30 Physical Activities For Toddlers (Month Challenge!)

Toddlers love challenges and anything they can win at, right? And as moms, WE love when we can keep our toddlers active (and tired!).

These 30 Day Physical Activities for Toddlers are perfect. Your toddler will love winning the printable badges that I have included in this post, and you will love that your toddler is active and gaining gross motor skills.

Make sure to check out my no-prep activities for tiring out toddlers too, because after completing the day’s challenge, your toddler might need even more activity. Keep it going for as long as possible, because more activity means falling asleep faster and staying asleep longer.

At least, we can all hope for that. Right?

How Does The Physical Activity Challenge work?

Here you will find 30 different activity challenges. Each day for one month, you will help your toddler to complete one of the challenges. Some of the challenges might even go over into the next day if your child needs or wants more practice!

So for example, on day 1 you are going to do the Bear Crawl Challenge.

For the Bear Crawl Challenge, your child will walk like a bear, staying on her hands and feet, with her bottom in the air, just like a bear. Your child will walk around like this for as long as possible.

You have two options.

1. You can set a goal for your child to meet. Maybe you want your child to do this challenge for 60 seconds, for example.
2. You can also have your child complete the challenge once to get a baseline number. Let’s say that your toddler was able to do the bear crawl for 40 seconds. Her challenge would be to beat her personal best score. (This option can be done over and over if your toddler is really into the activity, or if she is really competitive.)

You also can download the badges that I have created to go with each day’s challenge. Simply cut them out and give them to your child once she completes a challenge. You can place them on a chart, use tape to attach them to your child’s shirt or whatever you want. Get creative!

Download your completion badges here!

If your toddler is still energetic and way too far from being tired at bedtime after the day’s challenge, check out my ideas for how to tire out a toddler before bed. 

Materials That You Will Need Over The 30 Day Challenge

You might want to get all necessary materials together now and put them in a bin. Then you don’t have to do any prep work each day!

• obstacle course objects (cones, tunnel, pillows, etc)
• painter’s tape
• 10 stuffed animals
• bubbles
• ball
• bin, cardboard box or laundry basket
• 2 pillows
• pairs of socks
• pieces of paper
• balloon
• bubble wrap

Okay, ready to start? Have fun (and consider doing the challenge along with your toddler).

30 Day Physical Activity Challenge For Toddlers

Day 1- Bear Crawl Challenge

Your child will walk like a bear, staying on her hands and feet, with her bottom in the air, just like a bear.

Day 2- Obstacle Course Challenge

Use whatever you have around the house (including furniture!) to create a fun obstacle course. Set up cones or a painter’s tape balance beam. You can also use pillows as lily pads, a tunnel, a couch to climb on and run across, chairs to crawl under, etc.

Day 3- Freeze Dance Challenge

Have your child play Freeze Dance 5 times in order to win her badge.  That’s 10 minutes of movement!

Day 4- Yoga Challenge

Have your child complete a YouTube yoga workout. They are super fun. This is the one we love.

Day 5- Balance Challenge

See how long your toddler can stay balanced on one foot. If she’s advanced, you can have her do tree pose.

Day 6- Walk The Line Challenge

Use painter’s tape to create a balance beam. See how many times your toddler can walk back and forth on the line without stepping off.

Day 7- Relay Race Challenge

Set up 10 stuffed animals (or any kind of soft toy) and have your child run from one end of the room to the other to grab them one by one. Then set up a container on the other side for your child to place the toys in. Your child will run back and forth until all stuffed animals are moved from one end to the other.

Day 8- Catch Bubbles Challenge

See how many bubbles your child can successfully “catch” in 5 minutes. It’s much more challenging than it looks!

Day 9- Play Ball Challenge

Kick or throw a ball into a cardboard box or laundry hamper.

Day 10- Hopping Challenge

Set up an object on the floor for your toddler to jump over. For very young toddlers, it could simply be a line that your child has to jump over. For older toddlers, it could be something bigger, like a pillow. The challenge could be to master that, and then make the object that your toddler needs to jump over a little bit bigger or taller (maybe a stack of two pillows!).

Day 11- One Foot Challenge

Challenge your toddler to hop on one foot as many times as possible.

Day 12- Kick The Hand

Start with your hand really low to the ground. Have your toddler kick it. Gradually raise your hand higher and higher until your toddler can no longer kick it. Then see if she can beat her own record!

Day 13- Pillow Fight

Have a pillow fight with your child. It ends when your child successfully knocks you out 5 times. You can time it to see how fast it happens, and then your toddler can try to beat her personal best time.

Day 14- Animal Grab Challenge

Pile small stuffed animals on a pillowcase, then help your toddler bounce them off of the case (just like you used to do in physical education class with a parachute). Time your toddler to see how fast she can collect all of the stuffed animals into a certain area.

Day 15- Inchworm Challenge

Have your toddler get inside a pillowcase and inch like an inchworm from one side of the room to the other as fast as possible.

(inch like an inchworm or slither like a snake inside a pillowcase)

Day 16- Plank Walk Challenge

Have your toddler get into the plank position (demonstrate for her!). While in that position, your toddler should “walk” from one point to the other as quickly as possible.

Day 17- Forward Roll Challenge

Have your child forward roll from one point to another.

Day 18- Indoor Snowball Fight

Using sock pairs rolled up together and using whatever you have for your toddler to hide behind (the couch or a chair), have a snowball fight! See how many times you hit your toddler versus how many time she hits you. For the challenge, see if she can improve her standing.

Day 19- Hot Lava Challenge

Use sheets of paper laid out on the floor and have your toddler hop from one paper to the other, without touching the lava. See how many times she can do it before the lava gets her!

Day 20- Balloon Catch Challenge

Throw a balloon to your toddler. See how many times she can catch it consecutively.

Day 21- Balloon Badminton Challenge

Have your toddler hit the balloon back to you using her hand as a racket. See how many times in a row she can before it falls.

Day 22- Jump Backward Challenge

See how fast your toddler can jump, run or walk backward from one point to another.

Day 23- Skipping Challenge

Race from one point to another while skipping.

Day 24- Long Jump Challenge

Set up a starting line using painter’s tape or a jump rope. Have your toddler jump as far as possible and place some kind of marker where she landed.

Day 25- Rolling Challenge

Have your child roll on the floor from one point to another as fast as possible.

Day 26- Shape Tag Challenge

Start by identifying shapes around your house with your toddler that are within her reach. For example, the fridge is a rectangle, the table is a circle, etc. When it’s time to play, yell out a shape and have your child run to it, tag it and run back and tag your hand. Once your toddler has tagged your hand, you will yell out the next shape.

Day 27- Jumping Jack Challenge

See how many jumping jacks your child can do in 1 or 2 minutes.

Day 28- Bubble Wrap Attack Challenge

See how long it takes your child to pop all of the bubble wrap bubbles (you know, the big kind).

Day 29- Clean Up Challenge

Put on your toddler’s favorite song, or use the one below, and see if your toddler can clean up the room before the music stops.

Day 30- Don’t Drop It Challenge

Place a small object between your toddler’s knees (a stuffed animal, small pillow, piece of paper) and have your toddler hop around. See how long she can go without dropping it.

I truly hope you complete this physical activity challenge with your toddler. And I hope you LOVE it! Let me know in the comments!

Related:

• Indoor Activities For 18 Month Olds
• Activities For 19 Month Olds