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“Wait your turn!!!!”
There is so much wrapped up in this demand. In order to actually wait and take a turn, a person must comprehend and engage attention, listening, cause-and-effect and self-restraint skills. Turn-taking strength is critical for communication, delayed-gratification, and consideration, but it takes quite a lot of effort (i.e. While you speak, I restrain and listen, and then form response.)
Some of my favorite memories with all three of my kids (and even my former patients) involve practicing turn taking. We would giggle the most and enjoy our time together. I had one little guy who was mostly non-verbal but through this play; we built the sweetest narrative with his precious voice. It’s been over 20 years but I can still hear him laugh and repeat my “You drop it!” “Now, You drop it!” “No, You drop it!” as we each pointed to each other & took a turn dropping a block in a bucket!
Before listing activities that build a strong turn-taking foundation, let’s look ahead to the Long Term Vision for turn-taking. We hope and pray our kids will grow into considerate friends, participate in exciting conversations, learn to take turns for chores, and understand cause-and-effect for healthy prediction skills (if I do this, that will likely happen). Processing these long-term functions helps motivate us to engage our kids in play that makes them stronger turn-takers. This play allows us to walk with them through fun and functional repetitive practice to be strong turn-takers.
Remember P.L.A. stands for “Purposed”, “Linked”, “Anticipated” time. The following activities have the Key Target of Turn-Taking, which is your single purpose. When you, the parent, engage in the play session, you are modeling & praising only turn-taking. You are linking the action to language by narrating: “my turn, your turn”. As the parent, you are anticipating the long term vision as well as the immediate behavior of your child waiting for someone else to take a turn. As you repeat these and build on each phase, the child anticipates playing with you while having no clue they are growing stronger. Praise the desired action more than correcting a misstep especially if they are only playing with you.
Babies: Take turns with anything a baby does. If they smile, you smile. If they make a noise, you make the noise. If they beat on a table or chair; you do the same thing. Then pause and wait and see if they will make that noise again. Narrate who’s turn it is with each transition. This helps the learning process by adding the language to the experience. Use their name and “Mom/ Dad” rather than the pronouns (i.e. “Skyler’s turn” “Mommy’s turn”, “Skylar’s turn”) With babies, be sure to try and use doubles of toys. For example, they can still hold their cup and spoon while you take your turn drumming a second spoon on a different upside plastic cup.
Toddlers: We can still help children who are not old enough for most board games and who have not developed the coordination to play catch lay strong foundations that will help turn-taking tremendously. With toddlers, introduce using the same toy instead of doubles of the object. Sit side by side with no space between you. For example, spend 10 minutes each day bouncing the same ball one turn at a time, and continuing the narration. You will need some room and be prepared to chase the toy a little bit. They will not be able to control the direction of the ball so we suggest using a soft stuffed or foam ball with limited bounce. Playing on carpet helps too. In playing this activity, we set them up for more than just great skills for playing a board game! We help them practice taking turns and groove the necessary self-restraint into both their social memory and motor memory. This self-restraint in this activity is practiced in short, more tolerable spurts because they must only wait while you bounce the ball. Continue to link the experience to language but extend from just “Mommy’s turn!” to “Mommy’s turn! Bounce ball!”
3+ years: Using the same narration alternation, “your turn/my turn”, play a simple game of rolling a ball back and forth adding more space between you (1 foot for each age of their life). This lengthens the time the child must restrain because they must maintain attention and hold while the ball travels to you, you take your turn, and the ball returns to them. Hitting a balloon back and forth is a great activity to increase turn-taking in this age group because the balloon naturally moves more slowly increasing the self-restraint requirement. This also gives their motor planning some extended time as well. Many board games can be introduced at this age, but be sure to keep your focus for praise on turn-taking and not all the other rules. Pretend you have lost focus and ask, “Who’s turn is it?” Also try to take two turns at once and see if they will gently correct you. Model saying “Excuse me, I lost my place,” so they will know what to do if they accidentally take two turns in a row. They may or may not get it right, but if you do this repeatedly, they will try and keep track to assist you. Children this age usually want to be helpful. This helps to groove in that language and illicit their own narration of “your turn, my turn.”
———Around 4 to 5 years, you can begin to introduce group play and play with two or three children at a time in a triangular or circular formation. Continue to narrate who’s turn it is.——-
6+ years: Roll, gently kick, bounce or toss a ball back and forth. Transition the narration from “your turn/my turn” and use word games to attach communication to the turn. You can call out a category and they have to say one item from that category or you can say an object and they must add a descriptor word. Add the complexity of turns by adding rounds where you call 5 words; then they call five words. As they age, you can begin to ask question and they respond with the answer. Then reverse; they ask, you answer.
*** An alternative to this is rolling a car back and forth (bonus with mini figures in it) Add fun phrases like “Woohoo! I love the windows down!”, “Ahhh! We are going to crash into that giant!” (when the car is headed for your child), or “Oh no! I forgot to buckle my seat belt!” (when the figure slides into the floorboard). Don’t rule girls out of cars. Polly Pockets love to ride in a medium sized Jeep!
9+ years: Play catch for a few minutes each day after school to ask specific questions. Who did they eat lunch with? What did they play on the playground? What was their favorite part of the day? What was the worst part of the day? If they could have a do-over of one part of their day, what would it be and why? Some of these will be exciting parts and some may be regrets. Give them a chance to do the asking. Cue them by asking, “Is there anything you want to know about my day?” They may not have any questions because they may not have developed that sense of consideration. But then again, given the opportunity, they may also surprise you!
12+ years: Just volley at ping pong and talk; reminisce about when you used to play catch or kick a ball back and forth. See how many volleys you can get in a row and together try to beat your best number. Ask about any new music they like, any lessons at school that have been interesting or have irritated them or made them uncomfortable, what they would like to do with friends on upcoming weekends, etc.
We hope these help with “how” and “why” to play to grow a child’s turn-taking ability!
Laugh together and PLA well!