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Helping your child get ready to go out

Getting ready to go out is a brilliant opportunity to chat with your little ones and help them learn a life skill.

Pick an item of clothing and talk your child through the process of putting it on. Do they know what the item is for and why it's important to wear it?

Watch the video below to see how you can build conversations with your toddler around this small part of your everyday routine.

Why is getting ready independently great for development?

  • Asking open questions about what they're doing can help expand vocabulary.
  • Chatting through your everyday routine is a great opportunity to develop conversation skills.
  • Talking about body parts and different items of clothing helps them to link groups of words together.
  • Being patient with your child and giving them time to work it out on their own boosts self-confidence and resilience.
  • Mastering life skills like putting shoes on is great for fine motor development and hand-eye coordination.
A mum and her daughter sit at the bottom of the stairs. Mum is encouraging her child to put on her ugg boots by herself.
Let your child choose which shoe they want to put on first and explain the difference between left and right.

Top tips for talking your toddler through getting ready

For a toddler to dress independently, lots of smaller skills need to line up. Don't feel the pressure to have your toddler self-dressing at a specific age.

The most important thing is to follow your child's lead, talk through the process as you go and focus on one piece of clothing at a time. In the video above, we focus on shoes and introduce concepts of left and right.

There are loads of opportunities to introduce language into this part of your routine. The more words your toddler hears, the bigger their understanding of the process will be.

Take time to name the clothes that your child is wearing and talk about the body parts they go on. Let them choose which clothes or shoes they want to wear and describe them.

If your child says, "these shoes", you can expand on their words by saying, "you want the blue shoes". This is a great opportunity to introduce new vocabulary and help your child hear more words.

If your child is struggling, try not to jump in and do it for them straight away. Encourage and reassure them and give them time to try it for themselves.

Children learn in different ways, and you might be able to help them pick up this new skill using one of these methods:

  • Physically help your child: Put your hands over theirs and help them to get dressed.
  • Show your child: Put your clothes on at the same time as your child and show them what to do.
  • Tell your child: Talk your child through the steps one at a time.

All children develop skills at different rates, but at 2 years, your child probably won't be able to dress themselves fully. To see how you can expand this activity when your child is a year older, check out our getting ready for the day activity for 3-4 years.

A mum and her daughter sit at the bottom of the stairs. Mum is encouraging her child to put on her ugg boots by herself.
Let your child choose which shoe they want to put on first and explain the difference between left and right.

Talking through your everyday routines

There are loads of opportunities in your everyday life to introduce your child to new words and chat them through their routine. Check out some of these links below for inspiration:

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