Play is how children learn to talk, move, wait and cope. Here are 20 simple games you can start today — no special kit, just the bits and pieces already around your house — grouped by the skill each one builds.
Every game below uses something you already own — a ball, a scarf, an empty box, a shoelace, a handful of dry pasta. They are ordinary, well-established play ideas of the kind therapists build sessions around, written so you can do them at the kitchen table. At the Inclusive Developmental & Therapy Centre in Model Town, Multan, we usually send parents home with two or three of these at a time — never the whole list.
These are everyday play ideas that support your child. They’re lovely for any family, but they don’t replace an assessment or therapy if something’s worrying you. Follow your child’s lead, keep it light, and stop while it’s still fun rather than pushing on.
Get face to face at your child’s eye level, join the game they have already chosen rather than starting your own, then say less and wait longer. Pause for a slow count of ten after you speak. Most children need that silence to take their turn — filling it with another question takes the turn away.
The game itself matters far less than how the adult plays it. The same five minutes of rolling a ball can be worth almost nothing or a great deal, and the difference is these five habits.
That last habit has a shape you can picture. Match the length of your sentence to your child’s, then put a single word on top:
Don’t test. “What’s this? What colour is it? Say ball!” turns play into an exam, and most children go quiet under examination. Say the word for them instead, and let them borrow it when they are ready.
Don’t correct. If your child says “tar” for “car”, don’t ask them to repeat it properly. Just say “car” back clearly and carry on playing. Children hear the difference long before their mouths can make it, and being corrected is what stops them trying.
A session with us is not a lesson. The first few minutes go on finding what your child actually wants — usually one thing out of a room full of options — and then we make that thing the reason to communicate: holding the bubbles until they look at us, handing over one puzzle piece at a time, “forgetting” the spoon. Parents are often in the room, because the time we get each week is worth far less than the ten minutes you get every single day at home. You leave with two or three games, not twenty.
These are the ones we lean on to coax out first words, fresh vocabulary and longer sentences — all through play, never pressure.
More home speech activitiesYou’ll need: A ball, car or anything that moves
Build the suspense — “ready, set…” — then stop. Hold there until your child says (or has a go at) “go!”, and only then roll or let it fly.
Builds: Anticipation, turn-taking and a first powerful word.
You’ll need: A scarf, cloth or your hands
Hide a toy under a cloth: “where’s teddy? … there he is!” Then let your child do the big reveal while you react with real delight.
Builds: Object permanence, joint attention and early words.
You’ll need: Two snacks or two toys
Hold both up and ask “apple or banana?” Give your child time — a look or a point still counts — then say the word back for them.
Builds: Expressive language and back-and-forth communication.
You’ll need: Any familiar routine
Pop a shoe on your hand, or “forget” to open the yoghurt. Your child will want to put it right — and that itch to protest is a lovely reason to communicate.
Builds: Motivation to talk, problem-solving and requesting.
Playful ways to grow the words your child understands, and their knack for following what you say.
Receptive vs expressive languageYou’ll need: Just you
Start with one step — “touch your nose” — then build to two: “touch your nose and jump”. Keep it silly and light.
Builds: Listening, following instructions and body awareness.
You’ll need: A few favourite toys
Hide the toys and drop clues — “find the one under the chair”. Stretch the clues out as your child gets the hang of it.
Builds: Understanding directions, positions and vocabulary.
You’ll need: Everyday household sounds
Shut your eyes and guess sounds together — a tap running, keys jingling, a spoon tapping a cup.
Builds: Listening attention and linking sounds to meaning.
Fun ways to strengthen both the big whole-body moves and the small hand movements children lean on every day.
Gross vs fine motor skillsYou’ll need: A box and bottle lids or coins
Cut a slot in a box and let your child post lids through it. Trim the slot smaller as they get sharper.
Builds: Fine motor control, grip and hand-eye coordination.
You’ll need: Open floor space
Crawl like a bear, hop like a frog, waddle like a penguin — the whole length of the room together.
Builds: Core strength, balance and gross motor planning.
You’ll need: Old paper and glue
Tear paper into little pieces and stick them down into a picture. Messy, and brilliant for small hands.
Builds: Finger strength, pincer grip and creativity.
You’ll need: Dry pasta and a shoelace
Thread pasta tubes onto a lace to make a necklace — a calm, focused little workout for the fingers.
Builds: Two-handed coordination and concentration.
Play that grows sharing, waiting, joining in and reading other people — the roots that friendships grow from.
Building social skills at homeYou’ll need: A ball, sitting on the floor
Sit facing each other and roll the ball to and fro, marking each go with “my turn… your turn”.
Builds: Turn-taking, joint attention and shared enjoyment.
You’ll need: A mirror or just your faces
Take turns pulling happy, sad, surprised and cross faces — and naming each feeling as you go.
Builds: Emotional understanding and reading expressions.
You’ll need: Any snakes-and-ladders style game
Play together with plenty of “your turn!”, waiting and cheering. Winning really isn’t the point here.
Builds: Waiting, following rules and coping with losing.
Short, motivating games that gently stretch how long your child can focus — a little more each time.
Activities to build attention & focusYou’ll need: A phone timer
Set a short, doable time and finish a small task together before it beeps. Celebrate, then stretch the time a touch.
Builds: Sustained attention and task completion.
You’ll need: Pairs of cards or socks
Turn the cards face down and take turns hunting out matching pairs from memory.
Builds: Focus, working memory and turn-taking.
You’ll need: Music
Dance while the music plays, freeze the moment it stops. A favourite for children who need to move to focus.
Builds: Listening, impulse control and self-regulation.
Soothing, sensory play for children who tip into overwhelm easily — to help their bodies feel calm and settled again.
Sensory processing difficultyYou’ll need: A bottle, water and glitter or beads
Give it a shake and watch the pieces drift slowly down together, letting your breath slow as they settle.
Builds: Self-regulation and a calming focus point.
You’ll need: Household chores
Let your child lug the laundry basket, push a box or “help” shift the cushions. That deep-pressure work is naturally calming.
Builds: Sensory regulation and body awareness.
You’ll need: A blanket
Roll your child up snug in a blanket (face always out) for cosy, calming deep pressure.
Builds: Calming proprioceptive input and comfort.
Choose the game by what your child can already do, not by their birthday. A child who is not yet using words needs the same anticipation games as a much younger child, and there is nothing wrong with that. As a rough guide: under 18 months, play with faces and sounds; from 18 months, single words inside short routines; from three years, turn-taking and rules.
If you are not sure where your child sits, the milestone checklists by age set out what most children are doing at each stage, and our free child development check walks you through it in a couple of minutes.
Play in the language you speak most naturally — Urdu, Saraiki, Punjabi or English. Growing up with two languages does not cause a speech delay. When you count your child’s words, count both languages together: if your child says paani and water, that is two words, not one.
Most families in Multan and across South Punjab play in a mix, and a mix is completely fine. What matters is that the adult sounds relaxed. A parent pushing through slightly awkward English usually says less, waits less and enjoys it less than the same parent playing in Urdu — and the child gets less out of it either way.
A few of the games on this page, in the words parents actually use:
If the worry you would put as mera bacha bolta nahi — my child doesn’t talk — is what brought you here, play will help. Just don’t let it take the place of getting your child looked at.
Play at home supports a child who is moving forward slowly. It does not replace an assessment. Book a check if your child is not using single words by around 18 months, is not putting two words together by around two and a half, has lost words or skills they used to have, or does not turn when you call their name.
Other things worth getting looked at rather than waiting on: no pointing or showing you things by about 18 months, speech that people outside the family cannot understand by three, distress at everyday sounds, textures or food that is shrinking the family’s daily life, or a child who is not playing alongside other children at all by school age.
None of those is a diagnosis, and none of them means something is seriously wrong. They are simply the points at which watching and waiting stops being the better option.
A hearing test, almost every time. A child who is not hearing clearly — often because of repeated ear infections and glue ear — can look exactly like a child with a language delay, and no amount of play will fix that. We would far rather you had your child’s hearing checked first than start a block of therapy that was never going to be the answer.
We would also point you to a paediatrician or your family doctor rather than to us if your child has lost skills they clearly had before, has had seizures or unexplained episodes of blankness, is losing weight, or is very floppy or very stiff in how they move. Those need a medical look first, and therapy fits around it afterwards.
If a diagnosis has already landed and you are not sure what happens next, our first guide for newly diagnosed families takes it from the beginning. If you are still at the stage of wondering whether what you are seeing even counts as a worry, read through the situations parents describe most often — a good many parents find their own child in that list.
The ones that come up most often when we hand a family a game to take home.
Ten to fifteen minutes of proper, phone-down play, once or twice a day, is plenty for most families. Short and regular beats long and occasional, because it is the repetition that helps. You do not need a separate playtime either — bath, dressing, cooking and the walk to the shop are all good slots, and they already happen every day.
Start with something a screen cannot do: movement, tickles, chase, bubbles, a torch in a dark room. For a few days, play beside your child without asking anything of them, so you are not only the person who takes the phone away. Give a warning before the screen goes off rather than stopping it mid-video, and keep your first sessions to five minutes.
No. Repetition is how young children learn, and a game your child already loves is the best teaching material in the house. Keep the game and change one small thing each time instead — hide the ball somewhere new, add one new word, take one extra turn. If the same game is the only thing your child will accept at all, mention that when you speak to us.
For a child who is developing typically, everyday play like this is genuinely enough. For a child with a delay, home play makes therapy work better but does not replace an assessment. No website can tell you which of the two your child is. If a worry has been sitting with you for more than a few weeks, have it checked rather than watching for another six months.
No. Older children need the same skills — waiting, listening, taking turns, planning — simply dressed up differently. Swap peekaboo for card games, freeze dance for a timed challenge, and treasure hunts for two-step and three-step instructions. Older children often move quickly, because they understand what they are working on and want it for themselves.
No. Everything on this page uses household bits and pieces: a ball, a scarf, an empty box, bottle lids, dry pasta, a shoelace, a blanket. Flashcards and apps mostly test what a child already knows, and being tested is exactly what makes many children go quiet. If you want to spend something, spend it on time on the floor.
Probably nothing. Two minutes may be where your child is today, and stopping while it is still fun is far better than pushing on to a meltdown. Make the game shorter, easier and more physical, and try to stop before your child does. If the frustration is turning into daily meltdowns, that is worth talking through with someone rather than solving alone.
After the right toys to help your child? Not sure which skills to work on? Try our 3-question guide, or read why play matters so much in development. More answers sit on our child therapy FAQ page — and on the days when none of this feels possible, keep our little reminders for the hard days close.
In therapy, we match the play to exactly what your child needs next. Message us and we’ll show you how, and send you ideas to try at home.
MPS Road, Block A Model Town, Multan (near Bloomfield Hall School, Street No. 2) · Mon–Sat, 10 AM – 7 PM
