Infants
Interact with your baby on the floor, encourage him or her to roll to grasp a toy or reach for a play gym to strengthen gross and fine motor development. Hanging mobiles attract your baby's attention. Holding and moving a toy teaches your child to maintain focus and attention. Shaking a rattle teaches the baby the cause and effect between the motion of the rattle and the sound it makes. Bath time is a time for you and your child to play with his or her toys and to bond.
Toddlers
Provide the right toys for your toddler. Children love to imitate their parents. Give them play phones, toy kitchen items, tools and costumes. Playing with a ball, riding a tricycle and skipping or hopping improves gross motor skills. Putting together interlocking plastic sets, learning a musical instrument and having a tea party support fine motor skill development. Playing organized games develops social skills. Reading together, identifying numbers and colors and learning to count contribute to language development.
Children
Play board games or card games with your preschooler. "Feed the Kitty" is a dice game that lasts about 15 minutes and helps teach your child to count. "Hiss" is a board game that teaches your child to identify shapes --- snakes. Older children enjoy games such as "I Doubt It," "Old Maid" and "Concentration," which promote interaction between family members and also the development of their social skills. The board game "Monopoly" helps your child learn strategy and "LIFE" teaches your child that good deeds earn rewards.
Adolescents
Share activities, such as scrapbooking, with your preteen and teenager. Play "Scrabble" so that both you and your child can improve your vocabulary. Write a letter to the President. Do a science project together. Work on crossword puzzles or bake a cake. Sharing time and activities create family memories; make learning new tasks enjoyable, and teach your child about team work. Trim a Christmas tree or repair the back porch. Teach your child to be a responsible adult.