Toddler Songs
Choosing, teaching, and performing songs with Toddlers (18 months- 3 years).
Toddler Songs and toddler action songs are generally easy-to-learn, simple to sing, and engage toddlers in fun sing, move, and play-along activities. Toddlers are now enthusiastically exploring the world around them, developing language skills, increasing their vocabulary, and have more advanced gross and fine motor skills than babies. They love to play, interact with adults, and be challenged. Play-Along Songs activities provide for all of these and much more.
Ideal toddler songs are songs that are not only entertaining while engaging their minds and bodies, but are also playful songs that encourage toddlers to learn. Play-Along Songs books offer parents, teachers, early childhood professionals, and caregivers a wide variety of children’s songs that toddlers will enjoy and connect.
Play-Along Songs books feature toddler songs that allow toddlers to use their voices to sing, talk, make sounds, and even say silly words. They offer songs that enable toddlers to use their fingers, hands, arms, and even their whole body. There are even songs that encourage toddlers to use their creative imagination to modify songs, choose new activities, new words, new sounds, and new rhymes.
Five important insights on toddler songs:
- Learn the words, melody, and activity first for any song you want to use with toddlers.
- Don’t worry about your vocal skills. Toddlers are much more interested in what “they” get to do than in being critical of your voice. They want and look forward to your interaction and your attention. Play-Along Songs provides ONLINE video demonstrations for every song in each book to ensure your confidence and success when using children's activity songs. Here is an example of a song from Play-Along Songs Volume 1. It's a silly song about body parts. Watch this example of our online video instruction and demonstration of My Hands by My Side.
- Explain any information or actions for a children’s song you have chosen that your toddler may need to understand or may not be aware of. For example, you would explain the silly words in My Hands by My Side so they understand the relationship between hair and mopper and nose and nose-blower, and see how to do the movements at the beginning and end of each verse.
- Choose activity songs that are simple, fun and easy-to-do. Most animal and action children’s songs can be performed by toddlers. Signing songs with American Sign Language, ASL, is a physical activity that toddlers are capable of learning. Always start out with just a few signs and add more as they become more proficient. Watch this example of a wonderful toddler’s signing song from Play-Along Songs Volume 1 called Stop, Look, and Listen.
- Be creative and playful. Once you have learned any interactive children’s song, encourage your toddler to adapt songs. Have them choose new actions, animals, animal sounds, and even rhyming words.
