with feelings of boredom and loneliness. After all, whilst it’s important to teach your kids how to share with others and approach social situations, they need to know how to handle the opposite as well!
When kids don’t really know how to do fun things alone, they’ll find it hard to have fun without others around, boredom will feel ten times worse, and they’re more likely to feel alone and isolated when other people just simply aren’t around. They’ll see their friends again at nursery or school tomorrow, but in the meantime, they’re grumpy, stubborn, and frustrated!
And as a parent, that’s a hard thing to see your child deal with. It also means you’re less likely to get any time to yourself at all. If your child finds it difficult to entertain themself for half an hour, they’ll always be on at you to entertain them instead.
As such, it’s best to encourage this sense of independence in fun from a young age, and not reinforce the idea that they have to rely on others for this instead. And if that’s something you’d like to teach your own younger children, here are some ideas for independent play a part of normal, everyday life.
Photo by Luna Lovegood
Find Them a Hobby They Can Do at Home
Clubs are great things to encourage your kids to join. It’s nice to get your kids involved in clubs; it means they get out of the house on a regular basis for a bit of structured entertainment, and they can make friends outside of school. This allows them to make friendships that aren’t solely dependent on sharing the same classrooms week by week.
At the same time as this, try to ensure they have a hobby they can do when at home too. Something that doesn’t require them going out of their way to leave the house or involve others to have fun. This needs to be a kind of hobby that lets them make their own fun in their own way, in the quiet and comfort of their own home.
Drawing and colouring fits the bill, as does any kind of arts and crafts they enjoy. Keep the hobby simple so they don’t need too much help with it, and so you can keep your supervision to a minimum.
Remember, if they can do both of these activity types at the same time, they’re going to experience the best of both worlds!
Let Them Make a Mess
Kids can find messy activities very appealing, seeing as they don’t usually get to make a big mess. If you want the kids to learn to play by themselves, why not use the chance to make a mess as the gateway into developing longer term independent play skills?
Set some large pieces of paper out on the floor – tape some sheets of A4 together if you have nothing bigger – and hand them some paint pots. Make sure the paint is child friendly and easy to clean, just in case any gets on their face or on your own carpet! Then, let them know they can make whatever kind of picture they like, and leave them to it.
If they spend 10 to 20 minutes doing this and only then come to get you, so they can show you what they’ve made, they’ve successfully managed to play independently! Praise them for this, and for letting their artistic skills out, and ask if this is something they’d like to do again. If so, you can try other messy floor time activities that let them get totally absorbed in what they’re doing.
Buy Pretend Play Toys
There are plenty of toys out there that encourage independent play through pretend play scenarios. It’s why baby dolls, Barbies, and LEGO are such popular, fun toys that kids have loved for decades.
There are many different elements involved in playing with these toys, from customising their look, adding items from other sets, and putting big ‘towns’ together using multiple toys. And they never need to ask someone else to play to make these toys fun either.
There’s a lot of fun to be had in the first place, but then we come to the fact that kids get to dig into their imaginations when using these toys as well!
You can also buy mini domestic sets for kids to use, if you have a toddler who loves doing what you’re doing. If your child always wants to be involved, whether you’re making a meal, using a device for work, or working out in the living room. If they seem to be naturally drawn to activities like these, give them non-functional toy versions of the items you use.
That might mean buying a light plastic dumbbell for your toddler to lift at the same time you do, or building a fake oven and stove set in the corner of the kitchen for them to pretend to make food on.
Let Them See You Engaging in Independent Activities
Kids learn best from their parents. They want to copy you all the time, which is why a lot of younger children in their 2s and 3s often find it difficult to pull away from you. They want to know what you’re up to, spend time with you doing that thing, and be part of the life you share together.
They don’t quite have the cognitive skills to realise they can still share a space with you without having to literally be with you, so it’s up to you to show them how to do that, and that it’s OK!
And the best way to show them this? Display it for them through your own actions. They’ll soon start to copy your behaviour.
Say you like to play a few games of freecell on your laptop or phone whilst you’re taking a break from work; do this in the same room as them. Or if you’d like to get through another chapter of the book you’re reading, read it whilst you’re both sitting on the sofa together.
If your child has questions about what you’re doing and why, answer them honestly. Because you like to read, or you like to play games. Because it’s a lot of fun to do something on your own, just like the fun you can have when you play with your friends, or with mummy or daddy!
Be Patient
Some kids pick up independent play very naturally, whereas some kids have a lot of trouble with understanding how to play on their own. They may be able to do so for a few minutes at a time, but they also seem to know when your attention has been taken off of them. When that happens, they leave what they were very happily doing and come over to see what you’re up to.
This can be a bit frustrating for you as a parent, especially if you have some important things to be doing. If you work from home, for example, or you’re trying to cook dinner and you don’t want your toddler trying to pick up potentially dangerous utensils or touching the stove.
Younger children will always find it difficult to play on their own for sustained periods of time. Anyone under the age of 5 might find it very tricky to play like this for more than 5 to 10 minutes per day. It’s not quite realistic to expect otherwise, so be sure you’re not letting yourself down there.
But stick at it; show them they can have fun doing their own thing, and encourage that sense of ‘parallel play’ that’s often required for keeping a toddler entertained whilst you get on with something else.
And make sure you’re enforcing this independent play as much as possible. Children pick up new skills all the time, but they need multiple opportunities to use these skills to truly get to grips with them.
Teaching Independent Play to Your Kids
So, is it possible to encourage independent play in toddlers and young children? Yes, but it may be slow going! Indeed, it’s going to be a difficult thing if your child loves spending time with you, but it’s important to show them how to use playtime to their own benefit.
When they can do so, they’ll never have trouble finding something fun to do, or using their imagination in moments when very little else is going on. They may also be less drawn to using screens to find entertainment as well.
Show them how to do this by partaking in it yourself, appealing to their curious and messy sides, and by incorporating both social and solo activities in and outside of the home. When kids have more than one thing to do, they’ll start to see the fun in every kind of situation!
Leave a Reply