Re: Encouraging play and books- was:Re: Rude or am I expecting too much?


blue wrote:
"enigma" <enigma@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote
it just gets really frustrating to buy him toys because he
*doesn't play*. he has several hundred Matchbox/Hot Wheel cars
that mostly are piled in a bin. he has dozens of the 1:64
scale John Deere tractors & accessories... but he only gets
angry that they don't really work. he has Legos, & Magneatos &
Tinkertoys & wooden blocks. the only way he'll 'play' with any
of those is if a grownup sits down & builds him something...
and then he might spend less than 5 minutes watching the
process.
so, no, i don't think i'll be causing him hours of therapy
later. he doesn't *get* the concept of toys or play.
lee

My 2.5 year old is like this. She won't play with baby dolls in any way,
shape or form which is fine. She also has and does as you describe above.
She has MegaBlocks, Fisher Price Little People sets (farm and dollhouse and
amusement park), Playskool Weebles, matchbox cars, Pop-Onz, other blocks,
and a kitchen set with tons of cool realistic play foods. She basically
won't play with much of it alone and when she does it is very brief and she
usually just scatters it out then wanders off. She will play with it if an
adult sits down with her but like you said, she will watch for about 5
minutes before she wanders off then. She has a tricycle she won't
ride...etc. She'd rather do "gymnastics" on the floor, jump around, and
dance to the music on tv which is always on in the background. She is no
couch potato--she's extremely energetic.

One thing I wonder is how your toys are arranged -- whenever we've gone
to playgroups at homes with zillions of toys, DD2 is pretty psyched (we
don't have a whole lot of toys out at one time), then eventually
overwhelmed with the boxes, stacks, and bags of toys. It's all too
much, too present, too everywhere, and both DD's shut down. (Sort of
reminds me of Wal-Mart, versus a botique with 10 items available)

We have wondered if we wasted our money on "big" birthdays and Christmases,
all those toys. We aren't considering not getting her anything but we think
we are going to cut way back and she probably won't even notice. ??? Is this
normal for a 2-3 year old? Others I have seen her age come over and are all
over her toys playing, she even goes to their homes with news toys and
doesn't play much. She loves to play with the kid, it's the *objects* and
material things she doesn't care much about.

Does she engage in imaginative play with other things and/or other
people? DD1 could not care less about dolls, but give her a huge box,
some markers, and oodles of masking tape and she'd create, uh,
'something' at that age. Dolls never did it for her -- the stuffed
animals she had were arranged to be an audience for her 'shows' which
were sort of these monologues about the imaginary place and inhabitants
she'd created. DD2 is not of the same creative bent -- she's into the
dolls, but at 2 yo would 'work things through' with the little
people/random plastic figures, using the piano as a sound board for her
vingettes.

If she's happy -- and it sounds like she is, given that she likes to
just play with the kid (I'm guessing they play random little toddler
games, which is pretty neat given that at 2.5 there's still a lot of
parallel play going on), it sounds to me like all's well.

She is sort of the same way about books, she is not too interested or
attached. Now THIS disappoints me, though I don't show it. I was never in
daycare or preschool but I was reading before kindergarten (and writing
basic words), and LOVED to read in elementarty and junior high. How can I
get DD to sit still to be read to, and play??? Technically she will be 2 and
a half in early November. She is smart as a whip and loves people. Her
pediatrician says she has the vocabulary and sentence structure of the
average 4 year old. Her fine motor skills are a little above average as
well...her people skills seem to be better than mine, as she is not shy, and
doesn't seem to ne sensitive or prone to hurt feelings- lol.

My random suggestion -- mainly based on my hearing impairment -- is to
turn off the TV, and just have books around. Just 'there'. Not for
reading to her, but just 'there.' I have a hard time hearing with
background conversation (and even background music...ergh.), so our TV
is rarely on when the kids aren't having their weekly video (and are
awake). What would she do if she didn't have the 'Baby Einstein's to
watch? How would she entertain herself?

But because she is so smart, I want to get her into books, and I want the
experience of reading to her a lot-- instead of her sitting on my lap
babbling and trying to wriggle away and not paying the book a bit of
attention.

I think -- but may be pretty off-base here -- that what you want is
not what she want, and this necessitates some hard thinking about,
well, whether you're pushing something because it's your desire, not
hers. There are a lot of what you want phrases in your message, and a
lot about how what she does is not what you want -- yet at the same
time, you acknowledge that she's a pretty great kid.

So anyway I have subscribed her to Baby Bug and LadyBug magazines
(expensive!)
which have not arrived yet but she does love to thumb through
things and talk about what she sees. Oh yes........she also doesn't play
with Playdough "right"- she opens it up, tears it off into tiny chunks and
leaves it to dry instead of trying to build or mush it. She won't color
either, with crayons. She prefers to scribble a big jumble with markers. Any
tips on harnessing her in? lol...she is obviously very bright...I am not an
experienced parent at all, she is my only, so what I want to know- is this
her personality? Or is it her age and it could change when she's 4 or 5? Or
is it fairly common? What is this??

I don't think there is a 'right' way to play with Playdough....and
can't figure out what it is, in all honesty, that you want to
harness...she sounds great. Truly. If you can't dance around when
you're two years old, when can you? We subscribe to the same magazines
(and Spider, and Cricket -- well, okay, we've dropped BabyBug), and
they're just 'around' in the bathroom.

And seriously, it sounds like you have an abundance of stuff, and she's
not that interested in it (but is interested in moving around, and
dancing), yet it disturbs you that she's not, well, interested in the
things you feel she 'should' be interested in. I'd opt for boxing up
the things that don't interest her at present, and storing them for a
later point in time, and putting out just a few things (as well as just
random 'what will you make of it' stuff, like boxes, tape, scissors,
some random things she can rip up (magazines? scraps of cloth?). But
heck, now *I'm* pushing my approach on you....

A disclaimer is that I was raised in circumstances that really
reinforced the concept of 'Delayed Gratification' to a ridiculous
extreme, yet I wasn't aware of it at the time. As a result I'm kinda at
the other extreme of being resistant to buying 'things' and bringing
'stuff' into the house (excluding books and magazines -- but heck,
compare the cost of LadyBug to the cost of 'The Economist' or the HBR,
and you start to feel you've got a deal). Our house is far from
austere (with bulletin boards, and chalkboard paint in most rooms,
along with these random melted crayon blocks that are being stacked in
some sort of order not revealed to me) , yet we don't have a lot of
'stuff we bought milling about, so that may also be influencing my
response.

Caledonia

.

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