What does your 5-6yo like to play on their own?

[beckington]

Title pretty much says it all! I'm looking for ideas of what other 5-6 year olds like to do/play on their own, alone, without other kids or an adult involved - activities, toys they like to play with, etc.

Can you tell I'm trying to encourage my ds to play on his own?!

Thanks!

[Daffodil]

Drawing
Playing with Playmobil, plastic animals, etc.
Observing and catching insects
Making paper snowflakes, hearts, etc.
Playing around on kids' websites like Starfall
At 6, she got a pet mouse and enjoyed taking it out and carrying it around.
At 6 1/2, she suddenly got interested in dolls for the first time.

At that age she also spent a lot of time blowing bubbles, playing in the snow, making "stew" out of random stuff found outside, playing with milkweed fluff, etc. She usually did those things with her younger brother, but I think she would have happily done them alone if she hadn't had a brother.

[bandgeek]

Coloring/drawing
any type of pretend play-transformers, dollhouse, cars, ect
puzzles

[LuckyMommaToo]

DS is extroverted and much prefers to do things with others, but activities he will do on his own:
- puzzles
- lego sets (but not free building)
- mazes or dot-to-dots
- sometimes pretend play with action figures (star wars or superheroes)
- physical things like practicing different dives onto the couch
- playing Nintendo DS or Wii or online games

Hmmm...not much, huh?? Good luck,
-e

[sunnmama]

My dd really only played with stuffed animals at that age, but she played MUCH better alone if she had a book on tape playing in the background. I think it comforted her a bit to hear the stories, and the familiar voice (the Ramona series was her fav, and all the books are brilliantly read by Stockard Channing. Dd grew to LOVE her voice, lol).

Books, too, were big. Esp a big, huge bag of books from the library. Dd didn't self entertain much, but I always knew I'd get an hour or two to myself if we brought home a huge bag of books--and a book on tape!

[mpchez]

:D

Edited by mpchez - 11/13/10 at 8:49pm

[maryjane]

Ditto this

play doh

painting/coloring

blocks/legos/tinkertoys

playmobile/action figures/vehicles etc

He also likes to "write" stories... which involves stapling a bunch of pages together and then cutting out pictures from magazines and gluing them onto the pages. He is just learning to read/write, so he either sounds out words or comes to me at that point to help him write the narrative.

[nolansmummy]

Legos
Action figures
Coloring/drawing

[Marimami]

Crafts, musical instruments, playing with our cats. She really doesn't like most toys so they don't keep her occupied on her own at all.

Holli

[pianojazzgirl]

Drawing, painting, playing make believe with various stuffed animals and dolls, lego, looking at books (she's just starting to read and has recently been more interested than usual in her books). That said, mostly she likes playing with her little brother.

[emaye_to_2]

Yeah my 6.5 yo DS doesn't play well by himself either. The only thing I can come up with is Legos or possibly other building blocks stuff.

[meco]

Legos, legos, legos
Anything dress up or pretend
Select websites like orisinal
Art projects

[Mama2Bug]

building blocks
dress-up clothes and accessories
small people and animal figures
dollhouse
instruments (drums, paper horn, maracas etc.)
dolls and doll accessories
cutting paper/coloring/drawing
simple puzzles
toy workbench
small cars/trains/planes/trucks
playmobil anything
PBS Kids computer games
shoebox full of seashells, interesting rocks, acorns etc.
sandbox

[hottmama]

My 6 yr. old will entertain himself with:
-drawing
-sculpting (with sculpee, clay, or playdough)
-audiobooks
-video games

My 4 yr. old will entertain himself with:
-puzzles
-books
-train set
-toy animals

If you can get him interested in puzzles, you'll be set. My puzzle-lover will happily spend over an hour doing a puzzle quietly at the table.

[beckington]

Thanks for all the replies and ideas! My ds seems to default so quickly to the tv and computer these days when no one is playing with him, so I'm trying to build up a list of ideas I can pull out as alternatives. Playing with action figures or animals is something he plays in great depth with one of us (mom or dad) but very little on his own. His style of solo play is definitely more the 'diving onto the couch' variety, heh. He used to draw a lot, 'make soup' and entertain himself outside a lot, do puzzles, but he's just not into that anymore - I think if the tv and computer were no longer an option he might find them interesting again. He's just not that much into toys though and it's frustrating! Cutting out stuff from magazines to make books is a great idea - last year he was massively into making his own books and this entertained him for long periods, and maybe suggesting cutting and pasting pictures would get him back into it instead of all the drawing.

Anyhow, thanks!!

[zinemama]

What he likes best is listening to a book on tape from the library while doing Legos.

[mpchez]

[sunanthem]

I think finding more gross motor type stuff would work. My son at that age had very different play then my dd. We hung monkey rings in the door of his room, and he would spend tons of time flipping on them. Small trampolines might be great too.skateboards,bikes, scooters, marble runs, collecting, swords, climbing Outside I hung a rope ladder from a tree, and now we have a swing set in the back yard my 5 yr old dd likes to play on her own there too.  ... 

She also likes to play with our cat alot.

[beckington]

Wow, this is an old thread - OP here, and wow, things have really changed in my house since I posted this! It's funny because I've been saying to dh lately that I really miss ds because he plays on his own SO MUCH now and I feel like we don't do things together enough anymore!! I have no idea why the change, but it's happened gradually over the past year - little spurts of independent play, then back to full-on "play with me play with me", then back to more spurts of playing on his own. He's discovered that he loves Lego and Playmobile, so plays a lot with that. He's learnt to read, so spends a lot of time reading. He still loves writing books, and spends a lot of time doing that. He's also still really into making crafty things on his own. He can now easily go hours pretty much playing on his own! It's so WEIRD. I keep saying to my dh I don't think it's natural, heh. But I do feel like I need to be careful to make sure we have time doing stuff together, and really we do still do plenty - it's just compared to before it's so little! I'm 37 weeks pregnant so it's certainly good timing that he's all Mr Independent now! As long as I don't take advantage, you know?

Anyhow, to anyone else out there that is struggling with this, there is hope!