My Toddler Is Bored With All Our Toys!
“All the toys – we have all the toys. How are you possibly bored?” you think to yourself as you look at your destructive toddler. You probably have great toys too! The educational ones, wooden ones, brightly colored ones – but they are not keeping your child’s attention.
Here are 5 simple ways (that cost you virtually nothing!) to get your kids PLAYING with their toys and increase their attention span from one momma to another!
1. Limit Access
The best thing we did to help our kids “play” was to limit the toys they have access to. Sounds funny but more toys are NOT better. Too many options are overwhelming for anyone but especially kids. Think about how you feel when you look at Pinterest. So many great ideas – but you get paralyzed by the sheer number of options to actually execute anything. Same with your kids. In our home, we have a dedicated area that has 4-6 toys, a few books, and a free play kitchen area but everything else is put up in closets/bins (they are not allowed to access without asking – see below). I rotate the toys in their free play area every couple of weeks.
2. Organize Toys for Easy Access (for you to access not your kids!)
In our home, if the kids want to play with something other than the free play toys they must ask. This is our bread and butter. It isn’t mean, it isn’t to be controlling – it is to help them learn to make decisions, articulate what they want, and learn how to take care of their things. All the legos, the train sets, the puzzles, the cars, the fishing game, etc. are all “off-limits” until they ask. You don’t have to organize these in a fancy way – gallon size bags, boxes they came in, a large tub you can slide under a bed – all work. I love the idea of 17 closets with all matching bins but my reality is 1 very small closet and the kid’s room closet….
3. Require Clean-Up Before Getting Anything Else Out
Kids DO NOT naturally know how to clean up. So, if you have a toddler and think “they never clean up” good news – they are totally normal 😊 This is something we have to teach. By repetition. All-day. Everyday. Teaching kids to clean up is not for the faint at heart – it is hard work but totally worth it. It doesn’t have to be a fight. It takes 2 people to fight, don’t be one of them! Just repeat the same phrase “I would be happy to get out _____ once you have cleaned up _____” over and over and over. Stay calm. Stay patient.
4. Hold the Line and Be Patient
As just mentioned, when you start limiting access to toys, having them ask to get out toys, requiring clean up – you will get push back. Expect it. Embrace it. You are doing it right and they will learn, I promise! It is worth it.
It will make your home easier to maintain, your kids more responsible, and teach them to enjoy the toys they have. It may take them 30 minutes to put up 15 fish to the fishing game they no longer want to play with. They may cry and complain and say “I can’t!” But they CAN do it. They don’t want to. They just want you to get out the next toy for them to dump out and not play with! They will learn HUGE lessons just by you sitting down and allowing them to learn to clean up what they asked for.
Your home is not a kid toy dumping ground – they will learn quickly to really think about what they want to play with rather than just picking the first thing they see and deciding it was not really what they wanted.
5. When Kids Get New Toys – Have Them Pick Some to Give Away
We do not have a huge house with a bunch of storage anyway – but even if we did this point is still very important. When my kids get new toys from grandparents, aunts, etc. we always pick some to give away to other kids (around Christmas I will write about how we manage the new toys!). The biggest key to success – your kids need to choose what they are parting with. Not you. This is the HARDEST one for me as a mom, surprisingly. I do not want to be overrun with toys but I find that I actually get attached to certain toys because they are “too nice” to get rid of in my mind! I have done a 1:1 type toy exchange that has worked well (got a new stuffed animal – pick an older one to part with). This has really helped us manage the number of toys and also teach kids (and us!) that parting with things is a good thing. We do a toy “purge” every summer and before Christmas – more on this later!
Feeling overwhelmed or don’t know where to start? It’s okay - these things take some time and I just put a lot of information in front of you. Just pick one thing to work on first. Which of the 5 things above can you start today?
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A few extra notes – I do not have a toy box. In my opinion, this is where good toys go to die. They get lost, broken, forgotten. I do not like this option and prefer a cubby or shelf system where they can see exactly what they have, have a place to put it away, and a way to keep it “nice.”
Yes, I play with my kids and love it 😊 but not all the time. They need to learn to play by themselves, use their imagination, and self-regulate.
Yes, I help them clean up at times just not all the time. Normally when I do, they say something like “oh mommy, you are bringing me joy!” or something else that is equally adorable. At 2.5 they are already starting to understand although cleaning up their mess is their job – when mommy helps it is a gift, not an expectation! So much beauty in that.
Toys are a privilege, not a right. I truly believe that we have a big responsibility as parents and caretakers to teach our kiddos that excess (in anything) does not lead to happiness, although the world will tell us otherwise. We make our own happiness by our choices - let’s help them learn HOW to make choices when they are young!
