Babysitting is fun and rewarding if one plays with the children. Children become easier to handle if you give them your attention and do things together.
When babysitting, playing is a wonderful way to interact with children, especially babies and toddlers. This interplay gives them the attention they need and will make the babysitter popular. As an extra bonus, playing with them will make them more compliant as well.
Playing Tips for Babies
The following are general ideas as to how to play with babies. This is best accomplished via simple games. If the baby likes the game, one will need to be prepared to repeat it over and over again. The following are some interesting games that one can play.
- The Hand Game involves putting a small toy in one hand, putting both hands behind one’s back and asking the baby to point to the hand that has the toy.
- Roll the ball involves rolling the ball to a child that is sitting opposite from you on the floor and having the child roll it back to you.
- Where's the babyis a game where you can’t find the baby. One pretends to look everywhere for the baby while calling her name. By turning around and suddenly pointing and saying the baby’s name, the child will want you to play this one, over and over again.
- Find the animal, involves placing stuffed animals throughout the house and walking with the baby to try to find the different animals hidden.
- Dancing with the baby, involves putting music on and pretending to dance with the baby, twirling them around occasionally.
- Singing to the baby, involves songs that children love. By singing it to them you will get their attention.
Remember babies like to grab things. Avoid dangling jewelry and necklaces.
Playing Tips for Toddlers
Toddlers tend to like silly games. As with the babies, keep the game short.
- Scarf dancing involves bringing out colorful scarves and waving them to the music, while dancing.
- Coloring with the toddler is a fun activity. Standard coloring books or one involving self- drawn pictures is a good babysitter/child interaction.
- Hide-and-seek is a fun game that everybody loves and knows
- The wrong game involves the babysitter saying something that is obviously incorrect to the toddler. Since toddlers love to be right, they will take glee in correcting your mistakes. Ask them to listen to you and ask them to see how smart they are by finding your mistakes.
- In the spaceship game, one pretends that a chair or sofa is a spaceship. By placing the toddler on the babysitters lap, she can lean left and right pretending that the shipping is zooming through space. When the “destination” is reached, one can “explore” the new planet before boarding the ship to return home.
There are many more games one can play. The above is just a short, suggestive list. The key is to keep the games short and simple, which will pander to the child’s likes and dislikes. By playing various games, babysitting will become more enjoyable to both the babysitter and the child.
References
The Babysitter’s Business Kit. The American Girl Library. Pleasant Company Publications.1999
